History TroubledProduction / FridayThe13th

* For ''Film/FridayThe13thPartVIJasonLives'', Tom [=McLoughlin=] frequently found himself at odds with producer Don Behrns. [=McLoughlin=] would sometimes come on set and find that things he had asked for were either missing or never delivered. Fittingly, Behrns admitted that he'd get a bonus if the film was completed on time. The cast and crew did get their revenge: a swamp cooler that Behrns had set aside as a gift to himself when filming wrapped ended up getting obliterated during the scene where Jason flips the RV. You can see it get launched when the RV flips and then it crashes along the ground.

** Casting proved an additional headache. Cunningham wanted to keep Creator/KaneHodder, who had played Jason since ''The New Blood'', in the role, but the studio pushed for the part to be recast with Ken Kirzinger, wanting a "fresh start" and for a [[EvilIsBigger bigger]] Jason who would tower over Freddy Krueger. Creator/KatharineIsabelle and Creator/BradRenfro were originally cast as the leads Lori and Will, but both parts were recast, the former prior to principal photography and the latter a week into filming because Renfro showed up to the set strung out on drugs and unable to perform.[[note]]Renfro would later die of an overdose in 2008.[[/note]] Isabelle was eventually given the supporting part of Gibb more in line with her desired performance, and Creator/JasonRitter was cast in Renfro's stead.

** The film premiered on August 13, 2003 and became the biggest box-office hit in both the ''Friday'' and ''Nightmare'' franchises. However, ''ComicBook/FreddyVsJasonVsAsh'', a planned sequel that would've crossed the two series over with ''Franchise/EvilDead'' fell apart due to CreativeDifferences between New Line and Creator/BruceCampbell, and would eventually be released as a comic book rather than a film.

* Not only was ''Film/FreddyVsJason'' trapped in DevelopmentHell for over a decade (its idea originated as far back as one of the pitches for ''The New Blood'', as aforementioned in its entries), but when production finally got underway, it wasn't exactly smooth sailing. For starters, while Creator/BradRenfro was originally cast to play the male lead Will, they had to fire him a week before shooting began and replace him with Creator/JasonRitter, as when he first showed up to the set, he was strung out on drugs and couldn't perform (Renfro would later die of an overdose in 2008). During shooting, there was also a fight between director Ronny Yu and actress Creator/KatharineIsabelle, who had signed onto the film on the promise that she would not have to do nude scenes; during the shoot, Yu went back on this promise and repeatedly tried to pressure her to get naked in a shower scene (they eventually settled on using a body double).

** Others involved with the production, however, have claimed Cunningham's accounts to be grossly exaggerated, and instead place the blame on Cunningham himself for being a PointyHairedBoss during production. The one thing that all the accounts seem to agree on is that Marcus did not get on well in the slightest with lead actress Kari Keegan, who reportedly threatened to quit several times during filming.

* ''Film/FridayThe13thPart2'' ran into a bunch of problems before a single frame was shot. Sean S. Cunningham, the director of [[Film/FridayThe13th1980 the first film]], disagreed with Creator/{{Paramount}}'s plan to build the sequel around Pamela Voorhees' son Jason taking up his mother's murderous legacy, on the grounds that it would be [[ContinuitySnarl a massive, unexplained retcon]] of the first film's backstory; instead, he wanted to make ''Friday'' an anthology series. Victor Miller, the writer of the first film, supported Cunningham and followed him out the door, as did special effects artist Creator/TomSavini. Ultimately, however, things went fairly smoothly once Steve Miner, a producer of the first film, stepped in to direct, and nothing was bad enough to derail or slow down production afterwards. The only problems came when the producers discovered that Marta Kober, the actress who played Sandra, was actually underage, forcing them to cut a full-frontal nude scene they'd shot with the actress, and when Jason's actor Steve Daskewicz accidentally cut his finger with a machete and needed thirteen stitches.

* Much like ''A New Beginning'', it's generally agreed that ''Film/JasonGoesToHellTheFinalFriday'' had a troubled shoot, though exactly how troubled and who was to blame remains disputed. Cunningham (who had returned from the first film as producer of this one) claims that first-time (at just 24 years old!) director Adam Marcus's inexperience caused him to badly mismanage the shoot, including letting through obviously flubbed scenes without retakes, shooting lengthy sequences entirely in slow-motion, and forgetting to film important lines of dialogue, requiring Cunningham to reshoot nearly half of the movie. However, others involved with the production have claimed Cunningham's accounts to be grossly exaggerated, and instead place the blame on Cunningham himself for being a PointyHairedBoss during production. The one thing that all the accounts seem to agree on is that Marcus did not get on well in the slightest with lead actress Kari Keegan, who reportedly threatened to quit several times during filming. The end product did a ''little'' better than ''Jason Takes Manhattan'' at the box-office, though not by a whole lot (albeit it had a smaller budget, making it an overall more profitable venture), and many fans would prefer to think that [[FanonDiscontinuity it never happened]].

