The raunchy R-rated comedy Wanderlust, starring Paul Rudd and Jennifer Aniston, opens today (February 24) – you can read our positive review here. Some may not realize this is the latest venture from former members of the MTV comedy show “The State” David Wain and Ken Marino, whose previous movie Role Models was a pretty big hit a few years back.
The new movie takes them back to the type of humor they used to do on “The State” which carried over to Wain’s first movie, the cult comedy Wet Hot American Summer, a hilarious spoof of ’70s camp that did almost no business in its minimal theatrical release in 2001 but has found a fairly avid fanbase in the years since.
Wet Hot American Summer is an interesting phenomenon not just due to how popular it’s become after its theatrical release, but also the fact that so many of those involved in the movie have gone on to bigger things, and not just Wain, Marino and Paul Rudd, but also Elizabeth Banks, Bradley Cooper, Amy Poehler, Christopher Meloni, all of whom appeared in the low-budget camp comedy.
It looks like the pressure from fans to do a follow-up to Wet Hot American Summer has finally paid off as Wain and Michael Showalter are currently working on a screenplay for a sequel, which Showalter has said will actually be a prequel. While they’re trying to keep the plot of the movie (as well as how everyone will play their younger selves ten years later) wrapped up in secrecy, Wain explained to ComingSoon.net why they decided to do another movie:
“I think the following and the interest in ‘Wet Hot American Summer’ just kept growing all the time, so we are definitely interested in doing another one and that’s in our plans.”
With so many of the cast having gone on to bigger things and being far busier these days than they were back then, we wondered whether the guys were hedging their bets by writing parts for all of them in the script in hopes that will convince them to return.
“The ‘Wet Hot family’ has actually stayed in touch continuously so it’s not like we’re calling them cold,” he said. “We’re all still kind of buddies and we all look back fondly on that experience and I think everybody has already expressed interest in returning to it, so it should be great.”
Those who think Wain is planning on using his connection to Apatow, an admitted fan of “Wet Hot,” to make the sequel a much bigger studio movie may be surprised that Wain and his compadres instead plan on returning to their roots by making a smaller independent film.
“We’re probably just going to go with the original team that did the movie in the first place and go back to all the people who were involved with it in the beginning to keep it pure,” he told us.
Fingers crossed this sequel happens, and that they not only get all of the known actors who have gone onto bigger things but also the likes of Janeane Garofolo and David Hyde Pierce who haven’t done many movies in recent years. Most of all, fans of the original movie should be excited to see Marguerite Moreau back in a major role and her fun romance with Showalter’s character renewed.
In the meantime, check out Wain’s new movie Wanderlust in theaters starting today, and look for our full interview with Wain early next week.
