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Danny McBride Now Attached to Gestating Comedy 'Used Guys'

by Ethan Anderton
November 15, 2010

Some years ago the high concept sci-fi comedy Used Guys from director Jay Roach (Dinner for Schmucks) featuring Jim Carrey and Ben Stiller completely fell apart one month before shooting when a rising budget, which had reached over $100 million, scared Fox from following through with production. Carrey and Roach left the project shortly thereafter and all hope seemed lost. Then last year it was announced that Little Miss Sunshine directors Valerie Faris and Jonathan Dayton would helm the comedy with Stiller still attached and Reese Witherspoon taking the female lead. Now it sounds like Danny McBride might be involved, too.

The observant eyes at The Playlist noticed the news buried deep in an article at Variety with a mention that Fox might be pursuing the project yet again (after 18 months of little to no development) with a much more scaled down version of the film. If you don't recall, the reason the film was so expensive to begin with was because the story was set in a complex future run by women, where cloned male slaves are traded like cars. The high concept, meant high production design and special effects costs which got out of hand.

While being fiscally conservative is a necessity to gain a profit, I fear a concept like this will be tainted by a small scale in the same way that Mike Judge's Idiocracy, another future set comedy which suffered from poor execution, felt like a cheap knock-off of a Hollywood production. Of course, if the script is funny enough, and the production quality is still there, this long-gestating project may finally get off the ground. Of course, in this new iteration, there's no guarantee that Stiller and Witherspoon are still involved, but since McBride is taking the role once filled by Jim Carrey, that may in fact be the case. We'll keep you posted as this project continues to be stuck in development hell. Are you still interested in Used Guys?

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