Kevin Feige Explains Doctor Strange Director's Multiverse Of Madness Exit

Kevin Feige addresses Scott Derrickson's exit from Doctor Strange in the Multiverse Of Madness. Derrickson directed the first Doctor Strange, which premiered in 2016. The Marvel film stars Benedict Cumberbatch as the titular character, Stephen Strange, a brilliant doctor who turns to the mystic arts (mentored by Tilda Swinton as the Ancient One) after injuries from a major car crash render him unable to continue his career as a neurosurgeon.

Upon its release, Derrickson's Doctor Strange achieved box-office and critical success, grossing over $677 million worldwide. Throughout the last few years, Cumberbatch's portrayal of the character appeared multiple times in the Marvel Cinematic Universe outside of his initial film, including in Avengers: Infinity War, Avengers: Endgame, and Spider-Man: No Way Home. Initial filming for the sequel to Doctor Strange began in November 2020, though the pandemic put production on hold, resuming once again in March 2021.

Slash Film reports that Kevin Feige finally addressed the departure of Derrickson from Multiverse of Madness. According to his interview from the upcoming May 2022 issue of Empire magazine, artistic differences severed Derrickson's ties with the highly anticipated film. Contrary to popular rumors, the disagreement wasn't over Derrickson's pitch to lean into a more creepy, horror-esque tone in the Doctor Strange sequel – Feige insists that the development team at Marvel, fondly nicknamed the "House of Ideas," loved that concept, also discrediting rumors that Derrickson wanted to make a "no-holds-barred weird, gnarly, scary movie" of which Marvel disapproved. It was in fact other, unspecified differences that apparently caused the creative clash, and Sam Raimi subsequently replaced Derrickson as director after Derrickson stepped down. Read Feige's full comments below:

"We love Scott, and I think Scott feels the same. Nobody believes it, but it was just creative differences. There's been some thought that [the horror idea] was the creative difference with Scott and Marvel, and it was not. Because we love that idea. The intention was that Strange would guide us into a much creepier side of the world."

To fans familiar with Derrickson's pre-Marvel work, his desire to make Multiverse of Madness a horror film comes as no surprise. His oeuvre includes the 2005 possession horror film The Exorcism of Emily Rose, which he directed, and he also co-wrote and directed 2012's bone-chilling Sinister starring Ethan Hawke. The abdication of his role as director of Multiverse of Madness allowed Derrickson to return to his roots and work on the upcoming Blumhouse Productions horror film The Black Phone, an adaptation of Joe Hill's 2004 short horror story of the same name, which will also feature Hawke in the lead role. C. Robert Cargill, Derrickson's co-writer of the upcoming film, expressed last year that Derrickson, while disappointed to leave Multiverse of Madness, ultimately preferred to forfeit his directorial position and pivot to a passion project like The Black Phone rather than working on a compromised version of the Marvel film.

However, fans of both Derrickson and Marvel can rest assured that all parties involved parted on amicable terms. Furthermore, Multiverse of Madness remains in good hands under the direction of the experienced and impressive Raimi, who fans might know as the director of the original Spider-Man trilogy from the early 2000s. Raimi also shares with Derrickson a background in horror – he created and directed the original The Evil Dead film in 1981 and several subsequent sequels. Derrickson's The Black Phone is set for a theatrical release on June 24, 2022, while Raimi's Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness will premiere on May 6, 2022, and both films promise individual success in their own right.

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Source: Slash Film