Fifty Shades Sequels Release Dates Announced

Has there ever been? production more unsteady than that of Fifty Shades of Grey? It lost its first male lead as soon as he was announced, only to be replaced by a relative unknown at the time, model slash actor Jamie Dornan. Then rumours persisted that Dornan and his co-star Dakota Johnson despised each other on set, leading to a very tense promotional tour. And there is the little matter of author EL James being such a pest on set that acclaimed director Sam Taylor-Johnson allegedly quit the franchise so as to avoid working with her.

However, despite this volley of bumps on the road to depicting the love story betwixt a na’ve young English literature graduate and am emotionally distant billionaire with a very clean house and a red room of pain instead of a pantry, the sequels are still going ahead. We even have release dates.

Variety reports that Fifty Shades Darker and Fifty Shades Freed will hit cinemas February 10th 2017, and February 9th 2018, respectively. We’re glad they’ve given us 1916 off because as Irish citizens we’ll be too busy revving up for the national party that will be the Easter Rising commemoration.

The first film has grossed over half a billion euro worldwide since its Valentine’s Day release. With such similar release dates it seems studio Universal is hoping to replicate such steamy success. However, Variety also reports that EL James husband Niall Leonard will be writing the screenplay for the second movie. We’re a little bit nervous about that considering his proximity to the source novelist and his lack of Hollywood experience. His previous credits include Wild at Heart, that television series about the priest in Ballykissangel working as a vet in Africa.

Are you looking forward to the sequels? Or are you looking forward to more awkward interviews between the supposedly warring leads like this one below?

Variety

Follow Jeanne Sutton on Twitter @jeannedesutun