A Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker Script Leaked on eBay, J. J. Abrams Reveals
Lucasfilm and Disney made a whole movie about how difficult it was for members of the Rebel Alliance to steal the top-secret plans to the Death Star, but turns out, if you wanted to get your hands on the highly secretive script for Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, you just needed to be a little quicker with your bid on eBay.
Episode IX director J. J. Abrams made an appearance on Good Morning America on Monday, just one day after Rise of Skywalker was officially completed. While speaking with host George Stephanopoulos about the various ways Disney and Lucasfilm prevented the plot’s secrets from leaking out ahead of the movie's December release (including using special paper that couldn’t be photocopied), Abrams explained how it was almost all for naught due to one absent-minded actor.
“One of our actors, I’m not going to say which one—I want to, but I won’t—left it under their bed, and it was found by someone who was cleaning their place,” Abrams said. “And it was given to somebody else who then went to sell it on eBay.”
From a character perspective, Poe Dameron seems the most reckless and most likely to accidentally leave his script where it could be found, but actor Oscar Isaac seems like he’d be pretty careful about Disney secrecy. Whoever the guilty party was (Rey? Lando? Chewie?), the script’s secrets didn’t become public, luckily for Disney and any Star Wars fans who wanted to avoid spoilers.
“Someone at the company said, ‘There’s a script that looks like it’s a legit script that’s for sale on eBay,’ ” Abrams continued. “So he bought it, and they got it back before it sold.”
Abrams did not reveal how much the opening bid for the script was or if it was possible to “Buy It Now,” but it’s probably safe to assume it carried a hefty bounty.
In his recounting of the story on GMA, Abrams implied that the company employee just bought the script before anyone else did, which may or may not be the full story. You can imagine that Disney would bring down the full force of its entertainment empire on whoever ruined the ending to the last movie of the Skywalker Saga. Destroying Alderaan would look like child’s play compared to Mickey’s fully operational legal fury.
We’ll have to wait to find out what happens in Star Wars: Episode IX — The Rise of Skywalker when it hits theaters on December 20. Although...maybe browse eBay’s listings every once in a while. You know, just in case.
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Originally Appeared on GQ
