Terry Gilliam Says He Doesn't Have Enough Money to Make ‘The Carnival at the End of Days'

Terry Gilliam has had such a hard time trying to fund his last few projects that he’s hinted about retirement. However, back in April, fansite Gilliam Dreams reported that the director was set to direct a new, maybe final, film, titled “The Carnival at the End of Days.”

This past May, Gilliam claimed he had found funding for ‘Carnival.’ We already know that Johnny Depp will play Satan and that the rest of the cast would be composed of Jeff Bridges, Adam Driver and Jason Momoa. A January 2025 shoot was being eyed. (via Premiere)

No surprise, five months later, Gilliam is now telling Czech media that he doesn’t have the sufficient funds to make ‘Carnival,’ and that he would have to creatively compromise his vision to make it happen (via Novinky).

I don't have all of the money for it right now. I would have to compromise some of my ideas. Which I don't want to. I’m angry with myself for not being able to do it. Which is not always a bad thing. When I get angry, some interesting ideas come out [..] Maybe I’ll start shooting it soon, albeit with a smaller budget.

Gilliam goes on to add that he is “negotiating with the Saudis” to bankroll the project. He is willing to shoot ‘Carnival’ in Saudi Arabia if it means they are able to fund . The the whole thing. The lure of having Depp in the cast is no doubt what interests them the most.

In a recent French interview, Gilliam revealed that the budget for ‘Carnival’ would have to be around $30 million dollars. The filmmaker already spoke about the project last September in this interview. He mentioned working with a "young screenwriter” on the script and that final draft had, more or less, been completed. That screenwriter turned out to be Christopher Brett Bailey, 34.

Here’s Gilliam describing the plot of ‘Carnival’:

This is a simple tale of God wiping out humanity for fucking up his beautiful garden Earth. There’s only one character who’s trying to save humanity and that’s Satan, because without humanity he’s lost his job and he’s an eternal character and so to live without a job is terrible. So he finds some young people and he tries to convince God that these young people are the new Adam and Eve. God still gets to wipe out humanity. It’s a comedy.

The last time Gilliam directed a feature was 2018’s “The Man Who Killed Don Quixote,” a film he was trying to make for more than two decades. It came and went without much excitement, although I thought it was his, de facto, best film since the late ‘90s. The lack of commercial success on ‘Don Quixote’ is essentially the reason why Gilliam can’t find funding for his next projects. His films of the last 25 years have been both critical and commercial misfires.

Many forget just how important and vital a cinematic voice Terry Gilliam was during his peak years, especially when he was battling Universal for the final cut of his 1985 masterpiece, “Brazil.” He’s given us other great films over the years, including “Monty Python and the Holy Grail,” “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” and “12 Monkeys.”