Poor, poor Gambit. This has been a film plagued by issues ever since it was first announced. After reeling in Channing Tatum to play the titular character way back in 2014, the film then went through a bevy of directors, and looked as if it wasn’t even happening at all until recently, when things started looking up. They are now looking down again.
Director Gore Verbinksi has now dropped out of the project. He’s exited the film during its pre-production phase citing the dreaded “scheduling issues”, and this might be the worst hit Gambit has endured thus far, as Verbinksi had his own production team in place and plans for a New Orleans-based shoot in March, which now go flying out the window.
Whether this has anything to do with the approaching Disney/Fox merger is unclear, but what we do know is that Gambit was recently pushed back from its original February 14, 2019 release to a new opening date of June 7, 2019 in order to potentially accommodate these new issues, and as it stands will be opening alongside the rebooted Charlie’s Angels and The Secret Life Of Pets 2.
It’s a huge shame, because Verbinski is a talented director and is especially good at merging genres together on big budgets, just look at the first Pirates Of The Caribbean film and the supremely underrated The Lone Ranger, and Gambit‘s intended mix of a superhero heist film with comedy elements seemed right in Verbinski’s wheelhouse.
Instead, the film once again goes on a search for a new director, and it’s beginning to feel like this is a film that isn’t going to see the light of day, at least in its current incarnation with Tatum starring and from a script written by Josh Zetumer.
#Peace.Love.Gambit
