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Posted in: Current News, Hulu, TV | Tagged: btvs, buffy, buffy the vampire slayer
Buffy Star Gellar on Hoping Pilot Never Leaks, Avoiding Leaked Script
Sarah Michelle Gellar hopes the Buffy the Vampire Slayer: New Sunnydale pilot never leaks and that fans avoid the script that leaked online.
Article Summary
- Sarah Michelle Gellar urges fans not to seek out the leaked Buffy: New Sunnydale pilot or script online.
- Gellar explains pilots are unfinished products meant as learning tools, not final representations of a series.
- She emphasizes the leaked script is not the actual vision of the Buffy reboot team or a finalized version.
- Hulu canceled the new Buffy reboot, despite positive feedback on the more adult and streaming-focused rewrite.
From calling out the timing of when the team was hit with the bad news to calling out an executive "who was not only not a fan of the original, but was proud to constantly remind us that he had never seen the entirety of the series and how it wasn't for him," Sarah Michelle Gellar isn't hesitating to go on the record about her feelings regarding Hulu's decision to not move forward with her, Showrunners Nora Zuckerman and Lila Zuckerman, director and executive producer Chloé Zhao, and EP Gail Berman's Geller and Ryan K. Armstrong-starring Buffy the Vampire Slayer: New Sunnydale. As Gellar sees it, the Buffy reboot "deserves respect. And when I don't see it being given the respect, then I have to stand up for that because that's important to me." Checking in with SiriusXM's Page Six Radio, Gellar explained why she hopes the pilot never leaks online, despite the Buffyverse wanting to get their hands on it.
"I actually hope it doesn't because then everyone's going to have an opinion on this and that, and pilots are not finished," Gellar said. "It wasn't done, right? It's not like we did a season and finished it and then they shelved it. It's not like when they made the Batgirl movie and didn't [release] it. That movie was finished. You make a pilot — and I want to clarify this — we made a pilot [first instead of a full season] on purpose because there's some new characters and you want to see how it goes. There are things you learn from it, and there are things you fix. Usually, [the first version of a] pilot doesn't air … it's a learning tool. The original Buffy pilot [had] nothing to do with the show. It was a different Willow. It was a very different show. But those are learning tools and that's what a pilot is."
As for the draft that's out making the rounds online, Gellar urges fans to avoid reading it because it's not the finalized version of the pilot script. "I've seen a version of the script out there. It's not actually correct. That stuff is really unfortunate, and I ask fans if you see scripts — if you see it leaked — don't watch it because you're not getting our vision and all of that," Gellar explained. Deadline Hollywood's reporting from earlier this week noted from "multiple sources" that the streamer's biggest concern was that the pilot "played too young" and felt "small." Reportedly, the studios and creative team wanted to keep the spirit of the original series' modest budget look and vibe. The Zuckermans' rewrite was reportedly 90 minutes long: "It was more adult, featuring a lot more of Gellar's Buffy, and was described as a more of a streaming than a network show." DH reports that "the rewrite was well received at both studios, 20th TV and Searchlight TV, triggering the internal talk of a pending pickup, with at least one executive in charge 'putting everything on the line' for it, as one person put it."
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