Hilary Duff Out Of The Story Of Bonnie And Clyde

Hilary Duff is out of The Story of Bonnie and Clyde. EW reports that not long after Hilary Duff announced she is pregnant with her first child, Cypress Moon Productions, the company behind the remake, announced that they were moving forward without the actress.

This caused many to leap to the conclusion that Hilary Duff had been fired because she is pregnant, a charge the filmmakers vehemently deny. On the film’s Facebook page Anita Brazil Pace, the studio manager of Cypress Moon Studios, told angry Hilary Duff fans…

“This is NOT accurate information coming from the media. We are scheduled to go on this movie in October/November and we were told that Hilary would not be available until next June.”

Also out of The Story of Bonnie and Clyde is the film’s Clyde, Gossip Girl star Kevin Zegers. According to the studio, Zegers informed them that he would not be available until January which forces the company to look for a another new star.

In their statement to Entertainment Weekly regarding both Duff and Zegers’ departure from the film Cypress Moon Studios said

“While production has been pushed several times due to financial, scheduling and other factors such as tornadoes devastating some of our locations, we are currently gearing up to start production later this year. Unfortunately we now faced with scheduling conflicts with our leads Hilary Duff and Kevin Zegers. We were told that Duff would not be available until June 2012 and that Zegers would not be available until January of the new year. Due to our obligations with investors and international buyers it is imperative that we stick to our current schedule. Therefore we are forced to explore other options for the two lead roles. Unfortunately this happens all the time in the world of filmmaking”

The Story of Bonnie and Clyde has been kicking around since 2009 when writer-director Tonya S. Holly announced the project with both Hilary Duff and Kevin Zegers as the new Bonnie and Clyde. The announcement led to a backlash among film fans that consider the 1967 Bonnie & Clyde, starring Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway, to be the definitive telling of the Bonnie and Clyde story. This was despite Holly’s protest that The Story of Bonnie and Clyde was not intended as a remake of the 1967 feature.

Star Faye Dunaway then stirred the controversy by trashing Hilary Duff telling a reporter “Couldn’t they at least cast a real actress.” Duff fired back by telling reporters that her fans don’t know who Faye Dunaway is followed by pointed comments about Dunaway’s plastic surgery.

There is one more wrinkle to this story and more trouble looming for The Story of Bonnie and Clyde. As we reported, Limitless director Neil Burger has begun work on a Bonnie and Clyde adaptation with screenwriter Sheldon Turner said to be writing the script.

Regardless of the competing project and the lack of lead actor and actress, The Story of Bonnie and Clyde is still scheduled to go into production later this year. We will keep you posted when or if a new Bonnie and Clyde are cast.