American rapper-actor Ice Cube has claimed that his 'Friday' co-star Chris Tucker turned down a USD 10-12 million paychecks to reprise his role in the sequel for a very specific reason.
According to Fox News, the 1995 comedy about how the duo must come up with USD 200 they owe a local bully was a box office hit. It led to two sequels, 2000's 'Next Friday' and 2002's 'Friday After Next.
However, Cube, who also served as a producer on the films, said the comedian didn't return to play his character of Smokey due to "religious reasons."
"We were ready to pay Chris Tucker USD 10-12m to do Next Friday but he turned us down for religious reasons," the 55-year-old tweeted when someone asked on Wednesday whether Tucker had "quit over money" reasons. "He didn't want to cuss or smoke weed on camera anymore," the star added.
In November, Tucker reflected on his decision to step away from the franchise. "Back then, I gotta tell you, one of the reasons why I didn't do the second one was because of the weed," Tucker said during a show.
He continued, "Because I said, man, that movie became a phenomenon. I don't want everybody smoking weed, and I never really told people this because I kind of forgot about it, but it was one of the reasons why I didn't do it. Because I said, 'I don't wanna represent everybody smoking weed.'"
"And that's one of the reasons why I said 'Nah'. I didn't wanna keep doing that character. It probably was good for me because it kept me moving to the next phase and next movies," Tucker continued.
He also noted that he "never thought about doing sequels" as another contributing factor. "I always wanted to do a good job and keep moving to the next movie," he added.
However, it's noted that Tucker appeared in three 'Rush Hour' movies with co-star Jackie Chan. Still, as per Fox News, Tucker didn't completely rule out the possibility of returning for a potential fourth "Friday" movie. When asked about the long-rumored follow-up, Tucker told the outlet that he would "definitely consider it."
