As per Fast & Furious tradition, the Fast X trailer dropped just in time for it to be a big topic during Super Bowl Sunday. The first look at the 2023 movie release has already racked up over 31 million views online as it set the stage for what’s next for the Fast family in this action-packed blockbuster. The movie looks absolutely epic, so it’s certainly surprising to hear the entire script was basically rewritten in the matter of a day.
Fast X
Release Date: May 19, 2023 (Theaters)
Directed By: Louis Letterrier
Starring: Vin Diesel, Jordana Brewster, Tyrese Gibson, Michelle Rodriguez, Sung Kang, Ludacris, Jason Momoa, John Cena, Jason Statham, Rita Moreno, Helen Mirren, Brie Larson, Charlize Theron, and more.
To catch you up to speed, shortly after Fast X started filming in April 2022, its writer/director Justin Lin made the “difficult decision” to step away from his role at the helm. Just a week later, the director of the Transporter films, Louis Leterrier, was announced as his replacement. When Leterrier recently recalled taking the job on such short notice, he shared his whirlwind experience to the set of Fast X.
When speaking to Esquire Middle East, Leterrier recalled that he got the call from Universal in the middle of the night, Paris time, with a message asking if he could read the Fast X script by 5 a.m. that morning. Leterrier said that he had a “moment of panic” regarding if he could take on the job so quickly, but seeing as though he “admired” the franchise for years, he decided he couldn’t pass it up. In Leterrier’s words:
I read the script four times on the plane, and I said I had some ideas, and they said ‘great, because the whole third act is changing. Can you rewrite it tonight?’ I was literally on no sleep. I’d been on no sleep for days. Obviously, this was not going to be set in stone. But I was like, ‘okay, yeah, I’ve got some ideas,’ and started writing. And obviously, since the third act was changing, I needed to change the first act. And when you rewrite the third act, and the first act, the second act has to go. So basically I had to on the fly rebuild the airplane.
Prior to writing a new draft for Fast X, the director called Justin Lin’s initial script “incredible” and “wonderful.” Since Universal couldn’t waste much time on pausing principal photography given the actors were hired and production had been underway for a week, Leterrier’s experience between getting the call and arriving on set to shoot was around a four-day period. He shared more of the experience, saying this:
It was very liberating. When you’re the boy scout, the knight in shining armor who comes in to save the day, the pressure is lifted. You’re like, ‘well, I’m here to help,’ and everybody helps you. The pressure is off in a sense because everyone’s working towards the same goal—to make a great movie.
Thankfully, Leterrier had the Fast family by his side to help him along on his first time directing the franchise. While rewriting so much of the script in the matter of a night sounds objectively insane, especially in a big-budget franchise like Fast & Furious, the director was happy to be the movie’s “knight in shining armor,” and the trailer showed off some epic action and attention to detail from him.
Leterrier has also teased that there’s a “war brewing” for the characters of the long-running action movies, and it especially looks like Jason Momoa’s villainous character will be the center of that. Fans can look forward to Fast X coming to theaters this May 19.