Donald Glover breaks silence over Phoebe Waller-Bridge’ shock exit from Mr and Mrs Smith

Phoebe Waller-Bridge quit the Amazon Prime series Mr and Mrs Smith and has never revealed why … but now we know.

Waller-Bridge and Glover quit working together.

Mr and Mrs Smith star Donald Glover has finally broken his silence over Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s shock exit from the Amazon Prime series.

The talented writers originally joined hands on rebooting the 2005 action-comedy movie into an Amazon series, however Waller-Bridge later exited the series over “creative differences”.

Phoebe Waller-Bridge quit Mr and Mrs Smith despite originally co-writing the show and being set to star as the main character. Picture from Amy Sussman/Getty Images for AFI/AFP.

The truth behind those “differences” has never been talked about, that is until now.

“It’s a divorce in a weird way,” he told The Hollywood Reporter in an interview published Wednesday.

“You’re like, ‘Oh shit, this should have worked.’ And this is just me, being honest, but I think a good relationship is one where you don’t waver from the extremely uncomfortable.

“And I don’t know if we were ever going to get to a place where we could be completely brutal to each other,” Glover continued, adding, “It might’ve just been cultural. You’ve got to think, ‘Fleabag’ was written entirely by her, they don’t really do writers rooms in the U.K.”

Waller-Bridge had been originally cast in Angelie Jolie’s part, while Glover played Brad Pitt’s role. However, while Glover kept his role, the British actress was replaced with Maya Erskine and entirely removed as a co-writer.

Glover has confessed that he reached a point where he was “afraid” to share his concerns about the script with his co-star.

“You weren’t afraid to say something — but we also had the right to roast you,” he said of his time working on Atlanta, which he co-wrote before he joined Mr and Mrs Smith. “It’s just how we got the laughs … I don’t think we [Waller-Bridge] ever felt comfortable enough with each other. And that’s OK. That’s what happens when you’re two captains.”

Maya Erskine and Donald Glover are now starring in Mr. & Mrs. Smith, which has been met with rave reviews this month. Photo by Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images.

However, despite Waller-Bridge’s exit, Glover claimed that Mr and Mrs Smith didn’t seem to be something the British actress was particularly keen on doing in the first place.

“I feel like Phoebe wasn’t fully in love with the thing,” he said. “But I feel really good about the fact that if the thing was feeling more like hers and she was like, ‘I just love this,’ I would have been like, ‘You should have it.’”

Waller-Bridge previously opened up about her exit last year, saying that she “fully cared” about the series during her time on it.

“I worked on that show for six months fully in heart and mind and really cared about it — still care about it,” she told Vanity Fair in a 2023. “And I know it’s gonna be brilliant. But sometimes it’s about knowing when to leave the party. You don’t want to get in the way of a vision.”