Jon Watts recently directed Wolfs, starring George Clooney and Brad Pitt. It was a poor man’s Ocean’s 11, but still rather enjoyable. Check out our review.
Wolfs went direct to streaming on Apple TV+ and it seems Watts wasn’t happy about that. You’d think that having two huge stars, Wolfs would have put some bums on seats. Well, Apple didn’t think so and only released it for one-week theatres.
What was the point of one week? All the effort of posters and advertising, for one week. Apple are a streaming service though, so they are more interested in subs, not seats.
A sequel was planned for Wolfs and went into production. Then it was pulled, with most people thinking it was because of Apple. Watts was approached about a sequel, but declined, because:
“I wasn’t even told about it (the pivot to streaming) until less than a week before they announced it to the world. I was completely shocked and asked them to please not include the news that I was writing a sequel. They ignored my request and announced it in their press release anyway, seemingly to create a positive spin to their streaming pivot.”
“And so I quietly returned the money they gave me for the sequel. I didn’t want to talk about it because I was proud of the film and didn’t want to generate any unnecessary negative press. I loved working with Brad and George (and Amy and Austin and Poorna and Zlatko) and would happily do it again. But the truth is that Apple didn’t cancel the Wolfs sequel, I did, because I no longer trusted them as a creative partner.”
Honestly, good for him! Streaming services, like Apple, seem to think they can do whatever they like. Watts quietly, and with some humility, walked away so as not to be screwed over again.
Watts is a bit of a golden boy at the moment, having the recent Spider-Man movies under his belt. Spider-Man: No Way Home managed to successfully do a multiverse and grossed almost $2 billion at the box office.
You’d think that the combination of Watt, Clooney, and Pitt in Wolfs, would have been a slam-dunk. What these streaming services are thinking is anyone’s guess.