For all its jaw-dropping, Oscar-nominated visual effects, the heart of “Twister” was a romance between storm chasers Bill “The Extreme” Harding, played by Bill Paxton, and Dr. Jo Harding, played by Helen Hunt. Even though the film begins with the two in the middle of a divorce, the couple learn to reignite their love and passion for each other through their shared obsession with tracking deadly tornadoes. Sadly, Paxton has since passed, but Hunt is returning to star in a story about their daughter, who unsurprisingly is following in her parents’ footsteps to become a storm chaser herself.
Interestingly, there was a previously rejected pitch that Hunt shopped around revolving around a multi-racial cast of storm chasers. She claimed in an interview with Andy Cohen on “Watch What Happens Live” that she was planning on co-writing the script with Daveed Diggs and Rafael Casal, both of whom she works with on Starz’s “Blindspotting” television series. But the studio rejected the idea, according to Hunt.
