How Vin Diesel convinced Fast X’s director to get on board after Justin Lin dropped out

polygon.com:

It’s no secret that after 20-plus years of playing Dom Toretto, Vin Diesel is the beating heart of the Fast & Furious franchise, and the head of the family that keeps that franchise’s motor running. But it turns out that Diesel was also key to convincing Louis Leterrier — director of the latest F&F movie, Fast X — to join the project late after Justin Lin’s departure, and to help guide the franchise to its chaotic, massive, two-part conclusion.

Lin, the writer-director who oversaw the franchise since Tokyo Drift and turned it into a bombastic action-blockbuster mainstay, was originally supposed to direct Fast X. But Lin dropped out of directing shortly into filming, reportedly after a disagreement with Diesel. That left the series with a massive hole at its center. This is where Leterrier, a self-professed huge fan of the franchise, came into the picture. In an interview with Polygon, Leterrier explained that he had to rely on instinct to make Fast X since he got dropped in after filming had already started.

“I didn’t have time to think about it, almost,” Leterrier said. “There was no second-guessing myself, like, Am I doing this right? and then notes and everything. They were like, ‘Directors change. Go.’ And then we have a release date. So go, go, go, go, and then I’m at the premiere.”

But despite the daunting task of being thrown into one of the world’s biggest franchises, a 45-minute call with Diesel was all it took to get Leterrier on board.

“What decided [it] is meeting Vin, the rapport that we had. The relationship Vin and I had just on Zoom was so real,” he explained. “I was like, Oh, yeah, that’s the relationship I want to be in for the next two years. I thought it was just one movie. Now it’s two movies, so