Russell Crowe will have his vengeance, in this life or the next.
On Saturday, the ‘Gladiator’ star said he’s had enough of people asking him about the sequel to the film, which is currently in production but doesn’t feature the actor in the cast.
“You should fucking pay me for the amount of questions I get asked about the damn movie I’m not in.” he allegedly said at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival in the Czech Republic. “I don’t know about the cast, I don’t know about the plot.”
The awaited sequel has been in the works for some time. In 2018 it was announced that the film starring Ridley Scott was back in the director’s chair, but years passed before a The release date has been set for 2024. Meanwhile, Denzel Washington has been cast in the lead role alongside Paul Mescal.
In the original film, Crowe played a Roman general who was forced into slavery and seeks revenge against a sinister emperor. His performance in the 2000 epic earned him an Academy Award for Best Actor.
When asked about reprising his role on Saturday, Crowe said: “In this world I’m dead, two meters under the ground. And that’s that.” Though he’s sitting out Gladiator 2, he added that he “couldn’t imagine this movie being anything less than absolutely spectacular.”
“If Ridley has decided to do a second part … he’s going to have really strong reasons for it,” the actor said.
Charles Sykes/Invision/Associated Press
Crowe was one of several celebrities honored at the Czech film festival. The New Zealand native received a lifetime achievement award on Friday and performed with his band Indoor Garden Party that night.
But he also sparked controversy at the festival when he said his next film project would be called Nuremberg and he would play Hermann Goering, which caused a stir among Eastern European audiences.
Goering was the highest-ranking Nazi official tried before the Nuremberg Military Courts in occupied Germany after World War II. He was sentenced to death for crimes against humanity before killing himself in his cell.
Crowe spoke about “Nuremberg” and his role in the film back in March.
“It’s just going to be very, very interesting,” he said said on The Ryan Tubridy Show.
“I read the script a few years ago and I really respect it,” he added.
Crowe said it took the film’s director “many years” to fund the project because it was an “awkward subject.” But the actor promised that “the drama that unfolds in the script is psychologically very intriguing.”
