Rogue One director Gareth Edwards has admitted he thought it was a clerical error when he was first approached to helm the Star Wars film.

The British film-maker had just finished production on Godzilla starring Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Bryan Cranston when he got the call and said he was too exhausted to get excited.

Director Gareth Edwards arrives at the LA premiere of "Godzilla"
(Jordan Strauss/AP)

He said: “I suspect it was a clerical error and they meant to email someone else.

“I had just finished a big film and was exhausted, I just wanted to have a holiday but I went to Lucasfilm and was not good at auditioning.

Director Gareth Edwards arrives at LA Premiere of "Godzilla"
(John Shearer/AP)

“But I got home and was sent an idea and realised it was connecting to A New Hope, my favourite movie of all time.

“I thought ‘this is sacrilegious, you can’t do this’, but then I begged to. It is so surreal to make Star Wars.”

He added: “I couldn’t sit in the cinema knowing I had the chance to do it but someone else did.”

The film is set years before the first-ever Star Wars film, Episode IV, and Gareth joked: “I do Rogue One and George (Lucas) got to do the sequel Rogue Two.”

During a Q&A live-streamed on Twitter from George Lucas’s visual effects company Industrial Light & Magic in San Francisco, he said he was aware of the pressure to deliver a film in the franchise but added: “You’re on set and there are stormtroopers and an X-wing, and you feel four years old again.”

Star Felicity Jones, who plays heroine Jyn Erso, said the film gave her a welcome opportunity to escape period dramas.

Felicity Jones stars in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (Lucasfilm/YouTube)
Felicity Jones stars in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (Lucasfilm/YouTube)

She said: “It is so great to finally get out of the corset. I’m never going back. This is it now.

“It was full on, Diego (Luna, her co-star) and I would be doing boxing training outside our trailers like we were in Rocky. You throw yourself around these enormous sets.”

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story is released in UK cinemas on December 14.