Will Jonathan Majors’ Magazine Dreams ever see the light of day?
Magazine Dreams will be shopped to new distributors, but Jonathan Majors' domestic violence trial looms large over the film
Aux News Magazine Dreams
“Everything has kinda gone away,” Jonathan Majors said in his first interview following the domestic violence case involving his ex-girlfriend, Grace Jabbari. He referred to his career, which has dried up entirely in the wake of the guilty verdict. Marvel fired him from playing their next big villain, Kang the Conqueror, and he was dropped from the Dennis Rodman biopic 48 Hours In Vegas. Now, Magazine Dreams, which was shelved by Searchlight amid Majors’ legal troubles, has been dropped by the distributor entirely.
Relative to the situation, Searchlight letting go of the film could be seen as a positive development. According to Deadline, rights to Magazine Dreams have reverted to the filmmakers who can now shop the movie to other distributors, which means the movie actually has a chance of getting a theatrical release. But any distributor considering taking on Magazine Dreams has to contend with the same issues Searchlight did, which is not only having Majors in the lead role but in this lead role, playing a violent, isolated, obsessive bodybuilder.
At the beginning of 2023, Majors’ commitment to writer-director Elijah Bynum’s vision was generating early Oscars buzz. The A.V. Club’s Murtada Elfadl wrote that “Magazine Dreams is visceral and intense but ultimately feels like only a half-realized portrait,” nevertheless noting that “Majors, using his elastic face to convey a multitude of emotions, gives the type of physically transformative performance that gets people talking about awards.” The project premiered at the Sundance Film Festival alongside Celine Song’s Past Lives. While that film has endured as part of the awards conversation, Magazine Dreams saw its dreams cut short when Majors was accused of abuse in March of that year.
In describing the abuse and manipulation she endured in their relationship, Jabbari specifically cited the period in which Majors was preparing for Magazine Dreams as one of tumult and violence. She testified that during this time he flew into a “rage,” verbally berating her and throwing glass. And though the altercation between the formal couple in March brought Majors to court, a Rolling Stone exposé revealed further allegations of emotional abuse and aggressive behavior towards past partners and colleagues in Majors’ history.
In the trial, Majors was found guilty of just two of the four charges brought against him, specifically reckless assault in the third degree and harassment. The jury found he was not guilty of intentional assault in the third degree and not guilty of aggravated harassment in the second degree. The conviction nevertheless served as a nail in the coffin of this chapter of the actor’s career. Disney (parent company of both Marvel and Searchlight), which had held out on making any public decisions on his employment, only cut ties with Majors once the verdict was handed down.
In his interview with ABC News, Majors said he hopes “other people think that” he deserves a second chance, adding that he prays he still has a future in Hollywood: “It’s God’s plan and God’s timing.” But the interview itself could have further damaged Majors’ chances at relaunching his career; a PR expert described the decision as a “high risk, low reward strategy” to The Hollywood Reporter. Doubling down on comparing his partners to Coretta Scott King, for example, prompted King’s children to speak out against him—a situation that certainly wouldn’t endear him any further to the entertainment industry.
So while Magazine Dreams may be back on the market, its prospects look quite grim. Big distributors aren’t likely to back Majors at this juncture, so its best hope would be a smaller company with a smaller budget. Even if it did get a robust theatrical release, Majors’ name won’t re-enter awards conversations as long as his conviction is still fresh in public memory. And his reputation in turn hurts the chances for the rest of the film; see how Antoine Fuqua’s Emancipation slipped through the cracks after Will Smith’s slap scandal. Unfortunately for everyone else who worked on the film, it seems like Magazine Dreams is fated to fade away.
20 Comments
“In the trial, Majors was found guilty of just two of the four charges brought against him”
Just?
What the fuck are you talking about “just”? What the holy shit is wrong with you?
as lame as majors ended up being in his personal life, it is wild how many interesting black actors we’ve lost in the last few years, young and old.i don’t feel bad for majors in any way shape or form, nor do i think he’s entitled to work, but between andre braugher, chadwick boseman, lance reddick, michael k williams and majors now deleting his career it’s just a shame all around.
between andre braugher, chadwick boseman, lance reddick, michael k williams and majors now
…one of these things is not like the others.
yeah man i did my best to illustrate that in the post! you even cut off the part mid-sentence haha.
I just have to say it’s very strange to cite four deaths in about as many years, lump in a career imploding as the fallout of violent behavior, and then cast that broadly as some phenomenon of “losing” black actors. If four (or five, i guess) black actors are a significant percentage of black actors one’s aware of or finds interesting, one may want to become aware of more black actors.
alright buddy. all i said was it’s a shame we’ve lost so many in a short period of time, most of whom died, and also consider majors’ career an artistic loss. draw whatever weird conclusions about me you want.i apologize that my being sad about something got a rise out of you. i’ll try harder to either be less sad about it or differently sad.
boy, you really stretched to get there.
Everyone form a protective wall around Sterling K. Brown!
As a Briton, I ask that you repatriate Colin Salmon, Idris Elba and Chiwetel Ejiofor back to the UK immediately, just in case.
Better pull Jeffrey Wright in as well.
DailyWire+ baby
You can watch it as a double feature with the “comedy” Lady Ballers after the kids get tired out watching the terrible conservative attempt to make Bluey
Maybe he can get Nate Parker to help distribute.
lol Good luck with that. But it is too bad for everyone else who was depending on the film’s release.
At least everyone (especially the crew) would have already been paid, but yes, it’s a shame that one shitty person messes it up for everyone else who (presumably) worked hard on the film.
That’s true! I didn’t know if there were actors in it who were hoping its release would be their big break. But yeah I guess it’s always a gamble. At least they have something for their audition reels, and did get paid.
I want to see it, and I hope it does get released. I’m assuming it will go straight to streaming/VOD, and will be pretty much buried, though.
I know they’re both banned from Oscars now for at least a while but what if he worked with Will Smith. Perhaps he can be in Hancock 2 or whatever the sequel ends up being called. He could start out a super heel/thorn in Smith’s side but ultimately become his reliable sidekick when an even bigger threat shows up…
…chris rock or grace jabbari?
it’ll wind up distributed by one of those random Eurotrash companies that keeps pumping out Kevin Spacey movies.