Although they have just finished their visit to the “lost city”, Adam and Aaron Nee are quickly ready for a trip to the planet Eternia.
After years of speculation about a “Masters of the Universe” reboot that has not had a live-action film since 1987, the Nee brothers were announced as the film’s directors four years ago. Now they’re finally preparing to start filming Mattel Studios and the Netflix movie this summer, with “West Side Story’s” Kyle Allen attached in the role of He-Man. Talking to Variety Monday at the premiere of their film “The Lost City” at the Regency Village Theater in LA, the Nee brothers teased what fans can expect from Allen in the role.
“He has such an incredible emotional vulnerability, he’s just a great dramatic actor, but he’s funny like Michael J. Fox,” Adam said. “As he has this special thing, this energy that is very rare in an actor. Then you add on top of that he is trained in like all kinds of martial arts, he is a sword fighter, he does parkour, he knows everything, so the amount of Jackie Chan-style crazy action stuff we’ll be able to do in this movie will blow people away. “
The couple also discussed how the film adaptation of “The Lost City,” their most star-studded project to date, prepared them to take up the challenge of restarting a beloved franchise like “Masters,” which they co-wrote with David Callaham.
“As for ‘Lost City’, which helps pave the way for ‘Masters of the Universe’, it was very important to us that with ‘Masters of the Universe’ we stick to what it was for us as children , “said Aaron. “This ‘Masters of the Universe’ property and that toy for us as kids, it was not stupid for us or absurd for us, it had a depth and a meaning to it.”
Aaron continued: “But what we do not want to do is lose the fact that it’s wild and it’s crazy characters and colorful, and that was also part of the balancing act that we were trying to do with ‘Lost City ‘., Is to hold on to something that has a core of human empathy over it and yet is not afraid to have fun and go crazy and make wild things happen and have wild characters. “
The brothers also discussed what first drew them to “The Lost City,” a fairytale comedy starring Sandra Bullock, Channing Tatum and Daniel Radcliffe, which is expected to gross $ 20 million or more over the opening weekend.
“For us, our attraction to this film, after being in isolation for the first eight months of COVID, we read this script and it was just the perfect escape,” Adam said. “I think that’s why this movie is going to work in the box office because it feels like this amazing escape from some of the hard times people are going through right now.”
“This is the movie we longed for,” Aaron added. We realized, ‘Oh, it’s a void in our lives’, this thing that you can go to with your friends and just listen to each other laugh and escape out on this adventure and just for a moment forget all the challenges we have . has been through globally. “