Terrence Howard "difficult" to work with, was highest paid star of IRON MAN?

Finally we are starting to scratch against the surface of mystery that surrounded the sacking of Terrence Howard from IRON MAN 2 which the trades quite conspicuously at the time said was for pay demands. Entertainment Weekly report that there were two factors in Marvel's decision to let him go. The first was Terrence Howard's "difficult" behavior on the set of the film. They claim that Jon Favreau got so frustrated with Howard's attitude and performance that he spent way more hours than he should have chopping and basically minimalizing his role as Col. Jim Rhodes from a big character, to a supporting player. Another problem was that in the early days of casting, Howard was brought on to the film when no other stars had signed a contract. Marvel, not expecting to get the likes of Robert Downey Jr, Gwyneth Paltrow and Jeff Bridges for the movie, probably offered Howard too big a contract to sign on to secure the first big name for the film. By the time it was evident that the top Hollywood names were interested in joining this comic book property it was too late for them to renogiate. Leaving Howard, with some of his performance on the cutting room floor, as the highest paid actor of the film even though he had such a small part. Although the last movie contained the geek out line "Next time baby" in regards to him suiting up as War Machine, new scribe Etan Cohen (TROPIC THUNDER) and Favreau mapped out a script for the sequel which severly condensed the role of Rhodes. Once Marvel heard of this, they finally saw an opportunity to do what they wanted all along and offered him a massive, possibly insulting, reduction of somewhere between 80 and 50 per cent, probably with the intention of Howard bailing on the project. The reduction offer of course was rejected by Howard. Somewhere between these back and forth discussions... Howard was let go. He was replaced by Academy Award nominated Don Cheadle and it seems Howard was unaware of his departure from the franchise until he read it, at the same time we did, in the trades on Oct. 14th. Though I would fully expect Rhodes' role to be significant again, probably a major character and we know Cheadle has already signed on for THE AVENGERS... so his character is scheduled to go places.