Wednesday, 14 November 2012 Over the past couple of weeks we've been inundated with speculation over the identity of the director for Disney's Star Wars Episode VII , but according to Frank Marshall - husband of Lucasfilm's new president and Episode VII producer Kathleen Kennedy - the studio has now narrowed its search to "a couple of candidates", although Marshall wasn't giving much else away during a recent chat with MTV . "I do [know who will be behind Episode VII ], but I can't reveal it, or I won't be alive tomorrow." While big name directors such as Steven Spielberg ( Lincoln ), J.J. Abrams ( Star Trek Into Darkness ), Brad Bird ( Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol ) and Matthew Vaughn ( X-Men: First Class ) have been mentioned as contenders to oversee the next phase of the Star Wars saga, one filmmaker who seems to have been overlooked in many quarters is Joe Johnston. Having worked on the visual effects for Star Wars , The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi (as well as the Lucasfilm-produced Raiders of the Lost Ark , Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Howard the Duck ) early in his career, the Jumanji and Captain America: The First Avenger helmer certainly has the right credentials and his name must surely have cropped up during meetings at the studio. But would he be interested? "A lot would depend on what 'it' is," Johnston tells The Huffington Post .