The Wrap is reporting that the budget of The Rock’s upcoming holiday action, comedy Red One is skyrocketing partially in part due to The Rock’s lack of professionalism.
The budget has ballooned to $250 million.
“Production issues — ranging from Johnson’s chronic lateness and lack of professionalism on set to producers’ inexperience — caused costs on the movie co-starring Chris Evans and J.K. Simmons to spiral upwards to a final budget over $250 million, a sum more fitting for a superhero tentpole,” writes Umberto Gonzalez.
The Wrap also detailed some of The Rock’s odd behavior.
“Johnson showed up as much as eight hours late to set on the movie — forcing the crew to shoot around him on some days. On previous films, Johnson has made a habit of peeing in a water bottle to save time, upsetting crew members,” Gonzalez also writes.
“On set, away from his trailer, if he needs to pee, he doesn’t go to the public bathroom. He pees in a Voss water bottle and his team or a PA has to dispose of it,” an insider told Gonzalez.
“The only thing Dwayne was consistent at was being chronically late,” another insider told The Wrap.
Gonzalez writes that “Johnson was late an average of seven to eight hours per day and missed several entire days of production, ballooning costs by at least $50 million.”
“It was a f—–g disaster,” an insider told The Wrap.
“Dwayne truly doesn’t give a f–k,” said another.
The Rock’s lateness has been cited on other productions such as Rampage and The Fast and The Furious. Both Vin Diesel and Ryan Reynolds had on-set arguments over The Rock’s lateness especially when sets and locations are often rented for a set period of time.
The Wrap states that his “perpetual lateness” is due to “his refusal to work a full shooting day, despite factoring in his three-hour daily workout routine.”
“It’s a control thing,” said another insider.
Amazon MGM denied there have been any issues at all.
“Dwayne Johnson and Seven Bucks have been incredible partners on ‘Red One’—a film that audiences of all ages are going to love this holiday season. Our testing has been very strong — the reaction from CinemaCon speaks for itself — and we couldn’t have made it without Dwayne’s constant work and support. Any reporting that implies that we got to this point with him showing up seven-eight hours late to set is both ridiculous and false,” a representative told The Wrap.
Insiders also pointed the finger at producer Hiram Garcia and Amazon MGM feature and production executives Julie Rapaport and Glenn Gainor for the bloated budget.
Starring The Rock, Chris Evans, Lucy Liu, Bonnie Hunt and J.K. Simmons as Santa Clause, Red One‘s plot is described as: “After a shocking abduction from the North Pole, the Commander of the E.L.F. Task Force must partner with the world’s most infamous bounty hunter to save Christmas.”
The film is due out this November.
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