That's Showbiz, BabyExposing all the weird, expensive, political, ego-driven stuff that happens behind the scenes before and after films and TV series hit the screens.
Filmmaking is all fun and games until life rears its ugly head. Plenty of filmmakers are inspired by real events, but that's not what we're talking about here. The following movies were all changed in some way after they were finished because of something that cut far too close to the bone, whether it was a national tragedy or something much more personal.
One of the through lines in many of the following films is a horrible national event that whips through the news, destroying any possibility of entertainment. Films that were changed due to the horrific events of September 11, 2001, are so numerous that they have their own list.Â
It's unfortunate that there have been so many real-world tragedies that have changed the filmmaking world forever, but it's a testament to the filmmakers behind these movies that they were able to salvage a piece of their films in the face of devastating events.
Has a film ever been more snakebitten than The Interview? This Franco/Rogen joint is about an inept journalist who books an interview with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un before the CIA recruits him to assassinate the politician. When North Korea caught wind, they threatened action against the United States if Sony released the film.
In response, portions of the film were reedited to show North Korea in a slightly more modern light, and sections of Kim Jong-un's death sequence were shortened. That made everyone happy, right? Wrong. On November 24, 2014, a group of hackers referring to themselves as the "Guardians of Peace" leaked Sony's internal emails, employee records, and a few different unreleased Sony Pictures films in response to the impending release of The Interview.
Furthermore, the Guardians of Peace threatened to hack any theater that screened The Interview but promised the online attacks would end should Sony stop the release of the film. In December 2014, the hacker group released a message stating that Sony could release the film because they'd "suffered enough."
Kevin Williamson's directorial debut was meant to be a taut thriller that combined the tension of a Hitchcock film with the acerbic dialogue of Scream and the attempted murder of a teacher. Originally titled Killing Mrs. Tingle, the film had to undergo a name change following the tragic events at Columbine High School on April 20, 1999.
Upon its release, Teaching Mrs. Tingle was a box-office bomb, likely affected by the title change as well as the negative press surrounding the movie following the controversy.
The Iron Giant is one of the most affecting and devastating animated feature films of all time. Its story of an amnesiac weapon who learns to be more than a thing of destruction is both inspiring and heartbreaking, but the story behind this film is more painful than many imagine.
While director Brad Bird was in the early stages of preproduction, his sister was shot and killed by her husband. The senseless act of violence inspired the film's virulent anti-gun message and turned the film into something much more potent than the average animated picture. Bird later said in The Giant's Dream: The Making of The Iron Giant:
My sister Susan, who I love very much and was very close to, died of gun violence. Pointlessly, she was killed by her husband. I was devastated. When you shoot somebody, you’re not just killing that person. You’re killing a part of all the people that love that person.
Sacha Baron Cohen isn't known for pulling punches in his acerbic character work, but things changed shortly before the 2009 premiere of his film Bruno. Originally, the film featured the over-the-top character interviewing LaToya Jackson and trying to get her brother Michael's phone number. At one point, he breaks into her Blackberry and reads a phone number out loud that allegedly belonged to the singer.
Michael Jackson passed shortly before Bruno's release, prompting Cohen to quickly cut the scene before the film's premiere. A representative for Universal Studios stated that the last-minute change was made "out of respect for Jackson's family."
This 1993 film about the real pressure college football players face may not seem like something that would undergo last-minute cuts, but when high school students reenacted an incredibly dangerous scene from the film, it had to be edited before going to home video.
The stunt in question involves the film's lead, Craig Sheffer, lying in the middle of a busy highway while reading from a Sports Illustrated article about how he keeps calm under pressure. He's joined by his teammates in the middle of the road. It's intense.
The scene inspired high school students in different parts of the country to imitate the film, which resulted in two deaths and one injury. The scene was cut from the film following its theatrical release.
Kevin Williamson really felt the brunt of controversy in the late '90s, first with Teaching Mrs. Tingle and again with Scream 3. The third film in this long-running franchise went through a series of page-one rewrites due to script leaks and studio notes, but the Columbine massacre, which took place on April 20, 1999, prompted the biggest rewrite of them all.
Up until about six weeks before production, the film featured Stu Macher returning to the franchise and revealed that he was orchestrating attacks in different high schools. After the events of Columbine, the entire script was rewritten from scratch.
