More than a year after Megan Fox was unceremoniously dumped from the "Transformers" movie franchise, director Michael Bay and series star Shia LaBeouf are opening up about the reasons for her firing.
Bay is now revealing that "Transformers" executive producer Steven Spielberg personally ordered Fox's termination after she trash-talked director Bay in the media.
In the July 2011 issue of GQ, Bay recalls how, after Fox likened him to Hitler and called him "a nightmare to work for," Spielberg ordered the career hit on Fox.
Also read: Shia LaBeouf & Megan Fox: Grilled
"She was in a different world, on her BlackBerry," Bay recalled, describing the starlet's onset behavior on "Transformers 2." "You gotta stay focused."
Then came what Bay described to GQ as "the Hitler thing." In a description of the A-list director as an onset taskmaster who could lighten up after the cameras stopped rolling, Fox worked in an off-the-cuff comparison of Bay to the infamous war criminal.
Steven [Spielberg] said, 'Fire her right now.'"
LaBeouf concurs that Fox dug her own grave with her mouth, adding, "She started s— -talking our captain. Which you can’t do."
Despite the fact that Fox's career has yet to regain its momentum since the canning, and that the "Transformers" franchise now has an untested quantity in the form of replacement Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, Bay told GQ he has no regrets about giving Fox the heave-ho.
"I wasn’t hurt [by Fox's comments], because I know that’s just Megan. Megan loves to get a response. And she does it in the wrong way," Bay told the magazine. "I’m sorry, Megan. I’m sorry I made you work 12 hours. I’m sorry that I’m making you show up on time. Movies are not always warm and fuzzy."