Once upon a time, Noah Centineo was slated to wield the Sword of Power as He-Man in the Masters of the Universe movie. The actor put in a lot of work to get into tip-top shape, gaining over 30lbs of muscle, but the project fell apart despite being close to starting. So, what happened?
Aaron and Adam Nee had signed on to direct the Masters of the Universe movie, and pre-production moved quickly, but Centineo told Josh Horowitz on the Happy Sad Confused podcast that constant delays ultimately led to the project’s death.
“We were pretty close, dude,” Centineo said. “I went through the test process. We screen-tested loin cloth and stuff. All of it.“
“They’re, like, showing us previs,” he said. “They’re showing us kind of the production design, the world-building.“
“We got pretty close, and then for some reason or another, it just pushed and pushed,” he explained. “And then I think they just wanted to keep tweaking it and tweaking it, and the contract ran out. And we moved on and then I think Netflix acquired it for a little bit and then Amazon acquired it.“
Centineo’s version of the project was set up at Sony Pictures, then moved to Netflix before finally landing at Amazon, with Travis Knight directing and Nicholas Galitzine starring as He-Man. Although the Red, White & Royal Blue actor ultimately took over Centineo’s role, there’s no hard feelings; in fact, Centineo thought Galitzine did a great job.
“It’s so difficult to step into a role like that dude,” Centineo said. “I mean, that’s not an easy movie to make at all. And, like, I watched it and Nick is incredible.“
Unfortunately, after all those years in development and so many iterations of the project, Masters of the Universe didn’t do well at the box office, grossing just $114 million on a $170 million budget. However, the film has proven much more successful since its streaming debut on Prime Video, easily taking the #1 spot. It’s hard to say if we’ll see a sequel, but I suppose anything is possible.