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'The Hangover' Director Looks Busy with Four New Comedies Coming

by Ethan Anderton
February 6, 2012
Source: Deadline

With great comedies like The Hangover and Old School in his directing past, and his producing effort Project X coming in the near future, Todd Phillips is showing no signs of slowing down as a comedic force in Hollywood. While there's been missteps like School for Scoundrels and the wholly disappointing The Hangover Part II, Deadline reports the filmmaker has a handful of new projects dealing with drug traffickers, arms dealers, an adaptation of a series of web shorts and a mysterious project that sounds like it could easily belong to an action tentpole filmmaker. Thankfully, they all sound like solid new comedies.

Most of Phillips new gestating material comes in the form of adaptations, and all are under Warner Bros. renewed deal with his Green Hat Films production banner. One such project is Mule, an adaptation of Tony D'Souza's novel of the same name that follows a young couple that turns to drug trafficking to scratch a living during the recession. Another project deals with a pair in another unlikely business with Arms and the Dudes, the story two stoners (based on a Rolling Stone article by Guy Lawson) in Miami Beach who became big-time arms dealers, and suddenly had it all taken away by the Pentagon. Both have the potential for action and comedy in one package, something that Phillips has delivered with The Hangover franchise.

In addition, Phillips is also working on Million Dollar Strong, a film inspired by the web short of the same name that sees Mike O'Connell and Ken Jeong (of The Hangover and "Community") as a rap duo with a funny single called What's It Gonna Be. It's not clear what the storyline will be yet, but O'Connell and writer Peter Kline (The Living Wake) will script the film. Finally, a project called The Island is being developed from a script by Due Date writer Adam Sztykiel, but the logline is being kept under wraps so we have no idea what to expect.

As of now these are all being developed by Phillips' Green Hat Films production banner as directing vehicles for the filmmaker himself. However, he could just as easily end up only producing these films as well. Frankly, while I find Phillips brand of comedy to be great, both Due Date and The Hangover Part II just didn't hit the right chords with me. Due Date was a raunchy remake of Planes, Trains and Automobiles without the John Hughes heart and The Hangover Part II was a carbon copy of the original which brought laughs, but not nearly as well as the first film. All these new projects sound quite promising though.

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