Sarah Michelle Gellar has talked about how shocked she was by Hulu’s decision to axe the Buffy the Vampire Slayer series and blamed an executive who was vocally “proud” that he hadn’t seen the original series.
The I Know What You Did Last Summer star said she was promoting her latest release Ready or Not 2 at the SXSW Film & TV Festival in Austin, Texas over the weekend, when she received the call about the series not going forward.
“Let me tell you, nobody saw this coming,” she told People magazine. “No one saw this coming, including the head of Searchlight.”
Searchlight Pictures is the production company behind Ready or Not 2 and the Buffy series.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which started airing in 1997, follows Buffy Summers, played by Sarah Michelle Gellar, the newest “slayer” fated to fight supernatural creatures like vampires.
She is guided in her quests by her watcher, Anthony Stewart Head’s Rupert Giles, and helped by a loyal group of friends, including powerful witch Willow Rosenberg, played by Alyson Hannigan, and Xander Harris, played by Nicholas Brendon. The series ended after seven seasons in 2003.
Reports about the new Buffy the Vampire Slayer series being in the works began doing the rounds in February, with Gellar confirming the same month that it was indeed in development. Hamnet director Chloe Zhao was set to direct, with Nora and Lilla Zuckerman writing the script.
The series was meant to follow a new slayer played by Ryan Kiera Armstrong, while Gellar, once again playing Buffy, would only be a recurring character.
Gellar called out the timing of the cancellation announcement, saying: “I got the call as we were stepping onto stage for the premiere of their own movie. And it’s also the weekend of Chloé [Zhao] going to the Oscars as a best director nominee for Hamnet.
“For them to call us on the Friday of what should have been Chloé’s victory lap for an incredible film, and my world premiere of something that I worked very hard for is…That says something.”
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The day after, Gellar posted a video on Instagram to share the cancellation news with fans, where she thanked Zhao without whom she didn’t think she “would find myself back in Buffy’s stylish yet affordable boots”.
Gellar brought up 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”.
“That’s very hard when you’re taking a property that is as beloved as Buffy, not just to the world, but to me and Chloé. So that tells you the uphill battle that we had been fighting since day one, when your executive is literally proud to tell you that he didn’t watch it.”
Gellar added that she had spoken to Zhao about it and the two shared the disappointment at the news. “We don’t want to let the fans down. That hurts. Saddened at how it was handled and when it was handled,” she said.
“But Buffy is timeless. And the one thing I do want all these fans to know is that legacy is still there and this doesn’t diminish it. It doesn’t change it. That legacy is still there – for them.”
On the Oscars red carpet on Monday, Zhao said she was “not surprised” by Hulu’s decision to cancel the sequel.
“I had an incredible, incredible time with Sarah [Michelle Gellar], with all the cast and crew doing this. And we, first and foremost, see ourselves as the guardians of the original show,” Zhao told Variety‘s Ramin Setoodeh and CNN’s Elizabeth Wagmeister.
“Our priority for Sarah and for us has always been to be truthful to the show, to be truthful to our fans. So, things happen for a reason, and we keep our hearts open and we welcome the mystery. And what this might lead us to.”
On whether the duo will be looking for other streamers or distributors for the series to be resurrected in, Zhao only repeated: “Welcome the mystery.”
However, a source familiar with the project told People magazine that Disney owned the IP to the show and “as it stands today, it can’t go elsewhere”.
Other sources have said that the “door is open for more Buffy” and there is still a “lot of love for the IP”.
The Independent has reached out to Hulu for comment.
