Superman (1978 film) finish writing duties. George MacDonald Fraser was later hired to do some work on the script, but he says he did little. Their script was submitted in July 1976, and carried a camp tone, including a cameo appearance by Telly Savalas as his "Kojak" character. The scripts for "Superman" and "Superman II" were now at over 400 pages combined. Pre-production started at Cinecittà Studios in Rome, with sets starting construction and flying tests being unsuccessfully experimented. "In Italy," producer Ilya Salkind remembered, "we lost about $2 million [on flying tests]." Marlon Brando found out he could not film in Italy
Superman IV: The Quest for Peace the box office. It ended up with a total domestic gross of $15,681,020. Of the four Superman films starring Reeve, "The Quest for Peace" fared the worst at the box office, and the series went dormant for the following nineteen years. Reeve regretted his decision to be involved in the film, saying, ""Superman IV" was a catastrophe from start to finish. That failure was a huge blow to my career." Plans were made to make a "Superman V", but they never came to fruition. Reeve's 1995 paralysis made any further development of sequels involving him in the starring role impossible.