If you take a look through our Greenlit series, you know that exciting projects get announced all the time. But Hollywood is a place where a million different things can keep a film from crossing the finish line at any point. If your movie is held up long enough, you’re officially in a state known as “development hell.” And while some projects are lucky enough to escape its clutches, others are doomed to remain a Hollywood “what if.” Here’s what you need to know.
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This is when a movie, TV show, video game, or other project gets shelved indefinitely during preproduction. It’s possible the studio has already announced a desire to make it, but it must be paused due to myriad issues, including:
- Legal: The rights to certain projects change hands in Hollywood all the time. If a production can’t get up and running before that happens, it’ll get stuck. The studio may have problems with a collaborating partner or the story’s rights holders, preventing it from proceeding.
- Financial: Whoever is footing the bill for the project may suddenly start to feel wary of handing over large sums of money if they’re uncertain they can make it back. There may also be real-world issues, such as ongoing wars, that make financiers nervous about pursuing a project that can involve subject matter hitting too close to home.
- Artistic: The director, screenwriter, prominent actors, producer, or any combination of these key pieces might not be able to agree on the story as it exists. This could relate to financial issues if the writer or director has to figure out how to tell the same story but with fewer set pieces.
- Technical: The technology may not exist yet to create the best possible version of the story. Or the manner of making the film may require a massive undertaking all on its own, such as Phil Tippett’s stop-motion “Mad God” (2021), which required 30 years to complete.
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A similar, more rarely used term is “production hell,” which is when a project hits significant snags after cameras start rolling. For example, Gareth Edwards’ “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story” (2016) went through numerous script rewrites and reshoots, making for a tough process that nonetheless resulted in a critically acclaimed movie.
Development hell is tough on the actors and other creatives involved. Screenwriters may need to write dozens of drafts until it’s up to par with what the financiers want. Even then, key creatives such as actors, the director, and producers might drop out to focus on other projects. Dev hell isn’t something that only happens to up-and-comers—numerous A-list projects have hit that dreaded wall.
Development hell movies that were eventually made
“Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” (2024), dir. Tim Burton
The first “Beetlejuice” put Burton on the map in 1988, so it makes sense that sequel buzz started shortly after its release. Two sequel scripts came to fruition in 1990, “Beetlejuice in Love,” written by Warren Skaaren, and the infamous “Beetlejuice Goes Hawaiian,” by writer Jonathan Gems. However, Burton’s career took off in a different direction thanks to the massive successes of “Batman” (1989) and “Edward Scissorhands” (1990). Different versions of a “Beetlejuice” sequel were announced and dropped for decades. In 2015, Winona Ryder confirmed the film was happening, but hopes were dashed when, four years later, Burton said “nothing” was greenlit. It wasn’t until 36 years after the original film, in 2024, that a sequel directed by Burton and featuring the original cast made it to screens.
“Dallas Buyers Club” (2013), dir. Jean-Marc Vallée
Both Matthew McConaughey and Jared Leto won Oscars for Vallée’s drama, but it took decades for the movie to make it to that point. Craig Borten started writing the script in 1992 after hearing about HIV patient Ron Woodroof in a “Dallas Morning News” article. In the years that followed, Dennis Hopper, Craig Gillespie, and Marc Forster were attached to direct, only to drop out. Chase Palmer, Guillermo Arriaga, and Stephen Belber all took a crack at the script, and at one point Ryan Gosling was set to star. In the end, it was Borten’s original script that got Vallée and McConaughey onboard to finally bring it home to Oscar glory.
“John Carter” (2012), dir. Andrew Stanton
It’s always nice to hear about development hell movies that turned out to be successes, but not all of them are so lucky. Stanton’s “John Carter” is one of the most infamous box office flops of all time. Attempts to adapt Edgar Rice Burroughs’ “John Carter of Mars” series go back to the 1930s, but they were revived in the ’80s after George Lucas’ “Star Wars” became a cultural sensation. Tom Cruise was even approached to star with “Die Hard” director John McTiernan at the helm. That version fell through over concerns that visual effects weren’t sophisticated enough to bring the film’s sci-fi aspects to life. Director Robert Rodriguez took a crack when the rights landed at Paramount, but complications arose after he dropped out of the Director’s Guild of America. The studio replaced Rodriguez with Kerry Conran, who was replaced by Jon Favreau in 2005. It was Disney who finally shepherded the film in 2012—but unfortunately for the House of Mouse, “John Carter” lost about $200 million during its theatrical release.
