Star Wars: The Force Awakens is finally opening this week, Dec 18, 2015.
In a 60 Minutes segment broadcast on Sunday, director Steven Spielberg talked about the enormous pressure on JJ Abrams to not just deliver a home-run, but rather a grand slam with the latest highly-anticipated installment of the beloved space adventure series.
“Oh J.J. is terrified,” Spielberg told Bill Whitaker. “There’s a lot of pressure on J.J. to start paying Disney back for, you know, the franchise they bought from from George Lucas.”
Disney bought the Star Wars franchise from Lucas in 2012 for $4 billion.
Still, the film is expected to be a smash hit. More than $50 million in advance ticket sales were recorded a month before the opening.
The tracking suggests the movie could make $2.7 billion, thus joining the club of Titanic and Avatar.