** On the other hand, Shepherd himself, lead actress Melanie Kinnaman, co-star Dick Wieand and stuntman Tom Morga have alleged that Steinmann spent most of the shoot bingeing on cocaine, and veered between being [[PrimaDonnaDirector verbally abusive to most of the cast]] and so high off his ass that the cinematographer had to direct certain scenes, only cleaning up his act on days when Ross' mother was on-set. Steinmann also shot a couple of very graphic sex scenes, one of which was cut entirely, with the other being edited down to only about ten seconds. Wieand later theorized that Steinmann filmed the scenes so that the MPAA would insist on cutting them and let the gore go through uncensored, only for this plan to backfire when Creator/{{Paramount}} ended up cutting the gore ''and'' sex scenes out before even submitting it to the MPAA.

* ''Film/FridayThe13thPart2'' ran into a bunch of problems before a single frame was shot. Sean S. Cunningham, the director of [[Film/FridayThe13th1980 the first film]], disagreed with Creator/{{Paramount}}'s plan to build the sequel around Pamela Voorhees' son Jason taking up his mother's murderous legacy, on the grounds that it would be [[ContinuitySnarl a massive, unexplained retcon]] of the first film's backstory; instead, he wanted to make ''Friday'' an anthology series. Victor Miller, the writer of the first film, supported Cunningham and followed him out the door, as did special effects artist Creator/TomSavini. Ultimately, however, things went fairly smoothly once Steve Miner, a producer of the first film, stepped in to direct. The only problems during production came when the producers discovered that Marta Kober, the actress who played Sandra, was actually underage, forcing them to cut a full-frontal nude scene they'd shot with the actress, and when Jason's actor Steve Daskewicz accidentally cut his finger with a machete and needed thirteen stitches.

** The film was supposed to premiere in October 1984, but producer Frank Mancuso, Jr. (who had been involved in the franchise since ''Part 2'' by then) was so impressed by it that he decided to push the release up to April. Unfortunately, this left only six weeks for post-production, leading to one of the only times when Creator/{{Paramount}} actively assisted in production on a ''Friday'' film, renting a house in Malibu for Zito, Mancuso, and their editors to rush through the job of getting the film ready for theatrical release.

* Much like ''A New Beginning'', it's generally agreed that ''Film/JasonGoesToHellTheFinalFriday'' had a troubled shoot, though exactly how troubled and who was to blame remains disputed. Cunningham (who had returned from the first film as producer of this one) claims that first-time (at just 24 years old!) director Adam Marcus's inexperience caused him to badly mismanage the shoot, including letting through obviously flubbed scenes without retakes, shooting lengthy sequences entirely in slow-motion, and forgetting to film important lines of dialogue, requiring Cunningham to reshoot nearly half of the movie. However, others involved with the production have claimed Cunningham's accounts to be grossly exaggerated, and instead place the blame on Cunningham himself for being a PointyHairedBoss during production. The one thing that all the accounts seem to agree on is that Marcus did not get on well in the slightest with lead actress Kari Keegan, who reportedly threatened to quit several times during filming.

* Not only was ''Film/FreddyVsJason'' trapped in DevelopmentHell for over a decade (its idea originated as far back as one of the pitches for ''The New Blood'', as aforementioned in its entries), but when production finally got underway, it wasn't exactly smooth sailing. For starters, while Creator/BradRenfro was originally cast to play the male lead Will, they had to fire him a week before shooting began and replace him with Creator/JasonRitter, as when he first showed up to the set, he was strung out on drugs and couldn't perform. (Renfro would later die of an overdose in 2008.) During shooting, there was also a fight between director Ronny Yu and actress Creator/KatharineIsabelle, who had signed onto the film on the promise that she would not have to do nude scenes; during the shoot, Yu went back on this promise and repeatedly tried to pressure her to get naked in a shower scene (they eventually settled on using a body double).

