Donald Glover and Alden Ehrenreich on Solo‘s Romance, Humor, and Style
Donald Glover is a busy man. His critically acclaimed smash Atlanta recently returned for its second season (the reviews have been uniformly stellar), and he’s of course playing Lando Calrissian in the upcoming Solo: A Star Wars Story. We’ve gotten to watch Glover talk a bit about playing the young Lando during his press rounds for his hit show, but this is the first time we’ve gotten to see both Glover and Han Solo himself, Alden Ehrenreich, sit together for an on-camera interview. Naturally the folks that got this opportunity are The Star Wars Show, which had the two stars sit and take some questions on the film’s style, tone and more.
What we’ve gathered from the most recent trailer is that Solo might be a proper heist film, which would of course be a first for a Star Wars film. Rogue One was also initially billed as a heist film (the whole story was centered around the theft of the Death Star plans, after all), but it played a bit more like a gritty war film. In Solo, we’re watching the young Han being lured (or, more accurately, leap into) the smuggler’s life. The trailers have focused on one particular set piece—a space train robbery—that has made Solo feel like it really will be a heist film in spirit. In this interview, Glover and Ehrenreich broaden that picture a bit, giving us more background on how Solo is also a more romantic, funnier film than any we’ve seen in this franchise’s past.
Ehrenreich explains that seeing this younger Han means we’re also seeing one who is more idealistic, and whose at a romantic stage in his life (the Han we meet in A New Hope is as much a romantic scoundrel as he is a regular one). Ehrenreich also stresses the film’s humor, which has been glimpsed, but not centered, in the trailers.
Glover is, predictably, funny and charming. Listening to him discuss his response to getting the news that he got the role of Lando is priceless. It sounds almost exactly like what we’d do if we found out we were playing an iconic character who made his appearance in arguably the franchise’s most iconic film. Glover explains why he thinks its important to have been a fan of the original material, and gets into Lando’s particular style.
We’re looking forward to hearing what some of the other stars have to say about the film, like Emilia Clarke, who plays the mysterious Qi-Ra, or Woody Harrelson on his smuggler mentor Tobias Beckett.
Solo: A Star Wars Story hits theaters on May 25. Check out the video below:
