Ben Stiller thinks ‘Tropic Thunder 2’ may not happen in today’s climate.
“I doubt it,” the actor said when Collider asked whether he thinks the movie could be made today. “Obviously, in this environment, edgier comedy is just harder to do. Definitely not at the scale we made it at, too, in terms of the economics of the business.”
He continued, “I think even at the time we were fortunate to get it made, and I credit that, actually, to Steven Spielberg and DreamWorks. He read it and was like, ‘Alright, let’s make this thing.’ It’s a very inside movie when you think about it.”
“But yeah, the idea of Robert playing that character who’s playing an African American character, I mean, incredibly dicey. Even at the time, of course, it was dicey too,” Stiller explained.
He then added, “The only reason we attempted it was I felt like the joke was very clear in terms of who that joke was on — actors trying to do anything to win awards. But now, in this environment, I don’t even know if I would have ventured to do it, to tell you the truth. I’m being honest.”
In September, Justin Theroux, who wrote and produced ‘Tropic Thunder,’ talked about a possible sequel with ComicBook. He said, “I have some stuff already churning that I’d love to do, but I’ll keep it a secret. Hollywood just gets funnier as the years go on. It never ceases to amaze me how navel-gazing it can be. There’s a million things… we’ve gone through so many movements in Hollywood that I think those would all be somehow in the mix.”
Theroux went on, referring to Tim Burton’s ‘Beetlejuice’ sequel, “Listen, if an idea strikes me, like it struck Tim [Burton], where it’s like, ‘Oh, this could be a sequel,’ I’ll definitely do a sequel.”
‘Tropic Thunder’ is about actors who become real soldiers while filming a war movie in Southeast Asia. Justin Theroux co-wrote it with Etan Cohen, and Ben Stiller starred as Tugg Speedman and directed.
