Bruce Willis exited The Expendables 3 because of $1 million

Last Updated on August 5, 2021

Yesterday Sylvester Stallone tweeted that Harrison Ford was joining THE EXPENDABLES 3 (excellent news!) and Bruce Willis had dropped out (bummer), but a lot of people were more interested in why Willis had left the project. Right after Stallone announced the news he followed it up with this tweet that many people thought might have been about Bruce Willis.

Turns out it was, the greed part anyway. A source for THR says the fallout was about (of course) money. Willis was offered $3 million for four days of work in Bulgaria (where the third movie will be filmed), but apparently he wanted more:

"He said he'd drop out unless he got $4 million," this source close to the production says. "A million dollars a day. Stallone and everybody else involved said no."

That's when Stallone reached out to Harrison Ford and snagged the actor for THE EXPENDABLES 3:

The insider adds, "I think [Willis] was pretty surprised he was replaced in 72 hours by Harrison Ford — a better actor, a much nicer person and a more interesting direction for the film."

OK, so to be fair after taxes and his agent's fee Bruce Willis was probably going to end up taking home closer to $2 million, but that's still for only four days of work. I'm sure many of us would have no problem working for that amount (hell, I'd eat my own fist for that price) but maybe it was just a little too low for Willis. Still, you'd think that since him and Sylvester Stallone are kind of buddies (they both invested in Planet Hollywood back in the 90s) Bruce Willis wouldn't have a problem with his paycheck, and it's not like he was going to be working for free or anything.

But you know what? Harrison Ford in THE EXPENDABLES 3 is fantastic news and if that means no Bruno in the third movie than so be it. It'll be his lost, not ours.

THE EXPENDABLES 3 is in theaters August 15th, 2014.