'Anchorman 2' May Happen, With Budget Cuts

Here's the latest on Anchorman 2, and it's a bit of a reversal from last week. Deadline says Paramount and Adam McKay and Will Ferrell are nowhere near an agreeable budget figure, so if the filmmakers can jettison some costs, the movie might happen. The problem is, McKay and Ferrell are working with a $70 million figure and Paramount wants it to be about half that much, $40 million, to be precise. To be fair to Paramount, you can make this movie for less than $70 million. The first movie cost $26 million, and minus salaries, the sequel could take advantage of tax breaks in any of 44 states that have deals in place for feature film production. It's really a question of putting the movie ahead of the stars. For instance, The Hangover cost $35 million. The Proposal cost $40 million. Paul Blart cost under $30 million. So it isn't about $40 million not being enough to make a film so much as it is $40 million not being enough to pay the actors what they're worth. The flip side is that none of those movies were established brands and Anchorman is. But the flip side has a dark underbelly, namely that Will Ferrell might be box office cancer right now. We'll see what The Other Guys does this summer, but he's only made four movies that have eclipsed $100 million, none in a row. So his price should be the first thing to be cut. However, that doesn't appear to be the way the negotiations are going. "The filmmakers behind Anchorman 2 won't even start on a script unless Paramount moves the budget up to a range that is probably closer to $70 million," writes Deadline, and if it's true, that's just asinine thinking on the part of McKay and Ferrell, especially since, at any opportunity, these guys announce their resignation that the sequel can't be as good as the original.

Comments

[anybody]

Its hard to imagine that these guys can't make some kind of back-end deal and cut their salaries to get this made... I would think it would be box-office gold (based on how often I still hear the originals quotes flying about). And maybe it's wrong to place the blame solely on McKay and Ferrells shoulders because Carell and Rudd might be the ones demanding the big bucks to return. Who knows, all I know is something smells like bigfoots dick.

[Get The Big Picture]

McKay said a couple weeks ago that Paul and Steve slashed their prices, and anyway, Carell might get, what, $10, $12 million for something like Date Night? Rudd might get $5 million? That's before they'd take less, but it's not like those numbers would bankrupt the movie, particularly if Ferrell and McKay took a page out of Todd Phillips' book and got paid after the fact. That guy made $50 million off The Hangover and will make more off the sequel if it's a hit, all because he waited to get paid.