Patrick Dempsey was ready to join Scream 7, but things didn’t work out that way.
Back in October, Dempsey appeared on the Today show and shared: “I’m waiting on the script, [but] I haven’t seen anything yet. So we’ll see what happens.”
However, it was revealed in January that he wouldn’t be returning as Detective Mark Kincaid again.
“It just didn’t work out, and we were dealing with the fires and everything that was going on, and the schedule didn’t work out, unfortunately,” Dempsey, who lives in Malibu, told Variety.
Fans had assumed that the Enchanted star would return for the new movie as Neve Campbell’s Sydney Prescott calls her husband Mark in Scream 5. But it was revealed earlier this year that Joel McHale would play Sydney’s husband, Mark Kincaid.
As for other original cast members, several are returning, including Campbell and Courteney Cox, as well as Matthew Lillard, who played one of the killers in the first Scream and died in the movie.
Mason Gooding and Jasmin Savoy Brown, who appeared in the fifth and six installments as siblings, are also returning.
New cast members include Isabel May, Mark Consuelos, Asa Germann, Mckenna Grace, Sam Rechner and Anna Camp.
Directed by Kevin Williamson, Scream 7 will hit theaters on Feb. 27, 2026.