As The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power makes it debut after months of headlines touting it as the most expensive TV show ever produced, Amazon reportedly has another costly series waiting in the wings. However, this time it wasn’t by design. According to a new report, the Russo Brothers have been struggling to shepherd a new spy series, Citadel, which has gone way over budget due to expensive reshoots and creatives leaving the project.
Starring Richard Madden and Priyanka Chopra, Citadel was meant to bring a team of international spies together (Yup, like The Avengers.) for a debut miniseries that would “generate local spinoffs” centered on each character. Reportedly, there was trouble right out of the gate, which led to creative conflicts behind-the-scenes. Via The Hollywood Reporter:
According to sources, Amazon had some reservations about early footage, with the Russos, who were less involved due to a focus on their own pricey action project, The Gray Man, parachuting in. This brought about creative differences and led to two competing cuts, one pushed by the Russos, the other by [writers] Appelbaum and Nemec. As weeks rolled on, other project commitments had whittled down the creative camps to two opposing forces, Joe Russo and Appelbaum, who was the series’ showrunner.
Amazon chose to bet on the Russos, and days before Christmas, Appelbaum was let go.
According to the report, Amazon dropped an extra $75 million on reshoots earlier this year, which now makes Citadel their second most expensive TV series behind The Power of the Rings. As for why the Russos have been able to extract huge budgets out of streamers (The Gray Man is reportedly the most expensive movie on Netflix), they deliver when it comes to views.
As THR notes, “Extraction stands as Netflix’s sixth-most viewed original film ever, while Gray Man is the fourth-most viewed original, according to Netflix.”
(Via The Hollywood Reporter)
