StarWars.com chats with Executive Producers James Waugh and Jacqui Lopez and Producer Kanako Shirasaki about Star Wars: Visions, how the show came together and looking at each episode including the rock opera Tatooine Rhapsody.
Shorts like “Tatooine Rhapsody” from Studio Colorido and Geno Studio’s “Lop & Ochō” are more of a departure, a gamble for Lucasfilm executives during the ideation stage that took place almost entirely in virtual sessions during the global pandemic. Although some pitches came in beforehand, Waugh notes that the series was greenlit the week that San Francisco, where Lucasfilm headquarters reside, went into the initial lockdown in March 2020.
The initial pitch for “Tatooine Rhapsody” was a quick sketch and a paragraph. Waugh was concerned. “A rock opera? Can we do that? Is that just too silly or too far?” he wondered.
“I’m so happy you had the courage,” Lopez tells him. “It was a bold move and you had conviction. I’m really grateful because it’s awesome.” The resulting tale of the band Star Waver on a quest for stardom ended up being a quintessential Star Wars rock opera meets space opera. “It’s about a dreamer. And this is a story that’s so relatable and so Star Wars,” Waugh says. “People in the real world dream about being a rockstar — it’s ubiquitous. But that dream is only really achieved through belief and friendship. And that’s the Star Wars part, too.” And fans on both sides of the world will recognize the voice of Boba Fett. While the English dub tapped Temuera Morrison to reprise the role, the original Japanese version utilizes Akio Kaneda, who has been performing the role of Fett in Japanese translations of other Star Wars films and animation, Shirasaki notes.
