Brett Ratner’s filmmaking career may be over following the allegations of sexual harassment and misconduct that have emerged (including a blistering account by Ellen Page), but untangling his ties to Hollywood won’t be so easy. His RatPac-Dune Entertainment production company have had a significant co-financing relationship with Warner Bros., backing many of their top tier pictures. This year alone they have been involved with “Dunkirk,” “The Disaster Artist,” “It,” and “The Lego Batman Movie” among others. However, it’s the company’s association with “Wonder Woman” that’s now causing some real friction.
Page Six reports that star Gal Gadot is refusing to sign for “Wonder Woman 2” until Ratner is removed from the DC Films franchise. While WB has severed ties with Ratner, they are still sorting out another source of the $450 million financing that RatPac-Dun provided, and was used to finance the aforementioned projects, including “Wonder Woman.”
Certainly, no one wants someone with the kind of allegations Ratner is facing involved with a project where the core values are about empowering women. And it’s nice to see Gadot using what leverage she has to force the studio to make the right choice, and to do it expediently.
Gadot and Ratner have not commented on this story, however, while Warner Bros. simply offered a one word response: “False.” At any rate, they now know the movie world is watching to see how this unfolds.
“Wonder Woman 2,” previously scheduled to open on December 13, 2019 will now debut on November 1, 2019 (mostly likely to get out of the way of “Star Wars: Episode IX“).