John Boyega Explains That Movie Franchises Could Be An Actor's "Luxury Jail"
It's no secret that actor John Boyega has recently been very open about his time working in the sequel trilogy of Star Wars. Since the release of Star Wars: Episode IX - The Rise of Skywalker, Boyega has openly expressed his disappointment on how Lucasfilm treated his character Finn, and his thoughts on how non-white characters were treated in the sequel trilogy.
Recently, the actor attended a Q&A for his upcoming film Small Axe. He had this to say about big franchise films:
“Being in a big franchise, its kind of like luxury jail sometimes for an actor when you want to do something else. Because remember, in a franchise you’re working on one character for many years, which can starve your other muscles.”
Boyega talked about how sometimes he wanted to play the character in a certain way, yet the studio (Lucasfilm) had to agree to anything before he could play the character his way. The actor also discussed how much he preferred the character of Finn in Collin Trevorrow’s version of Episode IX, before JJ Abrams was brought into the project.
He then continued to talk about wanting to play a different character, someone who wasn’t franchise-run. Boyega also expressed his excitement to work with Steve McQueen on his new film Small Axe:
“And in wanting to be in something where I knew that I’d play a different type of role, a different type of man, and then knowing Steve through, we’re all a part of the same industry so I’d heard about Steve’s directing style, I was really, really curious and excited to have the opportunity anyway to be a part of it. And when it came through I was on the tele like ‘this is my moment.”
Boyega has full support from his fans who also felt that the character of Finn deserved more within the storyline. Some fans have even started a discussion on how good the sequel trilogy would have been if Finn was the main protagonist, and how awesome it would have been to have the sequel trilogy take us through his journey to become a Jedi. Some anger from some fans came from how badly the character's development was handled during pre-production.
Although Boyega is the most recent one on making these claims, this is not a new topic within the Star Wars community. Back in the '80s, Han Solo actor Harrison Ford wanted George Lucas to kill off Han Solo in Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi. Ford himself wanted Han Solo to sacrifice himself in Return of the Jedi, to save the rebellion, and to give his character a worthy death. He felt that his character had achieved everything within his character arc, and didn’t serve a purpose in the story anymore. This, of course, was rejected by Lucas, and we all saw the character of Han Solo later return in Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens.
As much as fans love both characters, they also understand the actors’ points of view. The sequel trilogy released its films back to back, giving the actors no time to work on other projects, or other characters. Actors have to mentally prepare for a role, so it is understandable that Boyega wanted to play characters other than Finn, especially when his character went from being a main part of the story, to a mere side character by the time of The Rise of Skywalker. The sequel trilogy brought many more fans to the Star Wars community, as well as disappointed many fans of previous films. Whether Boyega will appear in a future Star Wars project is very uncertain, due to his recent claims. Even if the character of Finn didn’t received the treatment he deserved, we can be sure of one thing: Boyega gave his best portraying the character, and made fans love him from the start.
Source(s): The Direct