{"id":652977,"date":"2026-06-22T22:44:15","date_gmt":"2026-06-22T22:44:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/652977\/"},"modified":"2026-06-22T22:44:15","modified_gmt":"2026-06-22T22:44:15","slug":"madonna-movie-dead-at-universal-after-budget-dispute-singer-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/652977\/","title":{"rendered":"Madonna Movie Dead at Universal After Budget Dispute, Singer Says"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tMadonna<\/a> revealed to Interview magazine<\/a> that a falling out with Universal Pictures<\/a> is the reason her movie biopic never went into production. The studio won a multi-studio auction in 2021 to make a film about Madonna\u2019s life, with the pop icon on board to co-write and direct the movie. Screenwriters such as Diablo Cody and Erin Cressida Wilson were attached to the film over the years, while \u201cOzark\u201d Emmy winner Julia Garner<\/a> won the part of Madonna 2022 after a highly-publicized<\/a> audition boot camp.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI was supposed to make a movie about my life. I worked on my script for two years and spent two years at Universal Studios with the line producers doing budgeting and casting,\u201d Madonna told the publication. \u201cWe had a falling out, me and Universal, regarding budget because I needed \u2014 I\u2019ve had an extraordinary life. I\u2019ve had a huge life, so I needed a big budget. You know what I mean?\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAccording to Madonna, Universal \u201ccouldn\u2019t get their heads around\u201d the budget required to make a biopic on her life, so she tried to bring the price tag down by finding \u201ca way to make it for less money in Serbia.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cMaybe they just didn\u2019t believe in me,\u201d Madonna said. \u201cOne of their first reactions was, \u2018We don\u2019t believe you\u2019d stay in Serbia more than four days.\u2019 And I said, \u2018Did you read the script?\u2019 My whole life has been survival. I\u2019m not going there for a holiday. But anyway, I was in limbo when that fell apart, and then Netflix reached out to make a series. That was a whole other long process, because I couldn\u2019t use the script I had with Universal unless I bought it from them for an extortionist\u2019s price, even though I wrote it. Don\u2019t ask.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThat\u2019s just the way it goes,\u201d she continued. \u201cI started trying to understand how making a series would work. It\u2019s a very, very different process. You have to meet a lot of writers and find the right showrunner, and I couldn\u2019t find one. This went on for another eight or nine months. I was like, \u2018Good thing I have another job because I need to work, I need to create. I need to do what I was put on this earth to do.’\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tVariety has reached out to Universal Pictures for comment.<\/p>\n

\n\tInsiders previously told Variety<\/a> the film would have followed Madonna from her humble beginnings in Michigan through her artistic coming of age in New York City during the \u201980s. The movie would\u2019ve led right up to the 1998 release of \u201cRay of Light.\u201d Netflix is currently developing an autobiographical series about Madonna via Shawn Levy\u2019s exclusive TV deal at the streamer, but Garner is not attached to this version.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhile the Madonna biopic did not come to fruition at Universal, the movie will live on in a fictional capacity<\/a> in \u201cThe Studio\u201d Season 2 at Apple. Madonna and Garner filmed episodes last year at the Venice Film Festival for the new season of Seth Rogen\u2019s Emmy-winning comedy series. One of the story arcs for Season 2 finds a Madonna biopic starring Garner heading to Venice for its world premiere.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Madonna revealed to Interview magazine that a falling out with Universal Pictures is the reason her movie biopic…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":652978,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[6491,96,10479,10868,56,54,55,18202],"class_list":["post-652977","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-julia-garner","tag-madonna","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-universal-pictures"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/652977","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=652977"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/652977\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/652978"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=652977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=652977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=652977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}