* Not only was ''Film/FreddyVsJason'' stuck in DevelopmentHell for over a decade (its idea originated as far back as one of the pitches for ''The New Blood'', as aforementioned in its entries), but when production finally got underway, it wasn't exactly smooth sailing. For starters, while Creator/BradRenfro was originally cast to play the male lead Will, they had to fire him a week before shooting began and replace him with Creator/JasonRitter, as when he first showed up to the set, he was strung out on drugs and couldn't perform. (Renfro would later die of an overdose in 2008.) During shooting, there was also a fight between director Ronny Yu and actress Creator/KatharineIsabelle, who had signed onto the film on the promise that she would not have to do nude scenes; during the shoot, Yu went back on this promise and repeatedly tried to pressure her to get naked in a shower scene (they eventually settled on using a body double).

* The franchise as a whole has been stuck in DevelopmentHell for almost a decade now. The sequel to the remake never really got off the ground due to the down economy, and a dispute between New Line and Paramount. Then New Line lent its share of the rights (they own the Jason Voorhees character) to Paramount (they own the ''Friday the 13th'' title), and after numerous release date changes, finally greenlit ''Friday the 13th: Part 13'' for an October 13, 2017 release date with filming slated to begin in March 2017 and Breck Eisner directing. Then ''Film/{{Rings}}'' flopped at the box office in February, and Paramount canceled the film just weeks before filming was to begin. Then New Line got back its share of the rights. And ''then'' Victor Miller, the writer of the original film, sued Cunningham (who remained producer for all of the franchise's material released after ''Jason Goes to Hell'') over the rights to the Jason Voorhees character, which has not only put any future films in jeopardy, it stopped ''VideoGame/FridayThe13thTheGame'' from creating any new content.

* Much like ''A New Beginning'', it's generally agreed that ''Film/JasonGoesToHellTheFinalFriday'' had a troubled shoot, though exactly how troubled and who was to blame remains disputed. Producer Sean S. Cunningham (who had returned from the first film) claims that first-time (at just 24 years old!) director Adam Marcus's inexperience caused him to badly mismanage the shoot, including letting through obviously flubbed scenes without retakes, shooting lengthy sequences entirely in slow-motion, and forgetting to film important lines of dialogue, requiring Cunningham to reshoot nearly half of the movie. However, others involved with the production have claimed Cunningham's accounts to be grossly exaggerated, and instead place the blame on Cunningham himself for being a PointyHairedBoss during production. The one thing that all the accounts seem to agree on is that Marcus did not get on well in the slightest with lead actress Kari Keegan, who reportedly threatened to quit several times during filming.

* Much like ''A New Beginning'', it's generally agreed that ''Film/JasonGoesToHellTheFinalFriday'' had a troubled shoot, though exactly how troubled and who was to blame remains disputed. Producer Sean S. Cunningham claims that first-time (at just 24 years old!) director Adam Marcus's inexperience caused him to badly mismanage the shoot, including letting through obviously flubbed scenes without retakes, shooting lengthy sequences entirely in slow-motion, and forgetting to film important lines of dialogue, requiring Cunningham to reshoot nearly half of the movie. However, others involved with the production have claimed Cunningham's accounts to be grossly exaggerated, and instead place the blame on Cunningham himself for being a PointyHairedBoss during production. The one thing that all the accounts seem to agree on is that Marcus did not get on well in the slightest with lead actress Kari Keegan, who reportedly threatened to quit several times during filming.

* The franchise as a whole has been stuck in DevelopmentHell for almost a decade now. The sequel to the remake never really got off the ground due to the down economy, and a dispute between New Line and Paramount. Then New Line lent its share of the rights (they own the Jason Voorhees character) to Paramount (they own the ''Friday the 13th'' title), and after numerous release date changes, finally greenlit ''Friday the 13th: Part 13'' for an October 13, 2017 release date with filming slated to begin in March 2017 and Breck Eisner directing. Then ''Film/{{Rings}}'' flopped at the box office in February, and Paramount canceled the film just weeks before filming was to begin. Then New Line got back its share of the rights. And ''then'' Victor Miller, the writer of the original film, sued Sean S. Cunningham (producer of the franchise) over the rights to the Jason Voorhees character, which has not only put any future films in jeopardy, it stopped ''VideoGame/FridayThe13thTheGame'' from creating any new content.

** Director Joseph Zito, fresh off ''Film/TheProwler'', was asked to both write and direct this film. The problem: Zito was not a screenwriter, and only took the writing job due to the promise of seeing his salary for the film doubled. As a result, he used that extra pay to hire Barney Cohen to ghostwrite the film for him, a move that got everybody involved (Zito, Cohen, and producer Phil Scuderi) in trouble with the Writers Guild of America. Cohen would be credited as the sole screenwriter on the film (story credit went to Bruce Hidemi Sakow, who had written an early treatment that Zito was supposed to turn into a screenplay) as a result.

