Netflix blocks new Nancy Meyers film: it’s too expensive

Scarlett Johansson, Penélope Cruz, Michael Fassbender and Owen Wilson. A stellar cast for the new rom-com directed by Nancy Meyers, director known for romantic comedies such as What women want, It’s complicated And Anything could happen. Meyers has been missing from the cinema since 2015’s blockbuster The unexpected intern with Robert DeNiro and Anne Hathaway. The news is that Paris Paramount, this is the working title of the project, was definitively blocked by Netflix due to apparent budget inconsistencies. As reported by variety, the cost agreed with Netflix in April 2022 was 100 million dollars but Meyers demanded at least another 50. This is actually an exorbitant cost for a simple rom-com, a genre that usually costs much less. The Californian streaming giant has finally set a ceiling of 130 million, of which 80 only for the cast, but evidently it was not enough because Nancy Meyers’ film suddenly finds itself orphaned by a studio.

For the most expensive romantic comedy ever, however, there is still hope of seeing the light, perhaps with a major or another streaming platform (Prime Video, AppleTV +) and with slightly lower budget claims. But what is it about Paris Paramount? Apparently at the center of the romantic story there would be two Hollywood directors who have lived a great love and are forced to work together again on an important project after having put an end to their relationship. This film would have re-proposed the great comeback of Nancy Meyers as a director, but also as a screenwriter and producer of a semi-autobiographical story. Meyers, in fact, was married for over twenty years to director and producer Charles Shyer (Alfie, The father of the bride), with whom he had two children and with whom he collaborated on several films. At the moment the project remains on standby, but with such a cast it seems really difficult that it cannot find a new accommodation.