One of the biggest stories recently was the revelation that George Lucas unloaded his entire business to Disney for a cool $4 billion. Many wondered how this out-of-left-field deal came together.
It turns out that, among other things, Lucas was sick of hearing jokes about his neck pouch.
BusinessWeek has a lengthy, and engaging, look at how the Disney/Lucas deal came together and the whole thing is worth a read whether you love Star Wars, love the film industry, or are a tiresome nerd (I happen to be all three, so this was like crack). But there are also all sorts of little tidbits, like this:
The criticism got to Lucas. He found it difficult to be creative when people were calling him a jerk. “It was fine before the Internet,” he says. “But now with the Internet, it’s gotten very vicious and very personal. You just say, ‘Why do I need to do this?’ “
Of note, this comes immediately after a paragraph discussing Jar-Jar Binks and the prequels, which are so badly written the first one accidentally features a fairly conservative message.
Other points of interest in the article:
- Lucas sold to Disney based on the fact that they bought Pixar and Marvel and essentially left them alone.
- Kathleen Kennedy was handpicked by Lucas himself to run the company after he left.
- Much of what’s going on in Episode VII was in the works before Lucas made the sale.
- The entire reason J.J. Abrams relented was because Kennedy actively went after him.
The whole thing is worth a read, so check it out.