As my fellow MovieBuzzer Graham has been reporting, the major studios are preparing for sequels for films before the original is even released (check out his articles on Captain America 2 and Real Steel 2!) I thought it was interesting that this news came out the same week that Will Ferrell appeared on TV’s The Office as the manager replacing Michael Scott (Steve Carell). Ferrell will appear on the show for a handful of episodes, and while Thursday’s episode was very funny, it rubbed me the wrong way. Why? What hurt about Thursday’s episode was seeing Ferrell and Carell together again while knowing that Paramount won’t put up the money to make Anchorman 2.
It’s ironic that studios will make sequels to just about any film — including for films that nobody seems very interested in seeing a sequel of — and yet Paramount, which holds the rights to make a sequel to Anchorman, will not produce a sequel to a film that the fans, stars, and the director actually want. The last news on a possible sequel was in September 2010, when director Adam McKay told Collider.com that Paramount was reconsidering its decision not to go ahead on the sequel, but no word since. It seems that the main problem is that the cost to bring the principal cast back together is more than the studio is willing to spend.
This, of course, is a shame, because Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy is perhaps Ferrell‘s greatest film. Even if it isn’t your favorite Will Ferrell film, you have to admit that Ferrell really hasn’t had a film as funny since (although Step Brothers, also directed by McKay, came close). In fact, Ferrell has had a few god awful films since: Bewitched, Semi-Pro, and Land of the Lost, just to name the worst. Ferrell‘s performance of Burgundy as an out-of-touch, overgrown diva who can’t accept the changing world around him is still hysterical years later. Even the outtakes are funny, as you can see from Wake Up, Ron Burgundy: The Lost Movie, which was a sequel of sorts that was cobbled together from the outtakes of the film and a discarded subplot. When the cast and crew can create a 96 minute film out of outtakes that is far funnier than most “comedies” today, you know you had a winning team.
On top of that, Paramount can’t say it’s spending its sequel money any better, either. Paramount has since produced under-performing remakes of The Longest Yard, The Honeymooners, and Friday the 13th. Paramount has also since released the “comedies” Failure to Launch, Hot Rod, Nacho Libre, Drillbit Taylor, The Love Guru, Hotel For Dogs, Dance Flick, Imagine That, Little Fockers, No Strings Attached, and Dinner For Schmucks, the last of which starred Anchorman leads Carell and Paul Rudd but wasn’t even close to being as funny as Anchorman. I haven’t seen all of those films, but all of them were met with poor-to-mediocre receptions, and probably collectively don’t have half as many laughs as Anchorman, too.
The “too expensive” message doesn’t hold water, either. Anchorman cost $26 million to produce, while Dinner for Schmucks (which starred Carell and Rudd) cost more than double that — $69 million — and made less money than Anchorman at the box office. Little Fockers (which Paramount co-produced with Universal, Relativity Media, and Anchorman partner DreamWorks) cost a whopping $100 million and was dogged by critics and fans of the series alike. Five of Ferrell‘s films have made at least $100 million at the box office (Elf, Talladega Nights, Blades of Glory, Step Brothers, and The Other Guys), a feat that only comedian megastars like Adam Sandler, Robin Williams, Eddie Murphy, and Jim Carrey have equaled or exceeded. It’s actually six if you count Megamind, which, coincidentally, was produced by Paramount and DreamWorks, too. Will Ferrell is a bankable movie star, and while I realize Anchorman didn’t make anything close to the money The Hangover made, Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures didn’t waste any time reuniting that cast for the eagerly anticipated upcoming sequel.
We’re lucky that an Anchorman sequel has some flexibility with its timeline. The original was set in 1975, and if another decade passes before we get a sequel I don’t see anything wrong with bringing Ron Burgundy into the 1980s. In fact, I think he’d be even more out-of-place in the Reagan era — I can see Burgundy moderating presidential debates and covering the major events of the 1980s, along with cat shows and panda births. But if Paramount isn’t willing to finance the film, we’ll never get to see it.
What do you think, readers? Want to see the Channel 4 News Team reunite? Give us your take in the comments below!
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