Is reviving old comedy franchises a 'Dumb' move?
When Harry first met Lloyd 20 years ago in Dumb and Dumber, it began a pop-culture love affair with fans for two of the biggest buffoons in movie history.
They're back — and again played by Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels — in the Farrelly brothers' Dumb and Dumber To (in theaters Friday).But the big question now isn't about their annoying bromance or the film's cult status. Instead, fans and critics will be looking to see whether this much idiocy plays well two decades later.
Doing a sequel to a comedy such as The Hangover or Horrible Bosses after a few years is hard enough, says Rentrak media analyst Paul Dergarabedian. "When it's like 10 years or 20 years later, it becomes an event, and you have to live up to that event."
It took four years to get a studio to make the first one, says Peter Farrelly, who's co-director/co-producer/co-writer with brother Bobby. But the long gestation period for this sequel gave them a story line they wouldn't have had before: The sequel finds Daniels' Harry and Carrey's Lloyd on a mission to find Harry's long-lost daughter and get the newfound dad a kidney for a transplant.
"All that stuff wouldn't have been doable after five years," says Peter.
A first inkling for another Dumb and Dumber came in 1998 after the Farrellys' success with There's Something About Mary. New Line Cinema wanted to do a prequel, i but the filmmakers balked and the studio went ahead anyway with 2003's Dumb and Dumberer — a critical and box-office failure without the Farrellys, Carrey and Daniels.
It wasn't until 2009, when Carrey watched the original film while staying in a hotel, that Dumb and Dumber To started to become a reality.
It took a long time, Daniels recalls. "Four drafts of the script, and the studio didn't like it.' Among the excuses, he says: " 'They're middle-aged, that was then, this is now, there's a whole slew of other great comedic actors out there.... maybe it's better if we just leave Dumb and Dumber where it was.' But we didn't."
Adds Peter Farrelly: "It's the lovability of those two characters that carries the day. The reason people watch (the original) over and over is it's kind of comforting being with them. They're warm guys even though they're bumbling idiots."
The track record isn't always good for long-gestating comedy sequels. Without the late John Belushi, Blues Brothers 2000bombed and added nothing to the franchise that began with the original 1980 movie. More recently, 2013's Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues got a mixed reaction nine years after the first Will Ferrell vehicle was a hit.
"Sometimes you can dilute a positive legacy if you don't do it right," says Dergarabedian.
However, there are several things working in Dumb and Dumber To's favor, says Jeff Bock, senior box office analyst for Exhibitor Relations. The rude sense of humor from the first film fits nicely into the mind-sets of YouTube-raised youngsters, plus it boasts the original stars.
"In terms of goofballs, you've got to put them up there as the Laurel and Hardy of our generation," Bock says of Carrey and Daniels. "They're like men out of time — it doesn't matter that 20 years have passed. They still have their shtick down and it's still funny. If this film does well, they could probably wait another 20 years and it'd still be funny."
Contributing: Patrick Ryan