It’s been nearly a decade since the last Anchorman hit theaters and the time has come for the Channel 4 News team to make us laugh once again. Those who bought the DVD and/or Blu-Ray will remember a bonus cut of the film titled Wake Up, Ron Burgundy. Which involved a whole set of improvised footage that didn’t make it to the cutting room floor. The filmmakers spliced it together to create a whole new film that was almost just as funny.
A new interview with Mckay discusses the possibility of doing the same with Anchorman 2. What brought the conversation to light, was a topic came up about a sequence in the trailer involved a gay man who the team mistakes for having traits of a vampire. Mckay mentions that the scene featuring actor Matthew Stanton has been trimmed from the film already, which Mckay admits is a terrible thing considering their past.
“He was in ‘Talladega Nights’ but his scene got cut out. He’s a day player from Atlanta and I completely forgot who he was and innocently cast him in this. I thought, that guy’s really good and he came up to me like, you don’t remember me, do you? He was a fan in ‘Talladega Nights’ but didn’t make the final cut. He’s awesome, though.”
Mckay explains that Anchorman 2 will end up being the longest film he’s ever done, with a stretched runtime of 1 hour and 53 minutes. Even with its lengthy cut, the scene was still dropped from the film. However, according to the director, enough footage was cut from the floor to make an entirely separate version of the movie altogether.
“We did so much improv on this one that we can literally replace every single joke in the movie and put in alt scenes and alt improv runs. I think the editor’s working on it right now, with 250 new jokes. I think it would be really funny to put it in theatres for midnight showings. I know that I personally, if I loved a movie and someone told me that, like if Airplane! had been released with all-new jokes, I’d be like, ‘you’ve got to be fucking kidding me!’ I’d see it in a second.”
I wholeheartedly agree! If Mckay and the studio actually had the nerve to make this happen, I’d go watch two visions of the film in a heartbeat. This isn’t a likely scenario, but it’s a fun idea to toss around at least. If anything, I’m willing to bet the DVD/Blu-Ray release will have it as a bonus feature. Fingers crossed!
The gang will return on December 20th in Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues! Would you watch two versions of Anchorman 2?
Check out the latest trailer for Anchorman 2!
[fresh_video url=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VdGI5-z_hg”]
Source: Empire
