Adam McKay said that he and Paul Rudd had worked for around six to eight weeks together in rewriting the script for the upcoming Marvel superhero film "Ant-Man." And he said that they made it "a little bigger, a little more aggressive, and funnier in places."
"I've always known Paul Rudd's a really good writer from improvising with him on set, but I had no idea he was that good-he's really great with dialogue," McKay, 46, recently told Collider while promoting the upcoming short film series "We the Economy: 20 Short Films You Can't Afford to Miss." "So the two of us holed up in hotel rooms on the east and west coast, and I think it was like six to eight weeks we just ground it out and did a giant rewrite of the script. I was really proud of what we did, I really thought we put some amazing stuff."
McKay and Rudd, 45, who plays Scott Lang / Ant-Man on the film, rewrote the script penned by Joe Cornish and Edgar Wright, after the latter exited the project in May.
"We added some new action beats," McKay said. "I grew up on Marvel Comics so the geek in me was in heaven that I got to add a giant action sequence to the movie; I was so excited. There's a lot that's already in there from what Edgar did, there's a lot of dialogue and character still in there."
"We just shaped the whole thing, we just tried to streamline it, make it cleaner, make it a little bigger, a little more aggressive, make it funnier in places-we just basically did a rewrite," McKay told the film website. "Edgar had a really good script. But we just had a blast, and Rudd was just so much fun to write with. I walked away saying, 'Hey, you and I gotta write a script together.'"
Wright vacated the film's director's chair over creative differences with Marvel. "Marvel and Edgar Wright jointly announced today that the studio and director have parted ways on 'Ant-Man' due to differences in their visions of the film," read a statement released by the studio and the filmmaker at the time, according to Deadline.
Two weeks after Wright left the project, Marvel tapped Peyton Reed to be the new director of the movie. When asked by Entertainment Weekly at the San Diego Comic-Con last July if Reed has had a conversation with Wright as part of the transition, Reed revealed that they "did exchange some emails." "Actually very good emails," he said.
Aside from Rudd, the film also stars Michael Douglas, Evangeline Lilly, Corey Stoll and John Slattery.
"Ant-Man" is slated for a July 17, 2015 release.