Up-and-coming Chinese-Australian writer Amy Wang has been tapped to replace Adele Lim and Peter Chiarelli on Crazy Rich Asians 2. Deadline reports that the original writers were involved in a pay disparity controversy after the release and subsequent success of the first film.
Directed by Jon M. Chu and based on the bestselling novel by Kevin Kwan, Crazy Rich Asians became a runaway hit in 2018, grossing more than $238 million worldwide to become the most commercially successful romantic comedy of the 2010s. Notably, it was the first major Hollywood studio film to feature a majority Asian cast since The Joy Luck Club in 1993. Sequels based on Kwan’s follow-up novels—Crazy Rich Girlfriend and Rich People Problems—were greenlit for a back-to-back production, but have since stalled.
News of Wang’s hiring is the first major update on the project in a while. She’ll reportedly be handling writing duties solo. Wang serves as a story editor on Netflix’s Brothers Sun, and has also directed episodes of Facebook’s The Birch, and is working on a horror feature as writer and director for Paramount Players.
Starring Constance Wu as NYU economics professor Rachel Chu and Henry Golding as her rich Singaporean boyfriend Nick Young, Crazy Rich Asians followed Rachel as she visited Singapore to attend a wedding with Nick, and met with his disapproving “old money” family. While the film received positive reviews, it also attracted criticism for some of its casting choices, and its representation of Singapore.
In 2019, The Hollywood Reporter broke the news about Lim having bowed out of the sequels citing pay disparity issues. She was reportedly offered $110,000 to return, while Chiarelli was offered between $800,000 and $1 million. It was said that his experience on feature films—Lim had only TV writing credits to her name before Chu brought her onboard the first film—was the reason behind his heftier payday. Lim went on to co-write Raya and the Last Dragon for Disney.
Chu stood up for her in a Twitter statement, and said that he was “frustrated” that he couldn’t get the gang back together for the sequels. He revealed that he’d tried to negotiate a truce between the studio and Lim, but she’d declined a revised offer. Chu said that he was proud “that she was able to stand up for her own measure of worth and walk away when she felt like she was being undervalued.”
In June 2021, while promoting his last film—the musical In the Heights—Chu told Collider’s own Steve Weintraub that the scripts for the sequels were “in progress” and there was “no way” that he was going to return unless the scripts were in great shape.
via Collider