Chris Tucker Claims No Responsibility For 'Rush Hour 3' Delay
It was a long road to get Rush Hour 3 into theaters, and director Brett Ratner and stars Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker all have their own versions of why there was a six-year lag between sequels. Ratner says he was always on board for another installment but since the powers that be were dragging their feet, he did movies like Red Dragon and X-Men 3 in the meantime. Similarly, Chan was willing to reprise his role as Chief Inspector Lee, but busied himself on other movies until he knew the project was a go for sure.
Chris Tucker spent the time between sequels mostly out of the public eye and at the same time, he was blamed for holding up the third movie in order to get a bigger paycheck. Tucker won't argue that he was well paid for Rush Hour 3 but he said the real reason the movie was held up was because there were script issues and New Line Cinema touted the sequel way before it was a done deal: "I had to make sure that it was gonna to be just as good as Rush Hour 1 or 2. And also, we never planned on doing a Rush Hour 2 or 3. Studios put the word out there saying, 'Oh, they're going to do another 3' and then they come to us and say, 'Do you want to do another one?' That's what really happens. Takes a little while."
Rush Hour 3 cost $140 million to make and earned more than a third of that back in its first weekend in theaters.
It was a long road to get Rush Hour 3 into theaters, and director Brett Ratner and stars Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker all have their own versions of why there was a six-year lag between sequels. Ratner says he was always on board for another installment but since the powers that be were dragging their feet, he did movies like Red Dragon and X-Men 3 in the meantime. Similarly, Chan was willing to reprise his role as Chief Inspector Lee, but busied himself on other movies until he knew the project was a go for sure.