** Just as he was in the process of finishing up the screenplay, a botched power play by Haney's agent saw him fired and replaced by an unidentified scab writer (the film was written during a Writers' Guild of America strike) who went under the credit of [[AlanSmithee Manuel Fidello]].[[note]](It's been long speculated by fans that "Fidello" is actually a pseudonym for Rob Hedden, the writer and director of the next entry, due to many similar character archetypes and bits of dialogue in both films. Good luck getting Hedden or any other writer to admit having worked on the film, however, as even decades later such an admission would have dire consequences with the WGA)[[/note]] After this, the screenplay was heavily rewritten to bring it more in line with the earlier entries in the series, taking particular inspiration from ''The Final Chapter'', as well as cutting some of the more ambitious (and expensive) ideas that Haney had tried to incorporate.

** The film was supposed to premiere in October 1984, but producer Frank Mancuso, Jr. was so impressed by it that he decided to push the release up to April. Unfortunately, this left only six weeks for post-production, leading to one of the only times when Creator/{{Paramount}} actively assisted in production on a ''Friday'' film, renting a house in Malibu for Zito, Mancuso, and their editors to rush through the job of getting the film ready for theatrical release.

** The production endured quite a bit of DevelopmentHell, such that it would be the first ''Friday'' film since [[Film/FridayThe13thPartIII the fourth]] to not come out one year after the last one. It was made under the shadow of diminishing box-office returns for the franchise since ''A New Beginning'', causing Creator/{{Paramount}} to push for a {{crossover}} with the more commercially successful ''Franchise/ANightmareOnElmStreet'' franchise. However, Creator/NewLineCinema wouldn't play ball, and so producer Barbara Sachs and writer Daryl Haney instead came up with a story similar to ''Film/{{Jaws}}'' about a land developer trying to build condos on Crystal Lake (with Jason Voorhees serving as the shark). However, executive producer Frank Mancuso, Jr. hated the idea and gave it an ExecutiveVeto, leading Haney to instead pitch the idea of Jason fighting a FinalGirl with [[MindOverMatter telekinetic powers]] similar to ''Literature/{{Carrie}}''. Everybody involved loved it and signed off on that instead.

* ''Film/FridayThe13thPart2'' ran into a bunch of problems before a single frame was shot. Sean S. Cunningham, the director of [[Film/FridayThe13th1980 the first film]], disagreed with Creator/{{Paramount}}'s plan to build the sequel around Pamela Voorhees' son Jason taking up his mother's murderous legacy, on the grounds that it would be [[ContinuitySnarl a massive, unexplained retcon]] of the first film's backstory; instead, he wanted to make ''Friday'' an anthology series. Victor Miller, the writer of the first film, supported Cunningham and followed him out the door, as did special effects artist Creator/TomSavini. Ultimately, however, things went fairly smoothly once Steve Miner, a producer on the first film, stepped in to direct. The only problems during production came when the producers discovered that Marta Kober, the actress who played Sandra, was actually underage, forcing them to cut a full-frontal nude scene they'd shot with the actress, and when Jason's actor Steve Daskewicz accidentally cut his finger with a machete and needed thirteen stitches.

** On the other hand, Shepherd himself, lead actress Melanie Kinnaman, co-star Dick Wieand and stuntman Tom Morga have alleged that Steinmann spent most of the shoot bingeing on cocaine, and veered between being [[PrimaDonnaDirector verbally abusive to most of the cast]] and so high off his ass that the cinematographer had to direct certain scenes, only cleaning up his act on days when Ross' mother was on-set. Steinmann also shot a couple of very graphic sex scenes, one of which was cut entirely, with the other being edited down to only about ten seconds. Wieand later theorized that Steinmann filmed the scenes so that the MPAA would insist on cutting them and let the gore go through uncensored, only for this plan to backfire when Creator/{{Paramount}} ended up cutting the gore ''and'' sex scenes out before ever submitting it to the MPAA.

* ''Film/FridayThe13thPartVIITheNewBlood'' was the most seriously troubled production in the series, and a sign of the DorkAge to come.

* Not only was ''Film/FreddyVsJason'' stuck in DevelopmentHell for over a decade (its idea originated as far back as one of the pitches for ''The New Blood''), but when production finally got underway, it wasn't exactly smooth sailing. For starters, while Creator/BradRenfro was originally cast to play the male lead Will, they had to fire him a week before shooting began and replace him with Creator/JasonRitter, as when he first showed up to the set, he was strung out on drugs and couldn't perform. (Renfro would later die of an overdose in 2008.) During shooting, there was also a fight between director Ronny Yu and actress Creator/KatharineIsabelle, who had signed onto the film on the promise that she would not have to do nude scenes; during the shoot, Yu went back on this promise and repeatedly tried to pressure her to get naked in a shower scene (they eventually settled on using a body double).

