Hollywood loves to pair up their hottest stars almost as much as I like to state the obvious; Jennifer Lawrence and Chris Pratt were scooped up by Sony earlier in the year to star in PASSENGERS but the film then encountered some resistance due to its budget.
PASSENGERS has been in development for quite some time, Jon Spaihts' script found itself on the 2007 Black List where it attracted the attention of Keanu Reeves, who was at one point attached to both star in and produce the film alongside Rachael McAdams. The project eventually fell through but Spaihts' script for PASSENGERS led to Spaihts putting together the first draft for PROMETHEOUS.
Here's what PASSENGERS is all about:
PASSENGERS follows a man (Chris Pratt) who finds himself woken ninety years early from cryogenic sleep on board a colony ship partway through its decades long journey through space. Faced with the prospect of spending decades alone he decides to wake up another passenger (Jennifer Lawrence) which sparks a unique romance between the two.
The project began prior to Tom Rothman's appointment as Sony Pictures’ new motion picture chairman so Rothman attempted to get the budget down to $90 million from $120 million only to finally relent when the filmmakers threatened to take the project elsewhere. A large portion of the budget will be covering Jennifer Lawrence and Chris Pratt's hefty salaries; Pratt will receive $12 million while Lawrence will score $20 million against 30 percent of the profit after the movie breaks even. Morten Tyldum, director of THE IMITATION GAME, is set to direct PASSENGERS which will begin filming in September.