“Mad Max: Fury Road” (2015), dir. George Miller
Despite a trilogy of “Mad Max” films already hitting theaters, director and series creator Miller faced an uphill battle on the fourth film, “Fury Road.” The idea for the film first materialized in the late 1990s with Mel Gibson eyed to reprise the title role, but real-world factors impacted any progress. Miller told Time Out, “With 9/11, the American dollar collapsed against the Australian dollar and our budget ballooned.” Miller moved on to “Happy Feet,” and by the time the director turned his attention back to the Wasteland, it was well into the 2000s, with Gibson out of the picture. It would be another few years until Miller found the time and funding—plus Tom Hardy as Max—to roll cameras in 2012. (The set itself is a great example of “production hell,” but that’s another story.)
“Megalopolis” (2024), dir. Francis Ford Coppola
You could assume the guy who made “The Godfather” and “Apocalypse Now” would have a blank check to do whatever he wanted. However, Coppola’s “Megalopolis” was an epic decades in the making. The film had been in development since 1983, and Coppola spent those years honing in on the aesthetic. He told Vanity Fair, “I wasn’t really working on this screenplay for 40 years as I often see written, but rather I was collecting notes and clippings for a scrapbook of things I found interesting for some future screenplay.” As a testament to how hard it was to get “Megalopolis” off the ground, the director sold a portion of his winery to self-finance the $120 million budget, with “Megalopolis” finally coming out in September 2024.
Projects stuck in development hell
Of course, not every film finds its way out. These are some development hell movies that seem firmly stuck with that label.
- “1906”: Director Brad Bird has worked on an adaptation of James Dalessandro’s novel “1906” since 2004, originally eyeing it as his live-action directorial debut after “The Incredibles.” The story centers on the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. At one point, it was reported that Warner Bros. would partner with Disney and Pixar to bring the project to fruition, which also would’ve been the first time Pixar worked on a live-action film. Bird was still hopeful about the movie in 2018, but with the announcement he’s directing “Incredibles 3” at 2024’s D23, it may still be a while.
- Live-action “Akira”: Katsuhiro Otomo’s anime film “Akira” is pretty much perfect as is, but that hasn’t stopped Hollywood from pursuing a live-action American adaptation for decades. Since Warner Bros. acquired the rights in 2002, many directors have come and gone to attach their names to the project, including Miller, Christopher Nolan, and Taika Waititi.
- “A Confederacy of Dunces”: Arguably, this is the most famous project forever stuck in development hell. Attempts to adapt John Kennedy Toole’s Pulitzer Prize–winning comedy have faced one misfortune after the next since Harold Ramis first planned to direct in 1982. John Belushi and Richard Pryor were originally attached to star as Ignatius J. Reilly and Burma Jones, respectively. Ramis dropped out after Belushi’s untimely death, which became an unfortunate trend for the project. Notably, John Candy and Chris Farley, both attached to play Ignatius as the film gained and shed directors and writers, also passed away far too young, leading to the film’s “cursed” reputation.
If you wind up in a place where your project is truly deadlocked, it doesn’t mean it’s the end.
- Work on other projects: You don’t want your creative juices to become stagnant. Use this opportunity to switch your attention to other scripts, roles, or any other areas of interest. The quickest way for your career to stall is to put all your eggs in one basket. Getting your mind off the project for a bit will also allow you to return to it with fresh eyes.
- Identify inefficiencies: Getting out of development hell occasionally means weighing your complete artistic vision against getting it made. Is there anything you can do to get it over the finish line? Go back to the drawing board to see if there are scenes to be trimmed, characters to be combined, or expensive elements such as outdoor locations and huge crowd shots that can go.
- Don’t go radio silent: A project might get shelved, but that doesn’t (always) mean it’s forgotten. Stay in touch with financiers and check in with them often. They may not offer any concrete milestones, but the conversation won’t just die out, either. (And, in some cases, it might lead to another project.)
It may be more accurate to call development hell “development purgatory” because there’s still a chance your project can ascend to the higher plane of actual production. No one said a career in entertainment is easy. When even the likes of Miller and Coppola have problems getting movies made, it really makes every finished film seem like a small miracle.