And nobody likes Ed Norton when he’s angry.

But, seriously, the prickly nature Ed Norton has displayed time and again over the years, as an opinionated actor/producer/director, that made him a natural choice to play the green goliath is apparently the reason he won’t be doing a publicity tour for The Incredible Hulk, Marvel’s next in-house production.

The director of the film, Louis Leterrier (director of The Transporter), campaigned with Norton for a longer cut of the film, clocking in at about 2 hours and 15 minutes, while Marvel wanted a shorter, fast-paced action packed cut of the film lasting just under two hours. Norton threatened to not publicize the film, and Marvel called his bluff.

But, according to Entertainment Weekly, he totally wasn’t bluffing.

Gregory Kirschling, of Entertainment Weekly, writes:

Edward Norton isn’t speaking. The star of The Incredible Hulk, the new $150 million adaptation of the Marvel comic-book series, would normally be chatting up the press this time of year, promoting his big summer movie. Instead, the 38-year-old Oscar nominee has declined repeated interview requests, following a disagreement he had with his producers over the final cut of the film… These creative arguments happen in Hollywood a lot but usually remain a secret. This time, they didn’t. So Norton isn’t talking, and others are ready to lay the blame — well, everywhere. ”It’s as much Marvel’s fault as it is Edward’s,” Leterrier says. ”And my fault. It’s everybody’s fault! Or no one’s fault, in a way. I regret that [Marvel and Norton] didn’t come to an agreement where we could’ve all worked together.”

Now, Norton states this was all blown out of proportion, and in a press release, stated:

Like so many people I’ve loved the story of The Hulk since I was a kid, so it was thrilling when Marvel asked me to write and help produce an altogether new screen incarnation, as well as play Bruce Banner. I grew up reading Marvel Comics and always loved the mythic dimension and contemporary themes in the stories, and I’m proud of the script I wrote. In every phase of production, including the editing, working with Louis Leterrier has been wonderful…I’ve never had a better partner, and the collaboration with all the rest of the creative team has been terrific. Every good movie gets forged through collaboration, and different ideas among people who are all committed and respect the validity of each other’s opinions is the heart of filmmaking. Regrettably, our healthy process, which is and should be a private matter, was misrepresented publicly as a ‘dispute,’ seized on by people looking for a good story, and has been distorted to such a degree that it risks distracting from the film itself, which Marvel, Universal and I refuse to let happen. It has always been my firm conviction that films should speak for themselves and that knowing too much about how they are made diminishes the magic of watching them. All of us believe The Incredible Hulk will excite old fans and create new ones and be a huge hit… Our focus has always been to deliver the Hulk that people have been waiting for and keep the worldwide love affair with the big green guy going strong.

I can see where Norton is coming from, but there are a few sticky details here.

1) Norton did a re-write of the script. He didn’t make that clear enough for my taste.

2) This really doesn’t explain to me why he won’t be going on Late Night to promote this movie.

I just hope to God that EW is just jumping the gun here and Norton wants things to cool down a bit before he comes out to promote the film. I’d hate to have to promote a film while in the middle of a public battle with the production company - how many times do you think he’d have to explain himself?

And, ultimately, maybe Norton is right about the cut of the film? Making Incredible twenty minutes longer is not going to distrupt the flow of the movie and maybe inject some intelligence into a character that is extremely nuanced and, let’s face it, hard to capture.

A big part of the character of the Hulk is that internal struggle that got lost in the first film, the fact Bruce hates the Hulk is partly because he hates what he is capable of and partly because even if the Hulk didn’t exist, Banner would hate himself. If this movie is just two hours of Hulk beat-’em-up on film, I’ll be majorly disappointed. That’s why Marvel made Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction, isn’t it?