Reports emerged in May that Hardy would not be returning for a potential third season<\/a> after alleged clashes with producers during production on season two. <\/p>\n Hardy was rumoured to have delayed his fellow actors during filming,<\/a> and unnamed sources said the actor \u201crefused to come out of his trailer for hours at a time\u201d.<\/p>\n Days later, a Variety report stated that Hardy had not been fired and that discussions over his return were still under way. The question of Hardy\u2019s future was finally settled earlier this month, when Paramount+ renewed MobLand for a third season and confirmed that Hardy would return<\/a>.<\/p>\n Brosnan said the reports \u201cblindsided\u201d the cast, as he had not been aware of any such rupture.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was my son who sent me the text one morning. I was away on vacation, and I couldn\u2019t believe it. I reached out to Tom, saying, \u2018I love you, mate. I love you,\u2019\u201d Pierce Brosnan told The Hollywood Reporter ahead of the show\u2019s second-season return.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd he and I, you know, we communicate. He\u2019s a painter. I\u2019m a painter. Both actors. But anyway, just to say, \u2018I\u2019m there. We\u2019re there. We love you.\u2019 So for me, it was kind of a storm in a teacup,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n Directed by Guy Ritchie, MobLand is a London-set crime drama about two rival organised crime families, the Harrigans and the Stevensons, whose battle for power threatens to destroy both dynasties. Tom Hardy stars as Harry Da Souza, a street-smart fixer caught between the warring families, while Pierce Brosnan plays Harrigan patriarch Conrad and Helen Mirren plays his wife, Maeve.<\/p>\n Mirren has already backed Hardy before<\/a>, sharing a photo of the actor on Instagram in May with the caption: \u201cLove you now and always, Helen.\u201d<\/p>\n On why she chose to intervene publicly<\/a>, Mirren said: \u201cWe live in the world of being talked about and interviewed in newspapers and so on and so forth. Pierce and I have both had many years of this and experience of it.\u201d<\/p>\n She continued: \u201cFalse rumours just should be knocked on the head, asap, which is why I did my post about Tom, not for Tom, but my absolutely genuine love of Tom.\u201d<\/p>\n The Thursday Murder Club star added that her support was \u201cpar for the course\u201d for a show where the cast is \u201call so mutually supportive of each other\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cVery often the actors get blamed for this sort of thing, and if there is a rumour, the immediate sort of blame can fall on actors. That\u2019s usually completely unfair,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n Mirren described Hardy and his character as \u201cthe anchor of this mad whirlwind\u201d, adding that no one on the cast is \u201ceven contemplating\u201d the series without the Mad Max: Fury Road actor.<\/p>\n \u201cTom is MobLand. Without Tom, we don\u2019t have MobLand,\u201d said Brosnan. \u201cHe is the centre. He allows us to play these crazy characters.\u201d<\/p>\n At the second-season premiere in London last week, Hardy, Brosnan, and Mirren appeared together on the red carpet<\/a>, putting on a united front. Brosnan downplayed the rumours, saying he was a \u201cmassive fan\u201d of Hardy\u2019s work<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are rock solid as a company, as a family. Everyone shows up for work, and everybody\u2019s just there on the spot. It moves very fast so it\u2019s not like we go out and socialise and go to the pub or anything like that,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Hardy said it was a \u201cprivilege\u201d to work with legendary actors like Mirren and Brosnan and watch them \u201cpushing the envelope\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cThey\u2019re awesome,\u201d he said. \u201cIn many aspects of course I look up to them. Coming up, these are actors that came before me.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":601987,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[430,156,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-601986","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601986","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=601986"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601986\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/601987"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=601986"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=601986"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=601986"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Pierce](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/GettyImages-2293992191.jpg\")
Pierce Brosnan and Helen Mirren have defended MobLand co-star Tom Hardy after reports of behind-the-scenes tensions cast doubt on his future in the Paramount+ crime drama (AFP via Getty Images)<\/p>\n![\"Tom](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Mobland.jpeg\")
Tom Hardy (right) allegedly kept ‘Mobland’ co-stars Pierce Brosnan (left) and Helen Mirren (middle) waiting on set ‘for hours’ (Paramount+)<\/p>\n