Netflix restarts work on paused Will Smith film

The exec pointed out that Smith's blacklist by the industry was less about the slap and more about his actions after.

Following the slap, the Men in Black star returned to his seat, accepted his Oscar award for best actor, and then attended the Vanity Fair after party where he sang along to his Grammy Award-winning rap track Gettin' Jiggy Wit It. This sequence of events demonstrated to the public that the actor was not at the very least remorseful about his actions. This swayed public opinion further against him.

While there isn't much information on the film, Fast and Loose will chronicle the life of a crime boss, John Riley, who loses his memory following an attack. After he wakes up in Tijuana, the criminal attempts to discover who he is. However, things are not what they seem as he finds out that he led a double life before the attack incident.

Apparently, a wealthy crime boss was one of his two identities with the other one being that of a broke undercover CIA agent.

David Leitch was originally attached to direct the project based on a screenplay by Erich and Jon Hoeber. Unfortunately, a week before the Oscar awards ceremony, the John Wick director dropped the project in favor of working on Fall Guy, the upcoming Universal Pictures action thriller led by Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt. Netflix had put out a call for a new director for the film prior to placing it on hold. At the moment, there is no indication that the streamer has found a replacement.

In the meantime, the victim of Smith's violence, Chris Rock, revealed in his recently released live-streamed comedy special on Netflix, Selective Outrage, that he's not ready to move on from the incident just yet.

In other news, although unconfirmed by Disney,Smith will reprise his role as the genie in a second installment of Aladdin, which is set to begin production this year. Also, the 2023 Oscar Awards ceremony was held this past weekend. The Michelle Yeoh-led Everything Everywhere All at Once was the night's big winner with seven wins from eleven nominations.