Will Jonathan Majors' Magazine Dreams ever see the light of day?

“Everything has kinda gone away,” Jonathan Majors said in his first interview following the domestic violence case involving his ex-girlfriend, Grace Jabbari. He referred to his career, which has dried up entirely in the wake of the guilty verdict. Marvel fired him from playing their next big villain, Kang the Conqueror, and he was dropped from the Dennis Rodman biopic 48 Hours In Vegas. Now, Magazine Dreams, which was shelved by Searchlight amid Majors’ legal troubles, has been dropped by the distributor entirely.

Relative to the situation, Searchlight letting go of the film could be seen as a positive development. According to Deadline, rights to Magazine Dreams have reverted to the filmmakers who can now shop the movie to other distributors, which means the movie actually has a chance of getting a theatrical release. But any distributor considering taking on Magazine Dreams has to contend with the same issues Searchlight did, which is not only having Majors in the lead role but in this lead role, playing a violent, isolated, obsessive bodybuilder.

At the beginning of 2023, Majors’ commitment to writer-director Elijah Bynum’s vision was generating early Oscars buzz. The A.V. Club’s Murtada Elfadl wrote that “Magazine Dreams is visceral and intense but ultimately feels like only a half-realized portrait,” nevertheless noting that “Majors, using his elastic face to convey a multitude of emotions, gives the type of physically transformative performance that gets people talking about awards.” The project premiered at the Sundance Film Festival alongside Celine Song’s Past Lives. While that film has endured as part of the awards conversation, Magazine Dreams saw its dreams cut short when Majors was accused of abuse in March of that year.

In describing the abuse and manipulation she endured in their relationship, Jabbari specifically cited the period in which Majors was preparing for Magazine Dreams as one of tumult and violence. She testified that during this time he flew into a “rage,” verbally berating her and throwing glass. And though the altercation between the formal couple in March brought Majors to court, a Rolling Stone exposé revealed further allegations of emotional abuse and aggressive behavior towards past partners and colleagues in Majors’ history.

In the trial, Majors was found guilty of just two of the four charges brought against him, specifically reckless assault in the third degree and harassment. The jury found he was not guilty of intentional assault in the third degree and not guilty of aggravated harassment in the second degree. The conviction nevertheless served as a nail in the coffin of this chapter of the actor’s career. Disney (parent company of both Marvel and Searchlight), which had held out on making any public decisions on his employment, only cut ties with Majors once the verdict was handed down.

In his interview with ABC News, Majors said he hopes “other people think that” he deserves a second chance, adding that he prays he still has a future in Hollywood: “It’s God’s plan and God’s timing.” But the interview itself could have further damaged Majors’ chances at relaunching his career; a PR expert described the decision as a “high risk, low reward strategy” to The Hollywood Reporter. Doubling down on comparing his partners to Coretta Scott King, for example, prompted King’s children to speak out against him—a situation that certainly wouldn’t endear him any further to the entertainment industry.

So while Magazine Dreams may be back on the market, its prospects look quite grim. Big distributors aren’t likely to back Majors at this juncture, so its best hope would be a smaller company with a smaller budget. Even if it did get a robust theatrical release, Majors’ name won’t re-enter awards conversations as long as his conviction is still fresh in public memory. And his reputation in turn hurts the chances for the rest of the film; see how Antoine Fuqua’s Emancipation slipped through the cracks after Will Smith’s slap scandal. Unfortunately for everyone else who worked on the film, it seems like Magazine Dreams is fated to fade away.