Longtime Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy is stepping down after 14 years of helming the Star Wars franchise. Her retirement goes into effect this week.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, current EVP and Chief Creative Officer Dave Filoni has been promoted to president and will now oversee the company’s creative direction. Business operations will be managed by Lynwen Brennan, previously the President & General Manager of Lucasfilm Business, who has been elevated to co-president.
Mentored by Lucas, Filoni was the logical choice for this role. After directing the animated film Star Wars: The Clone Wars and serving as showrunner of the companion series, he more recently executive-produced shows like The Mandalorian and Ahsoka.
Kennedy took over the development and production of Star Wars when she joined Lucasfilm in 2012, initially as the co-chair alongside franchise creator George Lucas. She became the sole head of the company just months later, after Disney acquired it for $4 billion and Lucas exited.
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This change has been long expected; it was reported in February 2025 that she was planning to step down at the end of the year. Kennedy isn’t entirely done with the company, however, as she will remain as producer on the next two Lucasfilm movies, The Mandalorian & Grogu and Star Wars: Starfighter.
In an “exit interview” with Deadline, Kennedy gave updates on a few long-brewing projects: The Dawn of the Jedi, a stand-alone movie written by James Mangold and Beau Willimon, is an incredible script but “it is definitely breaking the mold and it’s on hold.” Taika Waititi’s own long-brewing contribution to the Star Wars universe, she added, has “a script that I think is hilarious and great. It’s not just my decision, especially when I’ve got a foot out the door.”
She also confirmed that Donald Glover has turned in his script for a Lando film, but did not comment on its status. Her update on Simon Kinberg’s planned trilogy of films is that “He’s working right now. He wrote something that we read in August, and it was very good, but not there. We’ve pretty much upended the story, and then spent a great deal of time on the treatment, which he finished literally about four weeks ago. And it’s a very detailed treatment, like 70 pages. And so he is expected to give us something in March.”
Perhaps the most notable comment Kennedy made to Deadline was the way she referred to The Hunt for Ben Solo, a project whose existence was only revealed last fall after Adam Driver and Steven Soderbergh revealed it had died in development. Much like Ben Solo himself, her words make it sound like there’s a chance it could be revived: “Steve Soderbergh and Adam Driver turned in a script written by Scott Burns. It was just great. Anything’s a possibility if somebody’s willing to take a risk.”
However, she added, it’s a project “on the back burner,” much like the Mangold/Willimon script. “I think the ones by Taika and Donald are still somewhat alive,” she added. “That’s going to really be up to the new team to figure out.”