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Sarah Michelle Gellar and director Chloe Zhao are speaking out after Hulu unexpectedly canceled their highly anticipated Buffy reboot.
The slayer herself said the decision came as a surprise, but this decision is just another bump in the “uphill battle” of getting Buffy rebooted for a new generation.
Gellar revealed to People magazine she got the call just before she was set to take the stage at the Ready or Not 2: Here I Come premiere at SXSW.
“No one saw this coming, including the head of Searchlight [Pictures],” she said, noting her new movie is also under Searchlight, the same company behind the Buffy reboot. “I got the call as we were stepping onto stage for the premiere of their own movie. And it’s also the weekend of Chloé going to the Oscars as a best director nominee for Hamnet. For them to call us on the Friday of what should have been Chloé’s victory lap for an incredible film, and my world premiere of something that I worked very hard for is… That says something.”
Gellar went on to call out one of the executives on the show who was “not only not a fan of the original, but was proud to constantly remind us that he had never seen the entirety of the series and how it wasn’t for him.”
Photo: Karwai Tang/WireImage/Byron J. Cohen / TM and Copyright ©20th Century Fox Film Corp.“That’s very hard when you’re taking a property that is as beloved as Buffy, not just to the world, but to me and Chloé,” she said. “So that tells you the uphill battle that we had been fighting since day one, when your executive is literally proud to tell you that he didn’t watch it.”
Gellar revealed some interesting details about the reboot and praised actress Ryan Kiera Armstrong, who was set to take up the mantle as the new slayer in Buffy: New Sunnydale.
“I loved the duality that we had this new, younger slayer who was where Buffy was when the show started, and then we would pick up with where Buffy was now,” she said. “And I’d like to use this moment also to say that Ryan Kiera Armstrong is a superstar. I’m gutted that no one will see her as a slayer.”
Deadline reports the shocking cancelation came after 20th Television and Searchlight Television, the two production studios behind the reboot, indicated a series order “seemed imminent.”
The pilot was filmed in late July. But Hulu reportedly thought it was “too young” and “small.” Writers Nora and Lilla Zuckerman returned with a new script that was around 90 minutes that was “more adult, featuring a lot more of Gellar’s Buffy, and was described as a more of a streaming than a network show.”
The outlet reports Disney Television Group President Craig Erwich was the one who pulled the plug on the project. Multiple sources also indicated he was the executive Gellar was referring to.
20th Television still owns the Buffy IP, so it is possible that the reboot will be revived again in the next couple of years.
English (US)