‘Fast & Furious’ Producer Files Lawsuit Over The Rock Spin-Off

Dwayne Johnson

‘Fast & Furious’ Producer Files Lawsuit Over The Rock Spin-Off

It seems like Tyrese isn’t the only one unhappy with The Rock and  Jason Statham’s  The Fast and The Furious spin-off, Hobbs and Shaw. The franchise’s producer, Neal Moritz, also has issues.

Moritz is suing Universal over breach of an oral contract and promissory fraud when they shut him out of the spin-off film. “This case presents a classic example of Hollywood greed,” he said in his filing.

Moritz is asking that he be put back on as lead producer of the film or Universal must compensate him tens of millions of dollars in damages in lost wages.

Neal Moritz says,

In an extraordinary show of bad faith, and just a few days before filming was set to begin on Hobbs and Shaw, Universal took the position that Moritz either had to amend his oral producer deal to accept substantially inferior financial terms or be cut out of the Picture altogether. Remarkably, despite Moritz having complete Pay-or-Play protection on all of his last several deals on the FF Franchise and having relied on Universal’s oral promises, Universal also took the extraordinary position that it was free to exploit Moritz’s ideas for Hobbs and Shaw, and his work product over an approximately year-and-a-half period, without honoring its oral producer agreement.

His complaint continues,

Indeed, Universal has claimed that it can move forward with Hobbs and Shaw without providing Moritz with any credit or compensation,” the document says, asserting that the veteran producer was essentially dropped September 7 after not agreeing to the significant reduction in his overall compensation that the studio seemingly sprung on him during then summer. “If Universal believes that it can treat one of its most successful producers with such extraordinary bad faith, one can only imagine how Universal treats its lesser established producers.