While we look forward to our bountiful harvest of sequels in the coming months, Men In Black III has still yet to blossom—and according to the L.A. Times, what few buds have begun to grow have already been squashed by a work stoppage, leaving star Tommy Lee Jones to stare glumly at the soil, muttering to Vulture that there are still “vast pieces of the script yet unwritten” as he ladles well water across his furrowed brow. Farming metaphors. Today Entertainment Weekly confirms that the reason for this latest halt in production—which arrives on the back of a two-month hiatus, which itself followed a postponement of the initial October start date—is so director Barry Sonnenfeld will have “more time to prep the last act of the film.”
And while Esquire readers would no doubt gladly trade a few months of Sonnenfeld nattering about his adventures with GPS and his wife, Sweetie, just so he can focus, it’s not clear if that last act even exists yet. According to the EW report, Tropic Thunder writer Etan Cohen’s first draft was passed along to Catch Me If You Can’s Jeff Nathanson for a few weeks, and now it appears that it’s back in Cohen’s hands for further revising. Nevertheless, Sony has issued assurances that the film will meet its scheduled Memorial Day 2012 release date, and that both Jones and Will Smith remain available for filming whenever it resumes, hopefully negating the need to create an Oliver Reed-in-Gladiator composite and superimpose Jaden Smith’s face onto a stunt double. They can do that now, you know.