Jordan Peele Is Doing Just Fine After Losing The Bidding War For Zach Cregger’s ‘Weapons’

Earlier today, the trailer for Zach Cregger’s Weapons dropped, but as Dustin noted in his write-up, “maybe… don’t watch it. Maybe just go in cold.” Weapons is Cregger’s highly anticipated sophomore effort after the breakaway success of 2022’s Barbarian, and if it’s anything like its predecessor, then going in knowing as little as possible is a solid plan. Instead, let me offer you a little story that may get you even more hyped than the trailer, all without revealing a single plot detail:

Jordan Peele fired his managers after his production company lost the bidding war for Weapons.

You see, Weapons was a hot commodity from the get-go, presumably because of its quality but also because everyone wanted to know what Cregger was going to do after Barbarian. New Line ultimately won the bidding war for Cregger’s script in early 2023, and shortly thereafter, Deadline revealed that Universal was the runner-up, with Jordan Peele’s Monkeypaw set to produce. Universal’s bid ultimately came up a few million dollars short of New Line’s $38 million offer, despite Peele reportedly being ready to kick in part of his contractual backend. The details beyond that are scarce; either Universal and Monkeypaw were unwilling to match the bid and walked away, or talks fell apart and Peele was unhappy with the loss.

Maybe it’s just a coincidence that shortly after losing the auction, Peele parted ways with his longtime managers at Artists First, Joel Zadak and Peter Principato, who first signed Peele in his comedy days on MadTV. Principato also manages Cregger, who similarly got his start in comedy as a founding member of The Whitest Kids U Know, but that could all just be one big coincidence as well.

However he felt about losing out on Weapons, Peele is doing just fine, thank you very much. He produced HIM, an upcoming horror movie directed by Justin Tipping about a rising-star quarterback (Tyriq Withers))who becomes the protégé of a legendary player (Marlon Wayans), and also maybe has Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy. Here’s the trailer for that one, which hits theaters on September 19th (over a month after Weapons).