Seth Rogen was ‘traumatised’ by The Interview email hacking scandal

2014 satire was pulled from screens after terrorist threats made by Sony hackers

Seth Rogen has said he was “traumatised” by the email hacking scandal surrounding his comedy film The Interview.

In 2014, Sony Entertainment Pictures was hacked and thousands of private company emails were disseminated to the public.

The hackers also threatened to organise terrorist attacks at cinemas screening The Interview, which told the story of a TV host (James Franco) and producer (Rogen) who conspire to assassinate the leader of North Korea, Kim Jong Un (Randall Park).

As a result, many US cinema chains refused to screen the film, and The Interview was eventually released digitally, with only a limited theatrical release.

Rogen told Cinema Blend: “Truthfully, after The Interview we [Rogen and co-director Evan Goldberg] were a little traumatised, I think.”

After that, Rogen gravitated away from cinema for a while, and focussed his efforts on the TV industry.

The Superbad star continued: “The idea of going into television and directing a lot of TV shows and pilots, it just was a very educational experience to us.

“We wanted to try a lot of different things as directors, and work with different cinematographers, different actors, different tones, different styles. And it was actually an incredible learning experience for us. And after years of doing that, we feel like we were ready to go back into directing a film basically.”