** According to director Danny Steinmann and co-stars Shavar Ross, Dominick Brascia, and Debi-Sue Voorhees, there were a few minor problems with lead actor John Shepherd being standoffish during the shoot, a malfunctioning rain machine that held up filming of the finale, and make-up effects having to be cut or worked around during editing after Paramount deemed them sub-par, but production otherwise wasn't too problematic.

** According to director Danny Steinmann and co-stars Shavar Ross, Dominick Brascia, and Debi-Sue Voorhees, there were a few minor problems with lead actor John Shepherd being standoffish during the shoot, a malfunctioning rain machine that held up filming of the finale, and make-up effects having to be cut or worked around during editing after Paramount deemed them sub-par, but production otherwise wasn't too problematic.
** On the other hand, Shepherd himself, lead actress Melanie Kinnaman, co-star Dick Wieand and stuntman Tom Morga have alleged that Steinmann spent most of the shoot bingeing on cocaine, and veered between being [[PrimaDonnaDirector verbally abusive to most of the cast]] and so high off his ass that the cinematographer had to direct certain scenes, only cleaning up his act on days when Ross' mother was on-set. Steinmann also shot a couple of very graphic sex scenes, one of which was cut entirely, with the other being edited down to only about ten seconds. Wieand later theorized that Steinmann filmed the scenes so that the MPAA would insist on cutting them and let the gore go through uncensored, only for this plan to backfire when Creator/{{Paramount}} ended up cutting the gore ''and'' sex scenes out before ever submitting it to the MPAA.
** Furthermore, ''A New Beginning'' was cast under a fake title, and none of the actors knew they were doing a ''Friday'' movie until they got the part. This especially irritated Shepherd, who had spent several months preparing for an audition for a movie he thought was about a man suffering from mental illness (he even volunteered at a mental hospital to prepare for the role), and feared being associated with a franchise known for sex and blood given that he was working as a church counselor at the time.

* ''Film/FridayThe13thPart2'' ran into a bunch of problems before a single frame was shot. Sean S. Cunningham, the director of [[Film/FridayThe13th1980 the first film]], disagreed with Creator/{{Paramount}}'s plan to build the sequel around Pamela Voorhees' son Jason taking up his mother's murderous legacy, on the grounds that it would be [[ContinuitySnarl a massive, unexplained retcon]] of the first film's backstory; instead, he wanted to make ''Friday'' an anthology series. Victor Miller, the writer of the first film, supported Cunningham and followed him out the door, as did special effects artist Creator/TomSavini. Ultimately, however, things went fairly smoothly once Steve Miner, a producer on the first film, stepped in to direct. The only problems during production came when the producers discovered that Marta Kober, the actress who played Sandra, was actually underage, forcing them to cut a full-frontal nude scene they'd shot with the actress, and when Jason's actor Steve Daskewicz accidentally cut his finger with a machete and needed thirteen stitches. Nothing was bad enough to derail or slow down production, though.
* ''Film/FridayThe13thPartIII'' was a UsefulNotes/ThreeDMovie, which caused all manner of production difficulties. Getting the 3-D effects right (done in-camera in a time before post-conversion existed), especially with brand-new technology that they didn't have time to practice with, required dozens of takes and was prioritized over getting good performances out of the actors, leading to plenty of DullSurprise moments. Shooting in 3-D also forced production to move from the East Coast (the first two films having been shot in UsefulNotes/NewJersey and UsefulNotes/{{Connecticut}}, respectively) to Southern UsefulNotes/{{California}}, which in turn meant that they couldn't bring back Daskewicz to play Jason, as he would have had to pay for his own ticket to UsefulNotes/LosAngeles; he was recast with Richard Brooker. The Louma crane used for certain shots also fell over one day, derailing a whole day's worth of filming, and there was HostilityOnTheSet between the cast and what [[WebVideo/TheKillCount James A. Janisse]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4eYGwOmXaA described]] as a non-union "outlaw crew" who got drunk, used cocaine, and shot at rattlesnakes between takes, forcing assistant director Peter Schindler to corral them for the difficult technical aspects of the shoot. Production took twelve weeks, and most of the people who worked on the film have said that the shoot was difficult and unpleasant.