Between “Skeleton Crew,” Spider-Man, and “Cop Car,” you both seem obsessed with kids getting into hijinks. Is this a reflection of your own histories as kids getting into hijinks, or is this a little bit of wish fulfillment because you were goody-goodies? What’s going on there?
Jon Watts: No, I think what it is, is it’s what I always wanted to happen as a kid. I grew up in the middle of nowhere and for fun, you just go walk in a field in a straight line and you would just hope that you would get abducted by aliens, or find a buried pirate treasure or something like that, and then that never happened. We never even found a cop car, as much as we hoped that we would. So yeah, all of these films, I think we’re just trying to make that dream come true.
I interview a lot of people, and people talk about the movies that made them want to make movies and want to write movies. “Star Wars” and “Jaws” are the two that people cite the most, but “Skeleton Crew” is likely going to be an introduction to this world for an entire generation of people. Have you processed yet that your project is going to foster that love of this world that is going to make other people want to make movies?
Christopher Ford: Wow.
Watts: I think when “Star Wars” really works, no matter how old you are, it makes you feel like you’re 10. So by telling the story through the eyes of four 10-year-olds, we’re hoping to capture that same feeling of what “Star Wars” felt like to us when we saw it the first time.
Ford: And to what you’re saying, I think it’s really weird being on this side of the “Star Wars” thing as a fan for so long. And as much as we love our characters and we crafted this whole story, and put so much work into it, I still don’t really feel like it’s ours. It’s for the fans and for everyone who appreciates “Star Wars,” and so to me, it feels totally natural that a new generation or other people will have their own opinions and take things from what we’ve done and do something else with it. I’m so much more interested in being part of that continuing use of “Star Wars” as opposed to us saying, “This is our story, the end.” I want to add into the communal thing.
Watts: It’s nice to add a little bit of a postscript to the giant myth.
Ford: So much about filmmaking is so collaborative, so it’s not “I think it’s this,” it’s like, everyone comes together and works on it together.