Ridley Scott Paused Bee Gees Film After Paramount ‘Changed the Goalposts’: ‘They Didn’t Believe Me, and I Did’
Ridley Scott is meant to direct a biopic on the music icons the Bee Gees, but he revealed in an interview that he drove a hard bargain with the studio. So while it was previously reported the film would begin shooting early this year, the director now says disco fans will have to wait to put on their dancing shoes.
Scott said in an interview with GQ on Tuesday that Paramount, which released his most recent film “Gladiator II,” later “changed the goalposts” on his deal for the Bee Gees film (working title “You Should Be Dancing”). In turn, Scott instead will begin production on his film “The Dog Stars” for 20th Century Pictures first. “The Dog Stars” will start filming in April, and Scott hinted that the Bee Gees film could begin for Paramount by September.
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“The deal — the studio changed the goalposts,” Scott said of the Paramount project. “I said, ‘You can’t do that.’ They insisted. I said, ‘Well, I’m going to warn you, I will walk, because I will go on to the next movie.’ They didn’t believe me, and I did.”
He added, “I was being asked to go too far, and I said, ‘No. Next!’ They didn’t like my deal. So I said, I’ll move on. I’m expensive, but I’m fucking good.”
Fans of Scott, 87, know that the director works at a blistering pace, often shooting two films in a year. A source close to the director told IndieWire that Scott, while on the press tour for “Napoleon,” was becoming “antsy” about getting going on Bee Gees, and amid contract talks instead shifted his attention to the movie that was ready to go. There’s no bad blood between Paramount and Scott — in fact “Gladiator II” is one of his most successful films at the box office ever — but “Dog Stars” will shoot in March, and the Bee Gees film will now shoot in the fall.
A source close to Paramount and Scott Free told IndieWire simply that the Bee Gees project will move forward in the fall following “Dog Stars.”
Scott teased that the film will center on the “competition” among founding brothers of the Bee Gees Barry, Robin, and Maurice Gibb; their younger brother Andy died in 1988. Barry, the last surviving brother, will be executive producing the biopic.
“I liked the working-class side of the Bee Gees,” Scott said. “It’s all about competition with brothers…. And then they lose Andy — Andy OD’d at 30. … It’s more about the gift than the luck, right? It’s a fantastic story.”
“The Dog Stars,” which was announced in 2024 at 20th Century Studios with his “Gladiator II” actor Paul Mescal in the lead role. Mescal had to exit the film after he was cast as Paul McCartney in Sam Mendes’ four-part Beatles biopic; Jacob Elordi is rumored to have replaced Mescal in “The Dog Stars.”
“The Dog Stars” centers on a pilot named Hig (Elordi) who befriends an ex-Marine gunman while battling a band of scavengers called Reapers. The story is set in a post-apocalyptic world where an unnamed pandemic has decimated American society. The film is based on Peter Heller’s 2012 novel, and will be adapted by Mark L. Smith (“Twisters,” “The Revenant,” “The Boys in the Boat”) and Christopher Wilkinson (“Ali”). Smith and Cliff Roberts are producing “The Dog Stars,” along with Scott’s Scott Free production banner.
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