Director Victoria Mahoney Know a little about going into a beloved franchise and getting out on the other side. Between her promised the 2011 feature film Debut “Yelling to the Sky” and a wide range of TV directors (“Queen Sugar”, “Grey’s Anatomy”, “Claws”, “You” and many more), Mahoney was hired as the second unit director At JJ Abrams’ ”Star Wars: Skywalker’s rise. ”
A “Star Wars” play? That sounds good for some Director, but when Mahoney was hired in 2018, it came with some extra weight: The position meant she would be the first woman directed on a “Star Wars” movie ever.
So yeah, mahoney knows a bit about go into a loved franchise. For her second function, Netflix “The Old Guard 2,” Mahoney again takes an established (and loved) series and makes it his own. After Gina Prince-Bythewood’s Smash hit “The Old Guard,” Mahoney’s movie picks up where the superhero history ended and follows the utilization of a talented group of immortal warriors, including Charlize Theron, Kiki Layne, Matthias Schoenaerts, Marwan Kenzari, Luca Marinelli and Veronica Ngô, Plus Newbies Henry and Uma Thurd
The big question: What is her secret to put her own stamp on everything from “Star Wars” to “The Old Guard”?
“Well, I think I had a few pieces on the apple on it,” the director said during a new interview with IndieWire. “Coming into” Star Wars “and made the second device on” The Rise of Skywalker “, I had this wonderful experience of being on a franchise that I knew and loved because I was little. It wasn’t just like,” Oh, whatever, I suppose I should do this. “It was something I loved and I wanted to help protect.
Mahoney is still talking about her experience of “Star Wars” with reverence. This was not just a job for her; Although it helped her lead her next year of professional elections, including boarding ”The old guard 2. “
“I kept it with great duty and responsibility, and when you go into any of that size you get an instant, immediate Education in what it means to honor what the audience wants and betrayed what they want, “the director said.”That is A crash course in how to navigate in something you want to do in a story that is so loved. Between you and me and everyone who reads this article, nothing will compare with that. Nothing will ever compare to that level of reach. ”
And while the “The Old Guard” fandom is not quite As big and dedicated as “Star Wars”, the movies – based on Greg Rucka’s comic book of the same name – has lots of devoted viewers and readers.
“On this, the number of people who love the first and love the characters, they are very serious,” Mahoney said. “How do you make sure you value and honor each character and give the audience their wishes? There is also something good to get people with you somewhere they may not know they wanted to go, and they come to that place and realize that they were hungry for it all the time. But it’s all done with respect and care. I don’t think you can bump or demand.
Mahony’s fanatic curved and her desire to adjust expectations on the road-berries from something very simple: she is also a fan. She’s a fan first.
“There are different jobs that I have done where I ask a question or there is something that we try to find out, and I present something in a certain way, and it is like,” Oh, no one will notice it, “but I will notice. I will notice“She said.” I actually love this character, or I love this circumstance, or this story or whatever it is, and it will bug hell out of me. It will make me crazy. And then I will know that you did not care about me, and now I feel, “Oh, all the love I have given you is nothing and it is small, so you do not value me, so why do I value you and I do not look anymore?”
And yes, Mahoney is also a dedicated fan of Prince-Bythewood’s first film, which met Netflix in July 2020, during some of the earliest weeks of pandemic, and proved to be conditioner for film fans’ itching for original action. Mahoney is the first person to tell you: she looked at it very.
“I saw it, many times!” she said. “Some people think,” Oh, you exaggerate, “but I really did. I thought the world ended, and if I were to die, I would die and watch movies and TV shows and just watch stories and read books and listen to music. I thought the movie had some kind of hope. It was a care and considering the characters had for each other, and it length From their care and viewing, blew me away … I thought it was a beautiful feeling of hope in how they maintain these relationships. “
There was also something else that tickled Mahoney: taking the related, earthly worries (how do you take care of the people you love?) And sticking them in a wild frame (and, oh, you are also an immortal creature that has lived for thousands of years?).
“Part of why I thought it was exciting was (the question of) how to play with something that could be in the superhero man, which was held above us and far away from us, and how to bring it to a realistic view,” she said. “Where I and everyone else who watched the movie could wonder what I would do or wouldn’t do if I was immortal. I thought the first movie successfully did it and kept me curious in a way I kept watching it.”
