As we reported earlier, Disney has acquired Lucasfilm for over 4 billion dollars. George Lucas is the sole owner of the company, so all of that will head to him, but he won’t be holding on to it for long. The Hollywood Reporter tells us that Lucas plans to donate a majority of that to education.
Lucas is no stranger to giving back to schools; back in 2006 Lucas gave $125 million to his old college, USC. The donation was made through Edutopia, part of the George Lucas Educational Foundation. No word yet on whether he’ll be donating through this foundation or a new one.
Lucas seems content to finally be letting go of Star Wars, happy to begin a new part of his life concerned more with philanthropy than filmmaking. He had this to say Wednesday:
“For 41 years, the majority of my time and money has been put into the company…as I start a new chapter in my life, it is gratifying that I have the opportunity to devote more time and resources to philanthropy.”
All of this is in line with a pledge that Lucas made two years ago to give much of his wealth to education. Lucas has said that the key to helping the filmmakers and storytellers of the future is through education, and Lucas will now be able to devote a majority of his time (and money) in cultivating the next generation.
