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Freddie Prince Jr. won’t be reuniting with Mystery Inc anytime soon.
After landing the live-action role of Fred Jones, the actor, 47, said a follow-up to his two previous Scooby-Doo movies “I wouldn’t” after bad experiences on set. “I’m not interested, it was awkward,” he told TooFab.
“It wouldn’t be for me, man. There was too much bait and switch on the first one. The studio wasn’t fair to me in any way, in any shape or form. They weren’t straightforward,” said Prinze, adding: “I’ve had two jobs that I regretted, and Scooby was one of them.”
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He explained that he “didn’t fully appreciate the film” until he saw the impact it had on young fans at the time Scooby-Doo premiered in 2002, followed by its 2004 sequel Monsters released.
“Then all of a sudden I thought, ‘Hey man, we did a good job. There are millions of people who really love this movie. It’s not the movie I wanted to make, but I appreciate that,'” Prinze continued. “And it made me change my perspective on it.
Jasin Boland/Hannah Barbera Prods/Atlas/Kobal/Shutterstock
James Gunn, who directed the first two live-action adaptations, responded to a fan on Twitter last year who suggested he finish the trilogy with the gang reuniting for Scooby’s funeral. “Like it The great cold with Scooby Doo? OK. I’m in,” he wrote in May 2022.
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Prinze recalled another “difficult job” in the same interview and recalled it I know what you did last summer director Jim Gillespie “wanted another actor” to play his part of Ray Bronson.
“He was very direct about the fact, ‘I don’t want you in this movie.’ So when that’s your first job and you hear those words, it just kills you, man. It just kills you,” Prinze said, adding, “I wanted to fight that guy two or three different times.”
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The Wrestling with Freddie podcast host said he was “not mad” he did the movie, which “launched my whole career” and introduced him to his costar and future wife Sarah Michelle Gellar – who also starred opposite him as Daphne Blake in the Scooby-Doo franchise.
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“I wouldn’t have any of the things I have without that movie, I wouldn’t have my wife, I wouldn’t have all the other movies I’ve done, I wouldn’t have this podcast,” Prinze said. “I’m here because of that struggle and because of that pain and it was those things.”
