'Texas Chainsaw Massacre' Sequel Directors Replaced, And All Of Their Footage Has Been Scrapped
Ryan and Andy Tohill, the duo behind the 2018 British-Irish film The Dig, were hired back in February to direct Legendary's new Texas Chainsaw Massacre sequel, which picks up the story after the events of Tobe Hooper's original 1974 film. But things went south quickly once they got to the set, because the studio is completely starting over after just a week of production: the duo has now been replaced behind the camera and all of the footage they shot has been thrown out.
According to Deadline, Andy and Ryan Tohill walked away from the project after a week of shooting in Bulgaria, due to "some creative differences." The report says Legendary "didn't spark to what it saw" from the directors' first week's worth of work, so the decision was made in the last 48 hours to start from scratch.
"The Tohills' vision is exactly what the fans want," producer Fede Alvarez said earlier this year. "It's violent, exciting and so depraved that it will stay with you forever." Looks like he spoke too soon, because the Tohills are out, and David Blue Garcia is in. The Emmy-winning, Texas-based Garcia has directed several commercials and served as the cinematographer on the meta horror-comedy Blood Fest, but he only has one film under his belt as a director: a 2018 feature called Tejano that was shot in his hometown for just $58,000. You can watch the full feature on HBO Max right now. Check out a teaser for Tejano below to get an idea of what he can do with a micro-budget:
Elsie Fisher (Eighth Grade), Sarah Yarkin (Happy Death Day 2U), Jacob Latimore (The Maze Runner), and Moe Dunford (Vikings) lead the cast. This is the first we've heard about Fisher's involvement here, and after loving her performance in Eighth Grade, we're excited to see what she does with a more overt type of horror movie. (Junior high was really hard for some people, OK?) Chris Thomas Devlin is writing the script, while Fede Alvarez and Rodolfo Sayagues, who brought us Don't Breathe and the Evil Dead remake, are producing alongside Kim Henkel, the writer of the original movie. Production has been shut down this week to accommodate the behind the scenes changes, and it sounds like the plan is to get back up and running soon in Bulgaria.
If you want to know more about this Texas Chainsaw Massacre sequel's new director, he gets into some of his origin story and his approach to filmmaking in the following video: