John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein have previously worked together for films such as The Incredible Burt Wonderstone in 2013 and Stuber in 2019. Almost four years after their last project together, they’re back with action-comedy Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves. The movie will serve as the opening film for the annual Austin event today(Friday).
John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein directed Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves. Goldstein reveals that rather than focusing on the bad guys, they decided to center their story on good characters. He tells Variety, “I’m not a huge superhero guy. I collected comics as a kid, and I enjoy the Marvel movies. But what hooks me in is the story and the people in it. That’s how we approached D&D. It wasn’t about so much, OK, what monsters is going to end with? What dragon we can include?”
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He continued, “It was: Who’s our team? Because that’s the core of D&D. Who are we playing with at the table? Who are your friends? What are the characters they take on as their avatars, and why are we going to care about them? That was how we approached the whole movie.”
Daley added that they wanted the film to be enjoyed by a larger audience. He said, “There is that stigma that you have to get over that this isn’t just for the nerds. There’s something bigger and more cinematic.”
Initially, the duo thought about a film that tells the story of those who play the game and the idea was immediately shut down after Jumanji: The Next Level was released in 2019. Daley shared, “The moment Jumanji came out, we said, ‘No, we can’t do this again. Also, it does a little bit of a disservice. It reduces D&D to just a game and I think that there is so much that can be explored within that world. And it’s hard, stakes-wise, to care about a character that you know as an audience is being played by someone who’s safely in their home.”
RELATED: Final Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves Trailer Released
Due to Creative Differences, John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein Left The Flash Project
John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein have worked together for The Flash years ago prior to working together in Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves. The pair had an idea of giving the story a fresh plot line. Daley said, “We pitched this idea of a ground-level superhero where it isn’t entirely end-of-the-world stakes. He’s just learning his powers and is also somewhat dysfunctional with his life. The more imperfect we can make a superhero, the better, because that’s the inherent challenge: How do you give imperfection to someone that is, you know, physically perfect?”
They met up with The Flash actor Ezra Miller to discuss the potential plot line. Goldstein says, “They were intense and very bright. Later, it became clear that they didn’t want to quite do the same thing as we did.”
What happened next surprised the duo as Miller apparently had been working on a different script with Grant Morrison. Although the studio rejected Miller’s script, Goldstein and Daley thought it wasn’t worth it, and they decided to leave the project for good.
“It was a number of creative differences that caused us at a certain point to decide that it was time to go,” Daley says. Goldstein agrees and says “If we feel like the powers-that-be aren’t excited about making the same movie as we are, we’re not going to win that battle. And so it’s better to cut your losses and get out of there.”
Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves is due to have its world premiere on March 10, and is scheduled to be released in theaters on March 31 by Paramount Pictures.
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