Ewan McGregor on the Star Wars prequels: 'It's not Shakespeare'

Allow Ewan McGregor to be the first person to suggest that some of the dialogue in the Star Wars prequels may not have been Academy Award-worthy.

The actor, who's set to reprise his role of Obi-Wan Kenobi in an upcoming Star Wars show on Disney+, in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter reflected on his experience making the franchise's prequel trilogy, which faced a fairly icy reception from fans at the time. The actor admitted that working on the movies could be "tedious" thanks to director George Lucas' heavy use of CGI and bluescreens.

"After three or four months of that, it just gets really tedious — especially when the scenes are ... I don't want to be rude, but it's not Shakespeare," McGregor told the Reporter. "There's not something to dig into in the dialogue that can satisfy you when there's no environment there. It was quite hard to do."

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That might sound a bit harsh, though given that Lucas himself has said that "dialogue's not what's important" in a film, perhaps he wouldn't mind. McGregor also acknowledged to the Reporter it was "quite difficult" for him when the Star Wars prequels came out and "were universally not very much liked." But in terms of reception, could the Obi-Wan Kenobi series on Disney+ be a different story? Based on the talent involved, fans have a good feeling about this.