Brendan Fraser opened up about the Batgirl cancellation, and once again, he didn’t pull his punches. While promoting his new Darren Aronofsky movie, The Whale, Fraser expressed his frustration over seeing the film get shelved for a tax write-off after the production spent months in Glasgow crafting a Gothic film that didn’t heavily rely on CGI. Fraser was cast as the Batman villain, Firefly, and DC Comics fans were especially miffed when they learned his performance would never see the light of day.
“It’s tragic,” Fraser told Variety before putting Warner Bros. Discovery on notice that the cancellation will make creatives wary to work with the newly-merged conglomerate. He also praised Leslie Grace’s performance as Batgirl:
“It doesn’t engender trust among filmmakers and the studio. Leslie Grace was fantastic. She’s a dynamo, just a spot-on performer. Everything that we shot was real and exciting and just the antithesis of doing a straightforward digital all green screen thing. They ran firetrucks around downtown Glasgow at 3 in the morning and they had flamethrowers. It was a big-budget movie, but one that was just stripped down to the essentials.”
Fraser’s words make the second time he’s criticized Warner Bros. Discovery over the Batgirl fiasco. In mid-September, Fraser called out CFO Gunnar Wiedenfels by name after he essentially accused the media of blowing the cancellation out of proportion. Fraser then called the situation “disappointing,” but it taught him to only work with “trusted filmmakers” from now on.
(Via Variety)