The Skywalker by George Strayton – HollyShorts Best TV Pilot Finalist
George Strayton’s The Skywalker
This placement comes as writer-director moves The Star Cycle through post-production.
Hollywood, CA (August 11, 2026). Los Angeles- and Scotland-based writer/director George Strayton’s original 1-hour pilot for the limited series The Skywalker has been named a finalist for Best TV Pilot at the 22nd Annual HollyShorts Film Festival.
Set in 1970s Hollywood, The Skywalker tells the inside story of George Lucas and his wife and creative partner, Marcia. This limited series explores how the power of love can give a failed artist the courage to reveal his deepest self through a film dismissed by every studio as a childish fantasy, yet went on to become the highest-grossing original movie in Hollywood history and, more importantly, gave people across a polarized world a shared experience of hope.
The Skywalker was the winner of Filmmatic’s Season 10 TV Pilot Awards and the Alpine International Film Festival, and a finalist in the Filmmatic Sci-Fi/Fantasy Awards.
Strayton is currently in post-production on his own original science-fantasy short film, The Star Cycle. Which he wrote and directed in Scotland. The crew included producer Mark Lacey (TORNADO), DP/VFX supervisor Dante Harbridge Robinson (BLACK PANTHER: WAKANDA FOREVER), and BAFTA Award-winning editor Conor Meechan (CHLOE, Amazon/BBC). The feature screenplay from which the short is drawn has been nominated for Best Screenplay at the 2026 Paris International Indie Film & Screenplay Festival.
The 2026 HollyShorts Film Festival is headquartered at the TCL Chinese Theatres and venues throughout Ovation Hollywood. The Best TV Pilot winner will be announced at the HollyShorts Awards Gala on Aug. 23. Interviews, approved images and additional information about The Skywalker are available to accredited media on request.
About George Strayton Splitting his time between Los Angeles and Scotland, George Strayton is a veteran writer-director and producer. Selected credits include XENA: WARRIOR PRINCESS (Universal), HERCULES: THE LEGENDARY JOURNEYS (Universal), MECH-X4 (Disney), DUNGEONS & DRAGONS: DRAGONLANCE (Paramount) and OCTOBER FACTION (Netflix). In 2021, he was selected for the inaugural WGA East Showrunner Academy, receiving mentorship from Tina Fey, David Simon and Jesse Armstrong, among others. A full list of credits is available on IMDbPro.
