'Bride of Frankenstein' Director Reportedly Interested in Gal Gadot to Star

Earlier this afternoon, the announcement came from Universal Studios that pre-production on [...]

Earlier this afternoon, the announcement came from Universal Studios that pre-production on director Bill Condon's Bride of Frankenstein film would be put on hold indefinitely. With Angelina Jolie reportedly set to star, this hiatus would pose conflicts for the actress and her participation in Maleficent 2. Not all hope is lost, however, as The Wrap reports that Condon hopes to tap Wonder Woman star Gal Gadot to play the undead bride.

As recently as earlier this week, Condon was expressing that the film was aiming to start shooting on February 1, despite not confirming who was attached to star.

A statement from Universal read: "After thoughtful consideration, Universal Pictures and director Bill Condon have decided to postpone Bride of Frankenstein. None of us want to move too quickly to meet a release date when we know this special movie needs more time to come together. Bill is a director whose enormous talent has been proven time and again, and we all look forward to continuing to work on this film together."

This film was slated to be the second installment in the Dark Universe series of shared films featuring reboots of the classic Universal Monsters. The series was kicked off earlier this summer by Tom Cruise in The Mummy, which was a financial and critical disappointment.

Considering the underwhelming performance of that film, the fate of the Dark Universe seemed dismal, at best.

"This is fairly out of nowhere given how deep they were into prep over there, but not really surprising — their mandate has more or less been that they wanted these to work as PG-rated action movies/theme-park rides, not horror movies," an insider told The Wrap. "Basically Fast and the Furious meets The Avengers – but with super monsters. "

This could have been the big issue with the series going forward, as Condon wasn't at all thinking about the concept of a "shared universe."

"I will tell you this — what I'm doing is 100 percent making a really good monster movie," Condon recently told Collider. "It has nothing to do with anything else. Nothing. Zero."

"You just assume they'd throw out a lot of that thinking out after The Mummy's Rotten Tomatoes score, but it doesn't seem like it," another insider told The Wrap. "Makes you wonder if they'll ever get those (Universal Monsters) right. Why is it so hard for them?"

Javier Bardem was also rumored to star in Bride of Frankenstein as Frankenstein's Monster.

Gal Gadot can next be seen in Justice League on November 17.

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