Jennifer Lawrence Removes Herself From Adam McKay's Bad Blood Project
Elizabeth Holmes was once the founder of a $9 billion company called Theranos after claiming to have invented a device that can run blood tests with only a few drops of blood. However, in 2015, an article in the Wall Street Journal revealed doubts about the accuracy of Holmes' device, reporting that the company was using traditional blood testing machines bought from other companies to run its tests. Holmes' empire came crashing down, and in January of 2022, she was found guilty of four counts of defrauding investors, and potentially faces a maximum of 20 years in prison for each count (per The Mercury News). The story was so dramatic, it seemed made for Hollywood, and soon everyone wanted to make their own version of the story.
Entertainment Weekly compiled a list of all the media depictions of the story, including HBO's documentary "The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley," the ABC News podcast "The Dropout," the "20/20" special episode also called "The Dropout," the Hulu limited series "The Dropout" which is based on the podcast, the podcast "Bad Blood: The Final Chapter" created by John Carreyrou who wrote the Wall Street Journal article that exposed Holmes' fraud, and the upcoming "Bad Blood" film for Apple TV+ based on Carryrou's book about Holmes.
Variety reported in December 2021 that the "Bad Blood" film would be written, directed, and produced by Adam McKay with Jennifer Lawrence signed on to play Holmes. Now news has come out that Lawrence has dropped off the project, and her reasons for doing so make a lot of sense.
Jennifer Lawrence thought the story didn't need to be told again
New York Times reporter Kyle Buchanan tweeted on November 2nd that Lawrence had dropped out of "Bad Blood." According to Buchanan, Lawrence thought the story had already been told well enough in the Hulu limited series "The Dropout" and that Amanda Seyfried, who plays Elizabeth Holmes in the series, already did a great job with the role. "I thought she was terrific," Lawrence was quoted as saying. "I was like, 'Yeah, we don't need to redo that.' She did it." With so many versions of the story out there, it does seem like adding one more movie would be a bit of overkill.
It's not unheard of for Hollywood to double dip when it comes to true stories. In 2013, Ashton Kutcher starred as Apple founder Steve Jobs in the film "Jobs," but only two years later Michael Fassbender took up the same role in the movie "Steve Jobs." Similarly, the 2005 biopic "Capote" about Truman Capote was soon followed by another film about the same subject called "Infamous" in 2006.
But an actor announcing that she won't do the project because it's a story that has already been told in another medium is almost unprecedented. As @BoyandPiano exclaimed in response to Buchanan's tweet about Lawrence, "Somebody in Hollywood saying, 'We don't need to redo that'?!" Another Twitter user, @VallyOMally responded by saying "More actors need this mind set" with @dbking65 chiming in and calling it "quite refreshing." So it would seem that fans are applauding Lawrence's decision not to rehash a story that's already been told.