The Emmy nominations are right around the corner next week. During the lead-up to the noms, I had the pleasure of speaking with Academy Award and Emmy-nominated screenwriter Beau Willimon, the creator/showrunner of “House Of Cards,” the screenwriter behind the Oscar-nominated “Ides Of March,” and one of the writers of the Tony Gilroy-created “Star Wars” series “Andor.”
Willimon and Gilroy were mutuals of the legendary late screenwriter William Goldman (“All The President’s Men,” “Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid”), but also worked together on “House Of Cards”—Gilroy worked as a consultant on the show, who would give notes on scripts.
But “Andor,” a prequel to “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story,” was one of Willimon’s most significant challenges and most gratifying projects to work on, given that he was able to write alongside Gilroy—who he considers one of his mentors—and his equally talented brother and screenwriter Dan Gilroy.
Willimon had been nominated for five Emmys for “House Of Cards,” but he added one more nod to his roster for writing the prison episode of season one, “No Way Out,” an enduring fan favorite.
I already covered much of this long, in-depth conversation with Willimon. Still, I wanted to highlight some other elements of the talk, including his upcoming “Star Wars” movie with director James Mangold. But also, I perhaps tried to pitch the writer on a new spin-off show (Kathleen Kennedy, I hope you’re listening).
Asked who was his favorite character to write for, Willimon said without a doubt, Forest Whitaker’s Saw Gerrera, a radical insurgent character who is too much for the Rebellion, outside of working tentatively with Luthen Rael. One of the reason’s he cited Saw—and its notable that Willimon wrote both of the season one and season two episodes that feature Gerrera the most—is that he defines one of the big themes of “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story” which is willing to sacrifice everything for a better tomorrow—that, and of course, the ability to write for the Academy Award-winning Forest Whitaker.
“I’ve got to go with Saw Gerrera because you get to write these grand arias, and he’s so wonderfully and deliciously insane,” Willimon laughed.
“When you get to write something for Forest Whitaker, you could pretty much give the guy a phone book and it’s going to be great,” he said. “Getting to write that
Rhydonium speech [ed. The highly combustible and dangerous starship fuel featured in the series that Gerrera purposefully inhales, where you really feel that this is in his DNA, and this recurring theme in the show that Tony had from the very beginning, that none of these people are going to make it.”
For Willimon, Gerrera represented the ultimate willing-to-risk-it-all fighter who typifies these overarching themes.
“Through ‘Rogue One,’ we know that anyone who’s still alive in the ‘Andor’ show, most of them are going to bite the dust in the movie that you watch right after episode 12 of season two,” he continued. “So, it’s this idea of—who are the people that are willing to do this, to make these sacrifices, that need this despite the fact that they’ll never see the fruits of their labor. No one, I think, illustrates that idea better than Saw Gerrera.”
It all dovetails so brilliantly together, “Andor” and ‘Rogue One,’ I told Willimon that they could extend some of the iconic quotes. “It’s like ‘Rebellions are built on hope and hope is built on sacrifice,’” I suggested.
“I love that,” he said. “It’s absolutely true, and put that on the poster.”
When asked to write his favorite speech or monologue for “Andor,” Willimon again cited a sequence featuring Whitaker.
“The rhydonium monologue felt like just one of those arias you get to write that is totally earned and totally character specific, and when you do get just to let the fireworks go,” he said.
During our conversation, I posited that Saw Gerrera and his band of rebels would make for an excellent ‘Andor’ spin-off sho,w to which Willimon totally agreed. “Totally, I’d love to work on that show.”
However, the writer also explained that the more-is-less approach of characters like K-S20 and Saw Gerrera in “Andor” was purposeful, making their impact all the more memorable.
“One of Tony’s many superpowers is exquisite narrative structure and pacing, and always this understanding of leaving the audience wanting more,” he explained, quoting Tony Gilroy and his mentor, the late, great, legendary screenwriter William Goldman. “We’re both students of William Goldman, and his saying was, ‘Get in late and get out early,’ and ‘Do the most of the least.’ Be as efficient with storytelling as possible because that makes people lean in.”
“There’s a version of this show where K-2SO could have been there from the beginning, and Andor’s sidekick all along,” Willimon continued, explaining the more is less approach, and what-if version of the show they contemplated “But Tony wants to earn everything and he wants to be deeply satisfied when K2 finally does show up, I mean, what an entrance, right? It’s a true operatic entrance for this beloved character.”
Asked about whether he might stick around in the “Star Wars” universe post- “Andor,” Willimon noted that he’s already working with “A Complete Unknown” filmmaker James Mangold on his “Dawn Of The Jedi” [w/t] film set thousands of years ago that’s supposed to be a how-the-Jedis-were-originally-formed origin story. That said, he felt too cautious to say much, even though details were out there.
“I can go as far as to say that James and I have been working on a script for a while, but that’s about as much as I can say,” he explained.” So, I’m still in the ‘Star Wars’ universe at the moment, and it’s fun to be here.”
With Gilroy leaving “Star Wars” to do his own thing, fandom is already looking towards people like Willimon to be the successor of the more adult tone of “Star Wars” and how “Andor” can live on. Personally, I was still hung up on the idea of an “Andor” spin-off show, spending more time living in that specific tonal pocket universe of “Star Wars.” So I asked if Willmon would be game to stick around some more if someone pitched him a show, say, I dunno, a Saw Gerrera and his band of lunatic rebels series. Would he be down for that?
“I would always be down for that,” he said immediately. “I’ve had a blast working on ‘Andor’ and I have my hands full with my current commitment with James [Mangold], so that’s my first priority. But would I answer that phone call? Abso-fucking-lutely I would,” he laughed.
“I have to be careful with what crumbs I unintentionally drop here,” Willimon laughed, citing how this conversation could easily get warped on a Reddit thread. “My diplomatic and honest answer is I had a blast working on ‘Andor,’ I really enjoy working with Lucasfilm, and I would be delighted to work with them more beyond what I’m doing with them now. That’s the Reddit-sanitized answer,” he chuckled.
All seasons of “Andor” are available now on Disney+ and Hulu. If you missed it, listen to my full conversation with Beau Willimon below.
Rodrigo Perez is the founder and editor-in-chief of The Playlist, which he launched in 2008. He has worked in entertainment journalism since 2000, including at MTV, and has written for SPIN, IndieWire, Pitchfork, Complex, Magnet, and various music, film, and entertainment publications over the past two decades.
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