Appearing on the Team Deakins podcast, Oscar-nominated cinematographer Bradford Young recently opened up about his experience shooting “Solo: A Star Wars Story” back in 2017 – both versions of it.
Young, who has worked on such films as “Arrival,” “Selma,” “A Most Violent Year” and the mini-series “When They See Us,” came onboard the film when Phil Lord and Chris Miller were directing – and remained on when they departed and Ron Howard took over the film.
Young explained he almost turned down the film offer initially as the movie wasn’t in line with his previous work and wasn’t sure how he would fit:
“Before I even spoke to the directors, I was like, ‘no way,’ and then I spoke to the directors [Lord & Miller] and they explained to me, ‘this is what we’re trying to do,’ and at the time they were really referencing [Robert Altman’s] ‘McCabe and Mrs. Miller,’ and then I was like, ‘Oh! Ok, that’s one of my favorites.’ I felt like that was in conversation with some of the stuff I’d been doing.”
Then of couse came the very public director switch near the end of production as the pair were fired three weeks out from the end of shooting and ultimately Ron Howard took over:
“It was [hard], and that was playing up with my fears, ‘they just hatchet people, and the next person comes in!’ But I always understood that Kathleen Kennedy and [the late Lucasfilm producer Allison Shearmur], they don’t play around. They’re about the art.
It was great to understand there were folks in the process that were about the art [and] wanted to make sure this film has this feeling. ‘We don’t wanna lose this, because this is what people count on from these films.’ That was really refreshing for me.
When they changed directors, I thought for a second, ‘maybe I should go?. But then I was like, ‘Nah, I need to stay,’ because we had done so much work to develop this look, my team and I. The film needed it.”
Young has nothing but praise for Ron Howard as well who he says was easy to work with and just as disconcerted about the difficult situation as Young was:
“When Ron [Howard] came in. The thing that is so lovely about Ron, is that, it wasn’t like he was, ‘I got it figured out!,’ he was very open too. He was also like, ‘Man, I’m also like, what’s going on??’ [laughs] So we were both equally like [taken aback]. I remember once we had three cameras on a sequence, and it was great to look at Ron, and he looks at me, and be like, ‘Man, three cameras, this is crazy, what are we doing??’ I had a great time.”
The film is, visually, far darker and uses more shadow than most “Star Wars” films. Asked if he ever got pushback, Young says: “I had full support, which made me want to stay even more.”