Disney and Lucasfilm’s Solo: A Star Wars Story is on track to open to $130 million to $150 million over the four-day holiday weekend.
Should it go well, the film will beat the $139.8 million haul by “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End” in 2007 to take the Memorial Day weekend record at the box office. That said it will still be the lowest domestic opening of the four films to date, behind the $155.1 million that “Rogue One” pulled in domestically over three days in 2016.
Solo is also opening around most of the globe this weekend with the worldwide opening weekend total estimated to come in at anywhere between $285-330 million or so.
The news comes as more details about the film’s rough ride to the big screen have emerged in a new piece in Variety where the various cast and crew discuss the Lord/Miller exit and Ron Howard’s appointment as director. Co-star Donald Glover says of the change: “It was weirdly beneficial, not to belittle the seriousness of the situation, and [Lord and Miller] were really good. But I think there was honestly a miscommunication in the artistic vision.”
One anonymous crew member says it was the original director’s desires for improvisation and it’s messing up the schedule that led to their exit: “I got a lot of overtime [under Lord and Miller], which ultimately was their downfall. The first assistant director brokers that with production. He ultimately went to the well one too many times, and Kathleen Kennedy blew up.”
One big change was visuals with the same crew member saying: “Howard was inseparable from [director of photography] Bradford Young. You can totally see the love affair because Howard seemed super invested in how the film looked. Lord and Miller didn’t seem too fussed with that aspect, really.”
Glover has also responded to recent comments by one of the film’s writers suggesting his character of Lando Calrissian is pansexual to which he responded:
“How can you not be pansexual in space? There are so many things to have sex with. I didn’t think that was that weird. Yeah, he’s coming on to everybody. I mean, yeah, whatever. It just didn’t seem that weird to me ‘cause I feel like if you’re in space it’s kind of like, the door is open! It’s like, no, only guys or girls. No, it’s anything. This thing is literally a blob. Are you a man or a woman? Like, who cares? Have good time out here.”
He also separately tells EW that he sees any potential Lando spin-off film as a “Frasier in space” following high-end characters with very specific points of view landing on planets the opposite of what they’re used to.
Solo: A Star Wars Story has so far racked up strong, but not great, reviews. It opens in cinemas everywhere on Friday.
