Kathleen Kennedy may have received a contract extension at The Walt Disney Company for her position as head of Lucasfilm. We’re working on finding out if that’s the case, but it’s looking more and more like that’s actually what has happened. Essentially, she’s possibly been given an undefined additional time on her contract, but without any fanfare whatsoever. You be the judge about why that might be.
So, with Indiana Jones 5 delayed a year after they managed to get Harrison Ford injured for three months, Kathleen Kennedy has plenty of time for interviews. And that’s exactly what she’s doing for the first time in ages.
In an interview mostly about The Color Purple, a film from the eighties, Kennedy went on to discuss criticism she’s received in general throughout her career. Excerpts from the interview provide insight as to how Kennedy approaches negative feedback, as well as what her ambitions continue to be:
“There’s always going to be people when you make something that’s somewhat controversial that are just flat out not going to like what you’re doing. And we didn’t make the movie for them.”
“Ultimately, if that’s their response is to just cut it off and not even try. And, you know, so often, especially, you see it today, criticism like that sometimes comes before people have even seen something.”
“They haven’t even experienced it. It’s just something they might have heard or they’re jumping on the bandwagon of something that they think they might believe. I don’t know what you do about that, ultimately.”
“You try to make movies like this that create the conversation and maybe change a mind or two. And that’s good. And that’s all you can hope for.” — Kathleen Kennedy
And there you have it boiled down. Kennedy wants to make movies that change minds. If you disagree with her about a film, or if you see a film coming out and disagree with its perceived direction… well… it’s not made for you.
That’s a great buffer for criticism. So, remember, if you ever dislike your meal at a restaurant, the server can just reply, “it wasn’t made for you.” Apparently that works even if you bought a ticket, er, meal.
I suppose she could say that if you no longer like Star Wars under Kathleen Kennedy, Star Wars wasn’t made for you.
At least not anymore.
The question becomes who exactly is she making movies for and why does she want to change minds about anything. That isn’t her job. She is not a politician. No one elected her to anything, ever. Her job is to make movies that make money, period. Star Wars was a license to print money instead Kennedy has lost billions of dollars and alienated millions of fans. Kennedy is by any standard a failure.
Bingo!
I don’t honestly understand why anybody believes her contract was extended for any reason. If it has been there’s nothing to it. From what I’ve heard she got herself in trouble with Chapek again. I think we need actual official word from Variety, Deadline Hollywood, or Hollywood Reporter. The problem I have with the person reporting this rumor and I respect him a great deal is he has been wrong as much as he’s been right. I started watching him last winter, a year ago and it was very hard to believe a lot of what he was saying when not a lot of it ever came to pass. So I think we need to take this with a gigantic grain of salt. When I report these rumors I expect people to dive deep and search out their own information and I want to put them into context before I report anything. What is the background here? What’s been going on? Did the reporter realize that Frank Marshall himself is in the United States right now ? He should be in Morocco helping film Indy five. And if he’s here she is to and if that’s the case why are they both here? These are the things that need to be added to this rumor. And someone needs to ask out loud does she really need to be president of Lucasfilm in order to finish Indiana Jones five? Was that part of the contract that recently ran out ? And is Disney required to allow her to finish the movie. After the rumors about what Indy 5 might be came out in the Daily Mail I find it very difficult to believe that Chapek wasn’t the one who put the rumors out there and that people on the production with far more power in Hollywood than she has didn’t say what the hell are you doing? this needs to stop? These are the things that need to be considered when you post a rumor like this. Context is everything and it encourages your subscribers and your readers to do a deep dive themselves. Again no disrespect but more information is needed. Thank you
Great comment! More work is being done to corroborate the rumor. Expect a much larger article this week if possible dealing specifically with the contract extension, not just the interview.