by Mark Newbold
Designed with a younger audience in mind, YOUNG JEDI ADVENTURES is an energetic, fun, light-hearted series that shows a very different side of STAR WARS. Just in time for its second round of episodes dropping on Disney+ soon, we caught up with voice actor JAMAAL AVERY JR and co-creator MICHAEL OLSON to talk about the show….
STARBURST: Jamaal, how did you get the role, and how did you feel when you knew you’d been cast as Jedi youngling Kai Brightstar?
Jamaal Avery Jr: I was really excited to get the role of Kai. They told me I had it, and I was like, ‘What, that’s awesome!’ And then when I found out it was Star Wars, I didn’t believe them [laughs]!
Michael, was the show being developed before the general public heard about The High Republic?
Michael Olson: At the time we cast Jamaal, I’m not sure even the first Phase One book [Light of the Jedi] had come out, so he probably wasn’t aware that initiative was coming out, but I do recall me, him, and his parents had a really nice conversation and being able to say ‘hey buddy, you get to be the lead in a Star Wars show, buckle up. Little kids are going to pretend to be you!’ Even last night, my son was in bed reading the Young Jedi Adventures book, holding a green lightsaber which he was using to light up the bedroom because he’s scared of the dark and calling himself Kai Brightstar. It was really sweet, and that’s because of Jamaal. He gave such an incredible performance and embodied this character so well that kids are falling in love with him.
Not everybody gets to have Yoda’s very own training lightsaber; what a cool moment for any character to have!
JAJr: That was really cool. When I read the script, I was like, ‘Did he just get Yoda’s lightsaber?’ I had to read it back a couple of times. When you see Master Yoda fighting, that lightsaber’s been through a lot!
Have you seen any of the Hasbro figures that have been released for Young Jedi Adventures, and if so, what do you think of them?
JAJr: I think the character design is really spot on. I was thinking of getting some. I was reading the book and thought, ‘We should get some of the figures,’ so now I’m begging my dad, ‘Can we get some?’
Michael, as the show develops and the concepts come together, how intertwined is Young Jedi Adventures into the wider story, and are there considerations for what you’re doing?
MO: So this show definitely takes place during The High Republic, and one of the things that was really important for us was to place it in its own little corner of the galaxy a little bit farther away from some of the tragic events that are happening in the High Republic. Thankfully these Jedi kids are, for the most part, unaware of the grander galaxy-wide things that are happening, but James Waugh [producer] has mentioned in interviews that we have a few tie-ins here and there with the High Republic, so we will see some High Republic characters and maybe some locations as well.
Jamaal, from Season One, what’s been the most interesting and exciting thing that’s happened so far?
JAJr: I can’t really choose just one, but it’s between the episode where Kai Brightstar and Master Zia Zanna go on a mission, and Kai learns more about Master Zia when she was younger. Fighting is not the only thing that Jedi do. I also really liked when the Jedi first meet the pirates, I think that interaction was really cool and fun. I was watching it back with one of my friends from school, and he thought they were based on our own movement and actions, and I said no, I can’t do a backflip.
MO: You need to work on that, man!
Michael, as the show develops, we get to meet new characters, and one of those has been the pilot Nash Durango and her droid RJ-83. Is the hope over time to grow from this core group of characters and to other locations away from Tenoo?
MO: The lead of the show is Kai Brightstar, and he will always be the anchor and centre of the show, and secondarily, we’ve got Nubs and Nash to round that out, but we will certainly get to know new characters and younglings as they’re introduced to the temple as well as dastardly bad guys who become part of the world. There are definitely more relationships to be built. Kai gets to be involved with some of our secondary characters, which will lead to some interesting payoffs down the line, but the show is really focused on these core four characters.
Hopefully, down the line, there will be more ancillary products being released, so are you happy for other avenues to tell stories set during the era of Young Jedi Adventures?
MO: Oh, yeah, I’m so thrilled. I grew up playing with Star Wars action figures, and they were always second-hand or hand-me-downs from cousins or whatever, so that was primarily how I engaged with Star Wars. We had one VHS copy of it, which I could only watch at certain times, so I’m thrilled with the idea that there are action figures and toys so that kids can make up their own stories and extend their experience with our show because that’s what I did when I was a kid. In terms of the books, I love that stuff. My son is reading the latest book, well, I’m reading it to him at night. I love that the show gets to exist within the Star Wars ecosystem, so to speak. Jamaal mentioned the Young Jedi video games on Disney Now, so that’s part of the fun, seeing the toys, the books, and the video games; I’m here for it all and excited that people want to take these characters in different avenues.
