George Lucas Says He Had Three More ‘Star Wars’ Movies to Make but ‘Decided to Retire’ From Directing Instead

“Star Wars” creator George Lucas has revealed that he had plans to direct three more movies in a galaxy far, far away before he retired from directing upon completing “Episode III: Revenge of the Sith.”

Lucas sat down with Norah O’Donnell for an interview on “CBS Sunday Morning” to discuss his career and the opening of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in Los Angeles. The $1.5 billion museum has 1,200 pieces of art from Lucas’ private collection, including various paintings, photography, sculpture and original props, costumes and vehicles from the “Star Wars” films. The museum totals 300,000 square feet, with 35 galleries spread across a 13-acre campus.

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Plans for the museum were originally announced in 2013, and San Francisco and Chicago were considered before the “Star Wars” creator landed on Los Angeles. Lucas has been hands-on with the designs and even pointed out during the interview that the team needed to add more lights to read some of the art inscriptions better.

“What made this more challenging and why George was uber involved in every detail is that like his first depiction and explanation of ‘Star Wars,’ where he had to draw it to show people what it was, we kept trying to explain things that people didn’t quite get,” said Mellody Hobson, Lucas’s wife and business parter. “So they would sit there and look at us like, ‘What are you talking about?’ And so that happened so many times with the outside of the building, the inside of the building, the art on the walls that he increasingly took over the minutia because he had an idea of what he wanted it to be. Then the job was less about convincing and then asking people to execute. Now he won’t work at this level of detail forever because this nearly killed him.”

Lucas added, “Well, I’m 82, so there is a limit to — when I did this, I decided to retire from making movies, which was a big deal because I had three more ‘Star Wars’ to make. But I realized that I was running out of time, and I did want to make this museum, and I’d spent a lot of time developing digital technology for the movie business.”

The last films Lucas directed were the “Star Wars” prequel trilogy, comprised of “Phantom Menace,” “Attack of the Clones” and “Revenge of the Sith.” Like the original trilogy, he also wrote and executive produced them. Then, in 2012, Disney bought Lucasfilm for $4 billion, and Lucas wasn’t involved with the sequel trilogy of the 2010s. “Revenge of the Sith” was his film directorial effort, and he’s since written the stories for “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull” and the animated movie “Strange Music.”

Under Disney, the “Star Wars” universe spread to streaming with shows like “The Mandalorian,” “Andor,” “The Acolyte” and more. This summer saw the release of “The Mandalorian and Grogu,” the first theatrical “Star Wars” film since the sequel trilogy ended with 2019’s “The Rise of Skywalker.” Next summer, the franchise will expand with “Star Wars: Starfighter,” starring Ryan Gosling.

Watch Lucas’ full interview below.