Ice Cube: Why Chris Tucker Turned Down $12M Role In ‘Friday’ Sequel

Ice Cube: Why Chris Tucker Turned Down $12M Role In ‘Friday’ Sequel

Ice Cube explains why his “Friday” co-star Chris Tucker reportedly turned down a large paycheck to star in the sequel.

According to Ice Cube, Tucker was offered $12 million to reprise his role in the film, which followed the 1995 hit comedy and two sequels, 2000’s “Next Friday” and 2002’s “Friday After Next.”

Ice Cube, who also produced the films, stated that Tucker did not return to play Smokey for “religious reasons.”

“We were willing to pay Chris Tucker $10-12 million to do Next Friday, but he declined for religious reasons. He didn’t want to cuss or smoke weed in front of the camera any longer “

Ice Cube took to Twitter. (A fan had inquired as to why Tucker was not in the films.)

Tucker revealed in a recent interview with All Urban Central that it was because of the weed smoking in the movies.

“Back then, I gotta tell you, one of the reasons I didn’t do the second one was the weed,” he explained.

“Because, as I previously stated, that film became a phenomenon. I don’t want everyone smoking weed, and I never really told people about it because I kind of forgot about it, but it was one of the reasons I didn’t.

Because I stated, ‘I don’t want to represent everyone who smokes weed.'”

 He went on, “That’s one of the reasons I said ‘no,’ because I didn’t want to keep playing that character. It was probably beneficial to me because it kept me moving on to the next phase and movies.”

Tucker went on to star in three more “Rush Hour” films, as well as “The Fifth Element” and “Silver Linings Playbook.”