The Mandalorian's Bryce Dallas Howard: I was told to treat Baby Yoda "like a little baby crocodile"

The Hollywood Reporter

Howard, who directed Episode 4 of the Disney+ Star Wars series, is finally able to speak out about what she refers to as "Baby" after an "agonizing" year in which she and her two kids were charged with keeping the Baby Yoda secret. “The thing I was most nervous about was that my kids had been on set quite a bit," she tells The Hollywood Reporter. "So, they had seen Baby and interacted with Baby. When we were filming, my kids were 6 and 11; they’re now 7 and 12. When the kids went back to school, every single day I would say, ‘So, what are you not gonna talk about today?’ And they would say, ‘Baby!’” Howard says she was given a lot of flexibility in directing Baby Yoda while consulting with Mandalorian bosses Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni. "In the case of Baby, Jon was really, really wise in that even though Baby was cute, he was like, 'We can’t just treat Baby like this cute little stuffed animal; we need to treat him more like a little baby crocodile, sort of amphibian like and is cute but also could maybe kill you,'" she says. "It’s not just leaning into the fact that Baby is adorable. In my episode, because there are children in the episode, we’re allowed to see how others react to Baby, and we were able to lean into that a little bit."

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