Ridley Scott Describes His Original Gladiator 2 Opening Scene With Russell Crowe, And Now I Need To See This
Sir Ridley Scott has enjoyed a long and illustrious career, one that extends all the way back to Alien and Blade Runner (two of his absolute best) and continues to the historical epic Napoleon, which is enjoying a theatrical run before making its way to AppleTV+ later on this year. The prolific director, who is staying busy well into his eighties, is moving right back to Gladiator 2, which was delayed thanks to the SAG-AFTRA strike but is ready to resume production ahead of a planned 2024 release. The long-awaited sequel to Scott’s Oscar-winning Gladiator has gone through multiple iterations over the years, many of which we break down here, and during a recent conversation, the director gave more details to the opening scene he had crafted that would have used original Gladiator star, Russell Crowe.
Ridley Scott was a guest on CinemaBlend’s official podcast, ReelBlend, to talk all things Napoleon. And towards the end of the conversation, we brought up Gladiator 2, knowing that the director was in the middle of his shoot. We mentioned the fact that there have been numerous versions of Gladiator 2 available for people, and brought up the ones that once included Russell Crowe. As you likely will recall, Crowe’s character Maximus dies in the arena, having faced down Commodus (Joaquin Phoenix). But Scott figured out how to bring Crowe back, and once envisioned a Gladiator 2 movie that opened as such:
Nick Cave wrote the script, but I had the idea. I knew how to bring him back through a portal, back to the real world. I'm not going tell you what it is, because somebody will steal it. . … I talked to Nick every other day for about a month as he was writing it. And so I said, ‘We can bring him back this way.’ And what I want to do is start the film in Styx, on the edge of the ocean, and you see him, this warrior, wandering in armor. Then, it’s Maximus wandering, looking for where he's going to go next. That's Scene One.
Where the story went from there is anyone’s guess. Gladiator 2 stopped and started for so many reasons, leading to a near 25-year gap between the initial movie and the pending sequel. And while it’s unlikely that Crowe appears in the movie, the cast that Ridley Scott has assembled will melt anyone’s face. Denzel Washington, Pedro Pascal, Connie Nielsen, Paul Mescal, Djimon Hounsou, Joseph Quinn and more will be part of Scott’s sequel. And now, hopefully, people can stop asking Russell Crowe about the Gladiator sequel, because you know he’s been dealing with that inquiry for two decades.
Here’s the full interview with Sir Ridley Scott on the ReelBlend podcast:
And make sure that you are bookmarking our guide to all of the upcoming 2024 movies hitting theaters. It includes Gladiator 2, of course, but also lays out the calendar year and will stay updated as dates and titles change, because you know that shifts inevitably occur.
