Movies News

Denzel Washington gets off 'Unstoppable' train

By Adnan Tezer Jul 14, 2009, 23:53 GMT

Denzel Washington won’t be catching the "Unstoppable" train.

According to Variety, insiders close to the actor confirm that after waiting for 20th Century Fox to set a budget and a start date, Washington has formally withdrawn from the film and is looking at other projects for the fall.

Once Washington and his reps came to that decision, passed on Fox’s offer and started entertaining other projects, Fox prepared to come back to the table with a different offer that the studio hoped would entice the two-time Oscar winner to reconsider his decision.

Washington had planned since April to re-team with Tony Scott, this time to play a veteran engineer who jumps into a locomotive with a young conductor ("Star Trek’s" Chris Pine) to halt an unmanned runaway train filled with a toxic chemical.

Though it had a marketable combination of director, star and up-and-coming co-star, the studio was trying to cut the budget. Sources said that after cutting a $107 million tab down to $100 million, Fox wants it in the low $90 million range. The studio asked Scott to cut his salary from $9 million to $6 million, and wanted Washington to shave $4 million off his $20 million fee. Washington declined.

The picture also ran into poor timing: The Scott-Washington-John Travolta remake of "Pelham 1,2,3" has posted only $60 million domestically at a time when studios are looking to cut costs at every corner.

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