Adele Lim was one of the writers of the massively popular movie Crazy Rich Asians. She created the film with her male co-writer, Peter Chiarelli.

After the success of the movie, there had been plans to make two sequels of the movie. However, Lim quit the job after some payment disputes.

Now, Chiarelli has also been removed from the project and both have been replaced by a familiar face.

Amy Wang Replaced Adele Lim and Peter Chiarelli

On March 21, 2022, Deadline exclusively reported that Amy Wang had been added to the writing team for the next two installations of Crazy Rich Asians. This meant she was replacing both Lim and Chiarelli.

Wang now has the daunting task of writing Crazy Rich Asians 2, the direct sequel to the widely popular 2018 movie.

And to add to this, she is the sole writer for the movie. This means she has to fill two massive pairs of shoes and make the upcoming script a piece of writing deserving to be the sequel of its predecessor.

Wang is a familiar feature in the industry, having previously worked as a story editor on Netflix's hit Brothers Sun.

According to Deadline, when Wang was tapped for the job, she was busy writing and directing a horror feature for QC Entertainment.

There have been no plot leaks and further details on the next movie yet.

But, Wang has to keep in mind that she has to handle a big cast with the likes of Constance Wu, Henry Golding, Awkwafina, Ken Jeong, among others. It will be interesting to see how she distributes screen time to all these faces in the new film.

Adele Lim’s Payment Controversy with Co-writer Peter Chiarelli

This replacement news is the first major update on the Crazy Rich Asians franchise since Lim's controversial exit in 2019.

In September 2019, news broke about Lim's exit from the project. Director Jon M. Chu had been trying to get the two back together for the sequel.

But, a pay disparity became the last straw for Lim.

Adele Lim quit the Crazy Rich Asians franchise after payment disparity with co-writer Peter Chiarelli.

Adele Lim quit the Crazy Rich Asians franchise after payment disparity with co-writer Peter Chiarelli. (Photo: Adele Lim/Instagram)

Lim was told that she would get paid "$110,000-plus" for her contribution to the script, whereas Chiarelli would be getting paid over eight times more. Chiarelli was to be paid $800 thousand to $1 million.

There were other issues, too. Lim said that her perspective was often used only as "soy sauce" for the project, solely to give the movie more cultural authenticity.

Chiarelli reportedly offered her a split of his pay, but she declined the offer. When Chu found out about the issue, he tried to solve the disparity issue by offering her a fair amount.

However, between these two offers, a lot of time had passed. And Lim declined the latter offer.

"These things happen in negotiations, and I'm proud that she was able to stand up for her own measure of worth and walk away when she felt like she was being undervalued," Chu said in a Twitter statement after the controversy had somewhat subsided.

He also assured everyone that he respected Lim and would work with her in the future.

As for Lim, since quitting Crazy Rich Asians, she has written for Raya and the Last Dragon, and has two more projects in the works.