UPDATE: Click here for the official “PC” announcement… B-D reader ‘Garret’ just sent us in a breaking story over at Deadline Hollywood, who reports that Catherine Hardwicke won’t return to direct New Moon, the second adaptation in the four book Twilight series. In fact, they report that Hardwicke was fired by Summit Entertainment! This is shocking news to me as the only reason I found TWILIGHT worthy of a viewing was Hardwicke’s stamp on the adaptation, which is nearing $160m worldwide as this article is being written. Beyond the break you can read all about the real reasons for the firing before the trades spin the story in a “nice” way.
Deadline Hollywood Daily reports:

“The word from inside Summit is that Hardwicke, the acclaimed Thirteen director, “was ‘difficult’ and ‘irrational’ during the making of Twilight,” one insider explains to me. “That doesn’t mean anything when you’re talking about a filmmaker because they all are, but still…” (Indeed, Joe Roth and Sony kept saying those things about Julie Taymor on Across The Universe. Yet she made a cult classic and is now directing Marvel/Sony’s Spider-Man for Broadway.) From another of my sources, “Summit didn’t like her. They’re saying the DP [director of photography] Elliot Davis is the one responsible for the film’s sumptuous visual look, that the editor Nancy Richardson had to save the film in post-production, and Summit thought Hardwicke’s [CAA] agent Beth Swofford was alternately ineffectual and hysterical [when it came to controlling her client].”

In fact, I’m told that the studio has even had quiet talks with other CAA directors for the last week. “And Swofford never told Hardwicke about that and that she was about to get kicked to the gutter,” an insider tells me. “To add insult to injury, Hardwicke can now look forward to being grilled by the press for days on end, in front of the cast, about why she’s getting shit-canned.””

If anything, Hardwicke saved the movie from its trite plot and ridiculously cheap budget. Where’s the love?