When Mahoney signed to direct “The Old Guard 2” in 2021, she said she made a point to talk to Prince-Bythewood, who remained a producer on the project (the filmmaker was at the time that the sequel was green-lice, Just ready to make her “The Woman King”).
“I have her to thank a lot about this,” she said. “We talked, and much of what I wanted to know was how to maintain and preserve these incredible nuggets of truth and meaning that she puts forward in the first movie. You can think: ‘Oh, we can change it. Oh, you can do it. Oh, it doesn’t matter.’ But go into a second part and franchise that I like, (I had) the honor and collaboration with Spitballing with the first director about why They did what they did and that this thing that may seem like nothing to anyone was so Important and valuable and how I can help protect it or grow it. I valued her guidance and input and clarity and insight. “
Mahoney’s deeply rooted fandom is clear at every moment she talks about the movie. Even a question that wondered if she felt a special sense of favoriteism against Layne’s character, Nile (who really comes to her in the sequel), greeted with an unexpected response.
“I have no favorites and I’m not polite or political, because they all mean so much, “she said.” They act as a whole. They are not individual units. When it comes to the story, everyone earns another need, and if you pull out a card, the card house comes down. There is not one of those who earn a minor need. Any aspect of creative value, story value, character value that one of the nine (stars) presents at any given moment is the The most important thing in history. Who we shoot that day, that minute, regardless of shot, regardless of aspect of the story we hunt, is the most important thing, right? Then we go to the next and then that is The most important thing. Wherever that camera is between action and cut is the most important thing in the world. ”
Given how long Mahoney has been working on the film – after coming on board at the end of 2021, the Mahoney shot the movie at the end of 2022, broke through some serious delays from Netflix, shot additional material in 2024 and finally sees it released this week – She totally understand the fucking joy. She feels it even more acute.
“Well, for me it is different to be in it in real time from everyone who looks at it and waits and wonders,” Mahoney said. “I have it with movies, I have it with TV shows that I love, I am,” where is the next one? What is next season? “So I’m right at the fans by aches and hunger after what we love … no other answer.”
Mahoney’s movie leaves things wide open for a third feature, even if you have not yet been announced. During the production, Mahoney said: “There were discussions only logistically, and rightly, about what-if” as the other film could set up.
When it comes to a third movie? “Whatever discussions they have, I don’t know,” she said. “And I will be spectators with everyone else, because I will be gone and do something else. Whatever happens on the third, I will return to (that as) a viewer and a fan, and I wait with a crowded breath for what comes afterwards, and where they go, and how it plays out. I will cheer on everyone.”
With “The Old Guard 2” under her belt and “Star Wars” behind her, I asked how Mahoney reflects on the truly groundbreaking nature of her “Rise of Skywalker” work, to be the first woman, even less the first black woman, to direct on a “Star Wars” movie. Despite her characteristic optimistic and thought -provoking personality, even Mahoney got some moros in thinking back.
“It’s interesting, because many of the factors you just described are as poignant today on this movie as they were then,” she said. “I don’t know how many women have large budget films coming out this year. It is challenging. Unfortunately, the special part of the discussion is identical to the discussion that was in the” Star Wars “press tour.”
Mahoney still remains nasty of the dedication from the “Star Wars” fans, and the born and bred New Yorker tried to compare it with Knicks or Yankees fandom. “I’ll say” Yankees “now, I will lose people,” she said with a laugh. “They will be like,“ Oh, she’s a Yankee/Knicks fan. It sucks. “But when you went to the old Yankee stadium, you sit down, and it’s summer, it’s warm weather, and the lights go down and the sky turns magenta, something magically happened.
Even now, Mahoney said that she is still beaten when she sees young children at airports that sport her “Star Wars” PJs for a flight or adults playing lamps in a park with friends. “There are no words for what it does for your heart when you interact with people who have that kind of magic in them,” she said. “And then on (‘The Old Guard 2’), there is a sense of immortality and to live and love the one you are with that has any version of magic.
“And we’re just talking about imagination here,” she added. “But” Star Wars “has a way to access their imagination and put you in this amazing What-about. What is fun for me with “the old guard” and why I find it exciting is that there are aspects of “the old guard” that allows me, as a viewer and A narrator, to gain access to my imagination in a beautiful, welcome what-if. “
“The Old Guard 2” is now flowing on Netflix.
