Taylor Sheridan on why Emily Blunt is not in this sequel to "Sicario."
That was my decision, and at some point I’m going to have to talk to her about it,” Sheridan said in a recent interview for TheWrap. “Her arc was complete … I couldn’t figure out a way to write a character that would do her talent justice."
“Look what she went through. It was a difficult role. Here I write this lead character and then I use her as a surrogate for the audience. I make her completely passive against her own will so the audience feels the same impotence that a lot of law enforcement officers feel, I drag her through hell, and betray her in the end. It was an arduous journey for the character, and for Emily. That character had arc,” Sheridan said."
“What do you do next? She moves to some little town and becomes a sheriff and then gets kidnapped and then we have ‘Taken?'” he joked about Blunt’s role. “I had to tell the story that was true to this role, and I didn’t feel like I could create something with that character that would further that world that would do Emily’s character justice. That said, there could be room for Kate somewhere else down the road.”
Ain't it just great when screenwriters know when enough is enough? When to stop? Sparing any of the characters they created on page from becoming caricatures of themselves?
“Look what she went through. It was a difficult role. Here I write this lead character and then I use her as a surrogate for the audience. I make her completely passive against her own will so the audience feels the same impotence that a lot of law enforcement officers feel, I drag her through hell, and betray her in the end. It was an arduous journey for the character, and for Emily. That character had arc,” Sheridan said."
“What do you do next? She moves to some little town and becomes a sheriff and then gets kidnapped and then we have ‘Taken?'” he joked about Blunt’s role. “I had to tell the story that was true to this role, and I didn’t feel like I could create something with that character that would further that world that would do Emily’s character justice. That said, there could be room for Kate somewhere else down the road.”
Ain't it just great when screenwriters know when enough is enough? When to stop? Sparing any of the characters they created on page from becoming caricatures of themselves?
Sheridan also wrote a very similar screenplay, in structure, to "Sicario" last year, the great "Hell or High Water," and had a semi-successful debut as a director this year with "Wind River."
“Sicario 2: Soldado” opens on June 29.
“Sicario 2: Soldado,” has Benicio Del Toro returning as undercover operative Alejandro Gillick and Josh Brolin back as CIA agent Matt Graver.
“You want to see this thing through? I’m going to have to get dirty,” Brolin tells a room full of government officials. The pair will again be involved in the middle of the violent war against drugs alongside the United States-Mexico border. How relevant a topic to tackle. Drug cartels are smuggling terrorists across the U.S. border, Gillick and Graver decide to pit the cartels against each other.
The cast includes Matthew Modine, Catherine Keener, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, and Jeffrey Donovan. Blunt and director Denis Villeneuve opted not to return.
Italian filmmaker Stefano Sollima directs the movie.