News last week that Don Cheadle was replacing Terrence Howard in the Iron Man sequel probably didn’t suprise anyone more than Terrence Howard.
It was the surprise of a lifetime. There was no explanation. [The contract] just…up and vanished. I read something in the trades implicating that it was about money or something, but apparently the contracts that we write and sign aren’t worth the paper that they’re printed on, sometimes. Promises aren’t kept, and good faith negotiations aren’t always held up.
That’s Howard in an interview with NPR this past weekend. Having been on the short end of contracts several times, I know how these things look like they are going somewhere and then disappear in the middle of the night. If there were contracts that were signed, then there may be more to this story than what we are hearing on NPR and the H’wood trades. However, if no contracts were signed and things were being negotiated between Marvel and Howard’s agent, then anything goes.
3 Comments
Well, exactly. There has to be a written contract. If he went forward without anything in writing then he has no basis to move against Marvel. If there was a solid contract then he can bankrupt Marvel. It’s all currently very murky because if Howard has all the legal cards then there should not be any talking only legal action.
But one thing is clear, Marvel is confident of their legal position in this matter otherwise they would not have acted so decisively.
well, at least now we know that Marvel’s in the big leagues of movie production since they’ve started shafting Oscar nominated actors.
Honestly, it looks like Howard is trying to pull what Favreau did when Iron Man 2’s release date was announced and he hadn’t been signed. It looks, to me anyway, that Howard is trying to get some fan outrage to get him back in the movie.