In his multipart deep-dive into HBO’s Sex and The City, journalist James Andrew Miller’s Origins podcast features interviews with Sarah Jessica Parker, Chris Noth, Kristin Davis, Willie Garson, and other pivotal figures in the show’s creation, though noticeably not Kim Cattrall. (But more on that in a second.) According to The Hollywood Reporter, Miller revealed in the podcast’s most recent episode that the script for the never-made Sex and the City 3 allegedly featured the death of Mr. Big “relatively early†in the film, purportedly of a sudden “heart attack in the shower.â€
According to Miller, Kim Cattrall declined to take part in the third film, in part because the movie’s focus on Parker’s widowed Carrie didn’t offer as much to do for the iconic Samantha Jones, especially when Cattrall had already expressed a desire to move on from the series. That, and a sense of unequal compensation on the back end, touched a sore spot alluded to by recent friction between Kim Cattrall and Sarah Jessica Parker.
“We negotiated in good faith,†SJP told Miller. “I e-mailed her, I tried to reach out to her and say like, ‘We want you part of this. You’re an integral part, of course you are. I hope when you read this script you’ll see the beauty, the joy, the heartbreak in it that I see, that we have seen.’â€
“But I can’t force her to see it, but we did negotiate through the process and ultimately the studio said, ‘We can’t meet those asks of hers,’†Parker says. “So then it’s over, but that’s not a character assassination, that’s just the way business works.â€