Back on December 17th, we started following a developing story from IESB that Spider-Man 4 was going on an “Indefinite Hold” due to villain and script problems and some issues between Raimi and the studio. Not long after this story hit the interwebs it was “debunked”. The studio insisted that production was simply being halted due to the holidays and that they would pick up again shortly after the new year.
Well, according to Nikki Fenke over at Deadline Hollywood, production is being halted due to script problems. Apparently, this is an e-mail that went out to the Visual Effects Crew back on the 11th of December that they obtained:
Hey there–
We were just notified that our schedule is pushing. We will NOT be starting as planned. I’m terribly sorry for this news, and I hope this email reaches you in time to find other options. We do not know how long we are pushing, and we will not know until mid-January. By mid-January, we will be told how long the push is, whether it be 2 weeks, 2 months, or something else. The studio has every intention of making the movie, but we no longer have a confirmed start date.
Again, I’m terribly sorry, but Sam Raimi has story issues [that] need to be resolved before we are ready to shoot.
Feel free to call me if you have any questions.
VFX Team
According to the rest of the story, Raimi has actually been pretty vocal about the current draft of the script to the studio, going as far as saying he “hates” it. The fact is, Sony is saying that if this “hold” lasts for a significant amount of time, Spider-Man 4 will not make its May 2011 date, but they insist it will still make a Summer 2011 release. What is known from Deadline’s sources is that Raimi is unhappy with the script, wants Malkovich as the Vulture, and is unsure about the casting of Felicia Hardy.
You can (and should) read the full article with insight over at Deadline Hollywood, but there is some good to come of this news:
But I do hear that it’s now unlikely Anne Hathaway will be cast. “I’m not so sure we’re going in that direction,” an insider told me recently. Sony had been hot for her until bigwigs realized she’d cost too much and they probably don’t need “such a big star” for the pic, I’m told.
I still hope we see Felicia in some form, but with Anne Hathaway being too expensive (and in my opinion not a good fit for the role) perhaps the studio will cast an unknown (or lesser-known) for the role – which would probably be more beneficial.
So there you have it, Spider-Man 4 is on hold due to script issues and it sounds like Sony was just saying it was for the Holiday season to cover up this conflict or they were hoping it would have been resolved before the new year.