The movie world is still reverberating with the news, long expected and now confirmed, that “The Girl In The Spider’s Web” is moving forward without David Fincher or the cast he assembled for “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.” As one of our commenters recently asked, “Has there ever been an actress nominated for an Academy Award for a role and then the studio decides they don’t want her for the sequel?” However, for anyone familiar with with drama behind Fincher’s ‘Tattoo,’ they’ll know that producers Amy Pascal and Scott Rudin never wanted Rooney Mara for role, and it appears her growing fame and position as one of Hollywood’s finest actresses hasn’t changed that position. (And I can’t imagine Mara would be thrilled about reprising her role without Fincher either). But what does new Lisbeth Salander director Fede Alvarez think about all this?
The filmmaker was asked point blank about the casting of ‘Spider’s Web’ on Twitter, and had a thoughtful reply (though, let’s be honest, the decision to dump the ensemble was probably made by people above his pay grade):
It's said that 50% of the director's work is casting. If I'd just take Fincher's (amazing) casting, I wouldn't be doing half of my job. https://t.co/IgfkK0BimV
— Fede Alvarez (@fedalvar) March 14, 2017
He does have a point, however, and Alvarez is probably more interested in making the world and characters of Stieg Larsson his own, rather than using pieces of someone else’s project. And I’m certainly interested to see what he does with the material.
“The Girl In The Spider’s Web” opens on October 5, 2018.