Taika Waititi Forgot Natalie Portman Was in Star Wars

Movies

In a recent interview with Rolling Stone, Taika Waititi said he “forgot” Natalie Portman was in the Star Wars prequels.

Waititi, who directed the latest MCU movie, Thor: Love and Thunder, sat down with Rolling Stone to discuss the project.

During the interview, Waititi said Natalie Portman asked what he was up to next, to which he responded, “I’m trying to work on a Star Wars thing. Have you ever wanted to be in a Star Wars movie?” The interviewer, Brian Hiatt, said, “You did not say that to her.” Taika then nodded and said, “I forgot about those ones.”

Natalie responded, “I’ve been in a Star Wars movie.” Taika then said, “Uh, should we do another take?”

Taika has since said he won’t be rushing his Star Wars project if it’s not ready, which is a good sign because this next quote about lore and continuity won’t make Star Wars fans too happy.

“I’m never gonna please the fans. You know, I don’t want to mess with something that’s so treasured. Also, you feel like you’ve got to do a lot of research… and I don’t have any time. [Laughs] I mean, there’s thousands of books that have been written, these volumes of books about Star Wars with all those characters. I just don’t have time to get through them. So I can’t say like, you know, confidently, I’d be able to do something that’s like very close to what everyone knows. I’m not promising that I’m not going to do anything like that. I’m just saying: It’d be easier for me to not do that.”

From this, it sounds like Waititi prefers to take the easy way out and create some science fiction story that would be Star Wars in name only – something current Disney and Lucasfilm are doing really well, ignoring previous continuity to create their own stories based in the Star Wars universe.  

Asking about a Star Wars project, Hiatt said, “If you go too far away from everything we’ve known, why is it even Star Wars? Why not just make some random science fiction movie?” Taika agreed, saying, “Yeah, if you take away all of the Star Wars stuff, it’s not Star Wars.”