Don't Worry Darling: Did Shia LaBeouf voluntarily quit Olivia Wilde’s directorial? Or was he fired?

Shia LaBeouf’s eccentricities have been well documented over the years. Despite being one of the most talented and promising stars of his generation, LaBeouf’s career has been marred by controversies such as car crashes, dubious on-set behaviour, court-ordered rehabs, and whatnot: to only make things worse, he was accused of sexual battery, assault, and infliction of emotional stress by his former girlfriend and British singer-songwriter FKA Twigs in December of 2020.

While the Honey Boy actor denies the allegations, the lawsuit led to Netflix removing him from its Pieces of Woman award campaign.

And yet, many in Hollywood reckoned that his talent is too good to pass up as he continued to find credible opportunities. One such came in the form of Olivia Wilde’s rivetting period sci-fi thriller Don’t Worry Darling in which LaBeouf was cast to play the main lead opposite Florence Pugh (also starring Chris Pine and Wilde herself) but only to be replaced by Harry Styles in 2020, before the film even went on floors.

In a recent Variety exclusive interview, Olivia Wilde disclosed that she was forced to fire Shia LaBeouf from the film due to his ‘combative energy’ on the sets which, she adds, threatened to jeopardize the safety and trust of the whole crew. However, there’s a small twist in the tale as LaBeouf denies being fired from the project and insists that he quit on his own accord.

Responding to the same Variety piece via email, Shia LaBeouf shared that he was compelled to quit the production of Don’t Worry Darling because of the ‘lack of rehearsal time' ahead of the shoot. Claiming that he voluntarily walked out of the production on August 17, 2020, and that he communicated with director Olivia Wilde about the same around the same time to eventually arrive at a mutual decision.

Shia LaBeouf would share the screenshots with Variety of the text messages sent to Wilde. The same messages (dating back to Aug. 2020), as per the latest Variety story, reveal that both Wilde and LaBeouf met in person to talk things over but only in vain as the latter would back out of the project soon after.

To solidify his claims of voluntarily quitting Don’t Worry Darling and not being fired, Shia LaBeouf would also share the email he sent out to Wilde very recently. In the email. LaBeouf can be spotted thanking the latter for her kind words in the Variety exclusive but also questioning the claims of being fired from the project when, as he asserts, he backed out due to the lack of sufficient rehearsal time.

The same report states that representatives of both Olivia Wilde and Warner Bros. are yet to comment on the latest developments.