The disturbing news just seemingly keeps on coming for Universal's attempt to make a connected monster series of movies under the Dark Universe banner. Bride Of Frankenstein, the second of the fims that was supposed to help kick things off, is suspending pre-production in London to focus on fine-tuning the script.
Bill Condon is overseeing the new movie as director, and things had been proceeding according to plan: sets were under construction and the production was on track to kick off next February. But now it's all on hold. "After thoughtful consideration, Universal Pictures and director Bill Condon have decided to postpone Bride Of Frankenstein," Universal said in a statement to Deadline. "None of us want to move too quickly to meet a release date when we know this special movie needs more time to come together. Bill is a director whose enormous talent has been proven time and again, and we all look forward to continuing to work on this film together."
While Javier Bardem and Angelina Jolie had been in talks to play Frankenstein's Monster and the Bride respectively, they're both apparently waiting to see what David Koepp's rewrites can do to the script before they officially commit. Of the pair, Bardem is the more surprising holdout, especially since he posed with others from the planned Dark Universe films for an official picture back in May.
And despite a previously scheduled release date of 14 February, 2019, the movie is now without a slot on Universal's calendar, with the Blumhouse team taking over the previous date. The Bride crew have apparently been told to go home while the script is sent back to the lab, but the presumption is that things will be back on track once everyone is happy with the screenplay.
It's another sideswipe for a film series that saw the Tom Cruise-starring The Mummy underperform earlier this year. Despite a $407 million worldwide gross, the film is expected to lose the studio around $100 million and the future of the Dark Universe movies is shadier than ever.
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