Director Michael Bay exits 'Fast and Loose' over differences with Will Smith

Michael Bay has stepped back from directing Will Smith in the upcoming Netflix movie Fast and Loose.

Both the Hollywood heavyweights had signed the project, but creative differences have led to Bay's exit, Deadline reported.

Reports state that Bay, 60, wanted the film to focus on the action elements while Smith, 56, was more inclined toward the comedy.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Fast and Loose "focuses on a crime boss who loses his memory after an attack and gradually learns that he was leading a double life as a CIA agent." The film is set to begin filming in October.

Bay and Smith have had creative differences in their previous collaborations as well, including 1995's Bad Boys—their first collaboration, which also marked Bay's directorial debut.

However, both were able to find common ground when Bay advised him to appear in a scene bare-chested, but Smith insisted against it.

“So Michael Bay was shooting this scene, and I wanted to have my shirt on. And Michael was like, ‘Dude, I’m gonna make you a frickin’ movie star! Take your shirt off,'” Smith recalled on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon in 2020.

“I was like ‘Mike, come on man, running with your shirt off? Come on, man.’ And he was like ‘Dude, you don’t know! I know,’” he continued.

“So we compromised in that scene. I was like Mike, ‘I have to have a shirt. I’ll have it open, just not off.’ And we compromised, and it was one of the iconic scenes from that movie,” added Smith.

Smith, who was best known as a rapper and as the star of the sitcom The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air when he broke out as an action hero in Bay's directorial debut Bad Boys, also admitted at one point that Bay turned him into a “movie star.” Bay also returned in 2003 to direct Bad Boys II.