The news of Batgirl's cancellation after it was already so deep into post-production came as a huge surprise to everyone - including those who worked on the project!
Directors Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah have already spoken about learning of the HBO Max movie's shelving while they were preparing to do interviews to promote the project, and star Brendan Fraser has now shared his reaction to reading the news online for the first time.
The Academy Award-nominated The Whale actor, who was cast as the villainous Firefly in the film, said he was left completely "blindsided" during an interview with Variety.
“I thought I was getting punked, but it checked out,” he revealed. “Then came hysterical laughter like, ‘You’ve got to be kidding me?’ I know that the filmmakers and producers were expecting to hear from the studio about the film, and the anticipation was, ‘How do we broaden the movie out to take it from a streaming format to a theatrical release?’ But as we all know, it was the complete opposite. When we were expecting XYZ amount of support and money to expand scenes — to do pickup shots and those kinds of things — that was a gut punch. But then we learned that it was in the interest of writing down some debt? That part really stung.”
Leslie Grace (Barbara Gordon) disagrees with DC Studios co-CEO Peter Safran's assessment that Batgirl was "not releasable," and Fraser shares a similar sentiment.
“It was just magical to see how she was as quietly confident as a young actress in this breakthrough role and had a sense of purpose and dignity,” he adds when asked about working with the young actress. “She has a work ethic that is unrivalled. She’s dynamite — and dynamite comes in small packages but still goes bang. We do battle each other several times. There was a lot of kicking and punching and getting hurt but we were always help each other to our feet after breaking set pieces and knocking the tar out of each other.”
There's a chance Grace might get to suit-up as Batgirl again, but we'd say Fraser returning as Firefly is highly unlikely.
With his star on the rise (again), we're sure he'll have his pick of CBM roles very soon, so let's hope his experience with Batgirl hasn't turned completely turned him off.
About The Author:
Mark Cassidy is a writer, photographer, amateur filmmaker, and Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic from Dublin, Ireland.