20th Century Fox’s The New Mutants is one of the most interesting news stories in recent years. From multiple delays and rumours of extensive reshoots to being caught up in the middle of the Disney/Fox merger, the latest entry in the X-Men franchise has seen its fair share of issues.
With its long-overdue release now only a few weeks away, director Josh Boone is finally opening up about the journey to get the film out to the masses. First, he set the record straight with Entertainment Weekly about the talk of The New Mutants undergoing massive reshoots:
“Everybody said we did reshoots! We’ve never done reshoots. And I’ll tell you this: if there hadn’t been a merger, I’m sure we would’ve done reshoots the same way every movie does pickups. We didn’t even do that because by the time the merger was done, and everything was settled, everybody’s older.”
An example of that is Maisie Williams, who was only 20 years old during principal photography. The Game of Thrones actress also spoke with EW about the film, stating that:
“The movie is exactly the movie we set out to make. I was nervous when they were talking about reshooting or re-editing that it was gonna be very different, but honestly, it’s exactly what we set out to do.” It was a sometimes aggravating situation with the only information she heard about the film coming from news headlines. “I would be in the press for something else and then [reporters would] ask me about [The New Mutants], and the last thing I heard was, ‘Nothing until we know something.'”
Boone then discussed the acquisition of Fox by Disney, and how that affected the post-production of the film: “We had heard nothing because of the merger. It was radio silence for about a year, where we had no new information at all.”
Around this time, the filmmaker began working on Stephen King’s The Stand for CBS All Access in January 2019. Soon after, Disney asked Boone to come back and finish editing The New Mutants, “When they called me right before I went to go make The Stand and said, ‘Would you come finish the movie?’ I said, ‘I would fuckin’ love to come finish the movie!’”
20th Century Fox in association with Marvel Entertainment presents “The New Mutants,” an original horror thriller set in an isolated hospital where a group of young mutants is being held for psychiatric monitoring. When strange occurrences begin to take place, both their new mutant abilities and their friendships will be tested as they battle to try and make it out alive.
The New Mutants is directed by Josh Boone (The Fault in Our Stars) and features a cast includes Maisie Williams (Game of Thrones) as Rahne Sinclair/Wolfsbane, Anya Taylor-Joy (The Witch) as Illyana Rasputin/Magik, Charlie Heaton (Stranger Things) as Sam Guthrie/Cannonball, Henry Zaga (13 Reasons Why) as Roberto da Costa/Sunspot, Blu Hunt (The Originals) as Danielle Moonstar/Mirage and Alice Braga (Queen of the South) as Dr. Cecilia Reyes. It is set for release on April 3rd, 2020.