Lionsgate has issued an apology and taken down its most recent trailer for legendary director Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis, amidst misinformation in claims depicted in the video.
Supposedly, the trailer had numerous quotes attributed to well-known industry critics that were never said by them. It’s unclear where the quotes were even sourced from, but they were attributed to big names such as Roger Ebert, Pauline Kael, and Variety’s Owen Gleiberman.
Gleiberman said: “Even if you’re one of those people who don’t like critics, we hardly deserve to have words put in our mouths. Then again, the trivial scandal of all this is that the whole Megalopolis trailer is built on a false narrative.”
A spokesperson for Lionsgate said: “Lionsgate is immediately recalling our trailer for Megalopolis. We offer our sincere apologies to the critics involved and to Francis Ford Coppola and American Zoetrope for this inexcusable error in our vetting process. We screwed up. We are sorry.”
This is just the latest in a series of incidents surrounding the gargantuan indie project, with it receiving mixed critical reviews from festivals and a previous scandal in which footage surfaced of the director trying to kiss young female extras on set, behaviour which many in the industry have called unprofessional (thanks, Variety).