Those who are in-demand can’t do it all, even if they’d been under contract only to do one such thing. In a story that comes with much surprise and little reason, Variety report tell us Guillermo del Toro‘s Crimson Peak will go before cameras minus Benedict Cumberbatch, who’s reportedly “elected” to drop out of the pending horror title — for some reason, one we’ve not been made privy to.
A shame, considering what a fine team the Pacific Rim helmer had been compiling: Cumberbatch, Jessica Chastain, Mia Wasikowska, Charlie Hunnam (maybe not so much him) and Jim Beaver (Deadwood) were to lead, in the director’s own words, “a ghost story and gothic romance, [that’s] trying to subvert the rules of the usual gothic romance.” Too subversive for one Englishman, who still has a busy couple of months ahead with the Julian Assange-centered The Fifth Estate, 12 Years a Slave, and August: Osage County all premiering this fall. Meanwhile, del Toro and Legendary Pictures seek a replacement as Crimson Peak prepares for a February start.
As for actors making titles their priority, Deadline have word that Olivia Munn (The Newsroom, Magic Mike) is circling Mortdecai, an action-adventure in which Johnny Depp is to be seen as, of all occupations, an art dealer. The circumstances of her proposed involvement go unnoted, though the project is, itself, no great mystery: David Koepp will, with the assistance of scribe Eric Aronson, adapt a Kyril Bonfiglioli-penned novel in which trader Charles Mortdecai is asked to traverse the planet in search of “a stolen painting rumored to contain the code to a lost bank account filled with Nazi gold.”
Ewan McGregor and Gwyneth Paltrow have been tapped for supporting roles in the title, which is backed by Lionsgate and expected to kick off production by this year’s end. Somehow, some way, we’ll know what Munn‘s up to by then.
Is the loss of Cumberbatch a disappointing turn of events on Crimson Peak? Could Munn help accentuate the cast of Mortdecai?