We Were Supposed to Get a New Pharrell Williams Movie Today…What Happened?

Whenever new technology (like digital cameras or streaming media) enters the cinematic landscape, it’s said that these tools will “democratize” filmmaking and finally let more people make movies than ever before. That’s true to an extent, but it also feels like, in this decidedly modern age, more movies than ever are inaccessible. That’s true even of new releases from major studios. Does anyone remember a prior era where headlines were filled with news stories about projects like Batgirl getting pulled during post-production? Gigantic steps forward in technology have (combined with the horrors of corporate consolidation) coincided with high-profile new features vanishing in post-production at an alarming rate.

Case in point: This weekend, we were supposed to house a new Pharrell Williams musical by director Michel Gondry. This enticing creative union, entitled Golden, had Universal Pictures financing and distributing, not to mention an all-star cast. However, this production will never see the light of day. It’s just another modern case of an occurrence that used to be unprecedented: a big movie vanishing months before its release.

Golden started life as Atlantis and had a tortured existence from the start when it was first developed at 20th Century Fox in March 2017. Eight months later, the Fox/Disney deal would happen and basically kill any Fox projects that weren’t either Free Guy or continuations of Fox’s three biggest franchises. Unsurprisingly, Atlantis went silent for years. It would take seven more years for its revival as a Universal Pictures joint. Not only did the production have a new name, but now Michel Gondry was in the director’s chair. This filmmaker had spent the years after 2011’s Green Hornet doing indie cinema, motion pictures in his native country of France, and directing eight episodes of the Showtime Jim Carrey program Kidding.

Now, the Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind/Be Kind Rewind mastermind was back in the American major studio system doing an original musical from Pharrell Williams. But what would this project be about? Williams described the production to Empire in November 2024 as a period piece set in Virginia Beach in 1977. This would’ve put Golden right in the hometown of Williams when this musician was four years old and beginning to develop his love for music. Golden wouldn’t be an exact autobiography of his youth (the film’s leads were going to be much older in 1977 than four-year-old Williams), but it still would’ve been a profoundly personal project.

“It’s a coming-of-age story about self-discovery and pursuing your dreams, but it’s so much more magical than that,” Williams explained to Empire. “It’s a celebration of Black life, Black culture, and most importantly, Black joy.” Musical cinema veteran Kelvin Harrison Jr. and Halle Bailey were playing the two lead roles. The supporting cast, meanwhile, featured incredible names like Da’Vine Joy Randolph, Quinta Brunson, Jaboukie Young-White, Tim Meadows, Andre 3000, Brian Tyree Henry, and more. Oh, and my mortal enemies Benj Pasek and Justin Paul co-writing the songs. When I think of artists exemplifying “Black joy,” it’s the Dear Evan Hansen songwriters.

All signs pointed towards Golden being a fascinating little project, especially since it was poised to become the first live-action musical released to theaters after Wicked’s astonishing box office run. Then, in February 2025, just three months after Williams talked to Empire Magazine about Golden, the movie was gone. Variety reported that Williams and Gondry had both decided that Golden wasn’t up to their quality standards and would never see the light of day. This apparently wasn’t Universal’s decision (in contrast to Warner Bros. forcing the shutdowns on Batgirl and Coyote vs. Acme), but just came down from the creatives.

It’s a weird scenario, nearly unprecedented in the history of major studios. Countless indie films like Killing Winston Jones, The Long Home, and Hippie Hippie Shake with smaller budgets were shut down or shelved in post-production. A major studio release that had a reported $20 million plunged into it, though, was radically different. Whether intentional or not, this maneuver from Gondry or Williams reflects increased artist and studio executive paranoia alike over how movies go over. Just look at how Apple executives allegedly skipped over giving further non-F1 original movies theatrical runs over sensitivity towards reports over the poor box office runs of Argylle and Fly Me to the Moon.

Meanwhile, the major studios have titles like Distant and True Haunting, all shot at the dawn of the 2020s, sitting on a shelf somewhere. The days of even toxic releases like The Adventures of Pluto Nash or Battlefield Earth still hitting theaters are over. Studio executives want to play it safe and don’t want to risk getting their names connected to another Cats-sized punchline. It’s impossible to tell if the timidity informing these corporate figures also infiltrated Williams and Gondry’s respective headspaces. Whether it did or not, though, jettisoning a musical in post-production certainly echoes these tempered tendencies.

However, to be fair to Golden and the folks behind it, a friend of mine speculated one very likely and simple reason for its demise: Michel Gondry’s mental health struggles. This is totally conjecture and not based on any “inside whispers” from the industry. However, a 2023 piece on Gondry’s return to filmmaking noted that the director had been through a “very dark reality” in grappling with “mental health struggles.” This included what the piece describes as bouts of “megalomania” and perfectionist tendencies. Could Golden, in its post-production phase, not quite living up to what Gondry had in his mind have provoked these psychological woes?

If so, it would add a human dimension to why the project won’t see the light of day. Regardless of whether or not it did, Gondry’s mental health is infinitely more important than a movie.

Williams intended Golden to be a richly human celebration of life and Black culture. Such a cavalcade of splendor will only exist in people’s minds now, as this star-studded musical will never see the light of day.