By Lindsey Bahr, AP Film Writer
LOS ANGELES (AP) --There's been a disturbance in the force and the young Han Solo film is suddenly without a director. Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy said Tuesday that the Star Wars spinoff is parting ways with directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller due to different creative visions on the film.
Kennedy said a new director would be announced soon.
Lord and Miller had been filming the untitled project in London since January 2017 with stars Alden Ehrenreich as the young Han Solo and Donald Glover as Lando Calrissian. The supporting cast includes Woody Harrelson, Emilia Clarke and Thandie Newton.
"Unfortunately, our vision and process weren't aligned with our partners on this project. We normally aren't fans of the phrase 'creative differences' but for once this cliché is true," the directors said in a joint statement Tuesday. "We are really proud of the amazing and world-class work of our cast and crew."
Lord and Miller have developed a stellar reputation in Hollywood for their smart and profitable adaptations of creaky or impossible properties like "The Lego Movie" and "21 Jump Street" and its sequel. Anticipation was high for what they would do with the Han Solo film, which was written by Star Wars vet Lawrence Kasdan and his son Jon Kasdan.
Over the past six months the directors have been widely engaged on social media, drumming up interest in the project — the second Star Wars anthology film after "Rogue One." The anthology films are considered separate from the "main trilogy," which includes "The Force Awakens" and the upcoming "The Last Jedi."
Lucasfilm has had issues with directors before. In 2015 the company parted ways with director Josh Trank, who had been working on another Star Wars anthology film. They have yet to slate a replacement director.
The untitled Han Solo film is still slated for a May 2018 release.
Nintendo reports lower profits as demand drops for its aging Switch console
Nintendo, the Japanese video game maker behind the Super Mario franchise, said Tuesday that its profit fell 60% in the first half of the fiscal year, as demand waned for its Switch console, now in its eighth year since going on sale.
Kyoto-based Nintendo Co. reported a 108.7 billion yen ($715 million) profit for the April-September period, as sales slipped 34% from the previous year to 523 billion yen ($3.4 billion).
More than 74% of its sales revenue came from overseas, according to Nintendo, which didn't break down quarterly numbers.
Global Switch sales during the period dropped to 4.7 million machines from 6.8 million units the previous year.
But Nintendo said in a statement that Switch sales were still growing and vowed to stick to its goal of selling a Switch console to each and every individual, not just one Switch per every household.
Nintendo stuck to its earlier projection for a 300 billion yen ($2 billion) profit for the full fiscal year through March 2025, down nearly 29% from the previous fiscal year.
Annual sales were forecast to drop 23% to1.28 trillion yen ($8.4 billion).
It also lowered its Switch sales projection for the fiscal year to 12.5 million units from an earlier forecast to sell 13.5 million.
Nintendo and other game and toy makers rake in their biggest profits during the Christmas shopping season, as well as New Year's, a holiday celebrated with fanfare in Japan, when children receive cash gifts from grandparents and other relatives.
Nintendo has not yet announced details on a successor to the Switch.
Among its million-seller game software titles for the fiscal half were "Paper Mario RPG," which sold 1.95 million units since going on sale in May, and "Luigi Mansion 2... Read More