Justin Simien is opening up about the grief he felt after Disney’s decision to scrap his Star Wars: Lando series.
The filmmaker recently told Collider that the project was shelved despite reaching a significant stage in the development process. “It was pretty developed,” Simien recalled. “Yeah, there was a Bible, there was concept art, there were scripts, but it just wasn’t meant to be.”
This took an emotional toll on the Haunted Mansion director: “For me, the answer is that you have to really face it. It is true grief. I’ve never had a child, I’ve never lost a child, but it’s what I imagine that pain might be like. You pour so much of your heart and soul into something, but ultimately, you don’t have control over whether it lives or dies, and it is a true grieving process.”
However, Simien shared that his coping system was ultimately what helped him move forward, and that the loss of the project only made him stronger.
“For me, it has to be done pretty straight on like, ‘I am in grief. I do not feel good.’ I have to let myself feel those feelings,” he added. “There’s so much that I experience that I get to keep forever and take into the next project. I can’t obviously take the storyline or the IP or the characters, but there’s so much more that I got, as a maker, and that’s mine. Sorry, it’s too late, you can’t take that part back.”
After Simien exited the project, it was later revealed that brothers Donald Glover and Stephen Glover were teaming up to pen the script as well as turn it into a movie. Donald, who is also set to star in the feature, previously played Lando Calrissian in 2018’s Solo: A Star Wars Story.
Prior to Simien’s departure and the Glover brother’s announcement, the Dear White People creator told The Hollywood Reporter in July 2023 that he was uncertain about the Star Wars project’s future.
“The last thing I was told was that they loved it but needed to put a pin in it until they could figure out everybody’s availability,” Simien said at the time. “I haven’t investigated further, but I’m not an idiot. I’m not alone in that experience. But I can’t help but wonder, ‘Am I too Black? Am I too queer? And people just don’t want to say that?’ Because it seems like I develop things with these companies and they just never happen for reasons unknown.”
But when one door closes, another one opens. It was revealed last month that Simien is developing a new live-action Star Trek series for Paramount+ with Tawny Newsome.
