Bohemian Rhapsody director Bryan Singer has reportedly been fired from a proposed remake of 80s action film Red Sonja, in the wake of multiple allegations of underage sex.

Red Sonja producer Avi Lerner had signed Singer in September 2018 to direct a new version of the 1985 sword-and-sorcery yarn that starred Brigitte Nielsen and Arnold Schwarzenegger, with a rumoured $10m (£7.5m) fee for Singer – even though he had been fired from the Queen and Freddie Mercury biopic Bohemian Rhapsody in December 2017. However it has now been reported that Lerner has “dropped Singer from the project because he was unable to secure a domestic distributor”.

The project earlier appeared to have been put on hold after allegations against Singer of underage sex appeared in the Atlantic in January, which Singer denied as a “homophobic smear”. Lerner also denounced the article as “agenda driven fake news”. Red Sonja was withdrawn from Lerner’s studio Millennium Films’ sales pitch at the European Film Market at the Berlin film festival in February, with Millennium saying: “The project is not on the slate at the moment and is not for sale.”

Actor Rami Malek, who won the best actor Oscar for Bohemian Rhapsody, said in February that working with Singer on the film “was not pleasant, not at all”. The actor went on to say: “For anyone who is seeking any solace in all of this,” he said, “Bryan Singer was fired [from Bohemian Rhapsody] – I don’t think that was something anyone saw coming but I think that had to happen and it did.”

Lerner’s representatives have been contacted for comment by the Guardian but have yet to respond.