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Broken Lizard Returning With New Comedy 'Rogue Scholars'

by Alex Billington
February 26, 2010

It's not that they were ever really gone, it's that the Broken Lizard comedy troupe has sort of been laying low, making indies because they can't seem to get studio backing. But now THR is reporting that Universal has picked up two new projects from Broken Lizard, one untitled, the other called Rogue Scholars. MPCA (Motion Picture Corporation of America) has partnered with BL and will finance both of the projects. Rogue is being developed as a college comedy revolving around five unruly professors played by the five members of Broken Lizard: Jay Chandrasekhar, Kevin Heffernan, Steve Lemme, Paul Soter and Erik Stolhanske.

MPCA's Brad Krevoy wants to introduce Broken Lizard to a wider audience. In theory, Rogue Scholars will try to reach three generations of comedy fans by aiming for "college-aged funnymen" as students, BL as the teachers and an older generation as the administration. "We are hoping to have the best and brightest appear in this," Krevoy said. "If you look at [Broken Lizard's] body of work and see that they understand modern comedy, they are ready for that breakout. We want to expand them out of their core audience into a four-quadrant audience. They are worth the commitment to get these films made." I hope that's the case.

I'm a fan of Broken Lizard's earlier work but lost interest after Beerfest. I'd love to see them return to form and deliver an awesome comedy and I hope Rogue Scholars is it. However, the problem is that every time I hear about one of their projects, it always sounds great as a concept, but that doesn't mean it'll be good on the big screen. THR also says that both projects will still fall into the "low budget" category, but Universal will be handling the distribution in hopes of making both of these big hits. And we'll keep you updated, too!

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