Jamaal, now you’re a lead actor in a Star Wars project; how has it been telling your friends now that it’s ‘out there’?
JAJr: Yeah, I had to explain to a couple of my friends that it’s before anything in Star Wars. They asked, ‘do you get to fight Darth Vader?’ [Laughs]
You can’t do a Star Wars animated project without Dee Bradley Baker being involved somehow…
MO: Oh man, I love Dee Bradley Baker. I’ve worked with him on a number of projects in the past, so when I was coming up with the character of Nubs, he was the first and only person I was thinking of to play him. When he came in that first day, he asked a bunch of really insightful questions. He’s an actor’s actor, an incredible voice actor who can do all sorts of crazy sounds, but a true actor who really dug into who Nubs is and what motivates him and then went to town. That voice came out of him, and we were all ‘yes!’ That was the first thing that he did, we didn’t even have to change it, and it was perfect. He’s such a gift to work with, such a kind person, an incredible actor and a Star Wars legend, so I’m thrilled he got to be a part of our show.
Nubs, what a character. People seem to be latching onto him; he’s cute and cool and gets into a lot of mischief in the show. We’ve got Grogu in The Mandalorian and BB-8 in the Sequel trilogy, amongst many other such characters, so are you guys ready to ride the Nubs rollercoaster?
MO: Nubs Nation all the way! He’s been a lot of fun. When it’s really clicking for the audience across all age ranges, there’s usually a character in Star Wars that every person in each age range identifies with, and little kids might really see themselves in Nubs because he is expressing those big emotions and wears his heart on his sleeve like so many young kids do. I have two kids under three years old, and they gravitate to him and laugh when he comes on screen, so getting to see that has been really fulfilling, and I’m excited to see where this character goes. We’ve got some wild things planned for him, and I think the fans are going to be delighted.
As the show moves on, is the intention to see the characters grow?
MO: The challenge with this kind of show is that we’re making it for a very specific audience. We definitely want to invite parents and older kids to watch, but truly my North Star for who this show is made hasn’t changed, so we will definitely see our characters grow and hopefully get to the point where we see them make their lightsabers and do their challenges on Ilum, but for the foreseeable future the goal is to keep these characters a bit more evergreen and evolve the show through the kind of stories that we’re telling and exploring the galaxy and meeting new villains.
We may be a few centuries before Ilum becomes Starkiller Base, but we do have the opportunity to see some of the trials and training a Jedi goes through. Jamaal, are there any of those trials that you’re looking forward to performing as an actor?
JAJr: I’m looking forward to all of them, but I’m most excited about performing the scene – if they do – where they go to Ilum and get their Kyber Crystals to build their lightsabers. I’d be really excited to do that, which seems like fun.
Jamaal Avery Jr
The music is wonderful. Michael, do you have any involvement with that?
MO: Oh yeah, 100%. We went through a very rigorous process of finding our composer, and we landed on Matthew Margeson, who is an immense talent and who has such respect for John Williams’ work. It’s been fun watching him step into those shoes, and he did a phenomenal job. We meet with him every other week as we’re spotting different episodes and referencing all kinds of movies, not just Star Wars movies. We usually land on some John Williams movie because it seems like he composed the score for nearly every movie of my childhood. It’s been a true, true pleasure for me. We recorded the opening theme with a live orchestra in Vienna. Unfortunately, I couldn’t be there, so it was over Zoom, but man, that was an experience. Several dozen musicians playing the theme song for our show, and it sounded incredible, and Matthew did an incredible job of getting great performances from everybody.
Jamaal, of all the merchandise that you could possibly have your character become, what would you like to see Kai turned into?
JAJr: This is really funny, but [laughs] I would love to see Kai on a bedsheet! I’d go to sleep with my character on.
MO: I’ll feel like we’ve arrived when we have Kai Brightstar on diapers!
Episodes 1-6 of STAR WARS: YOUNG JEDI ADVENTURES’ debut season are available to stream on Disney+, with a new set of six being released via the platform on August 2nd!
