Fans of the The Hangover comedy trilogy might be disappointed to hear the latest update about a potential fourth movie.
Actor Zach Galifianakis starred in the movies about a group of men getting up to crazy hijinks while attending raucous bachelor parties around the world.
The trilogy helped propel Galifianakis and his co-stars, especially Bradley Cooper, to superstardom, and for a time was the highest-grossing R-rated comedy ever in the U.S. In fact, The Hangover and its sequel remain the 10th and 11th highest grossing R-rated movies of all time at the domestic box office.
The third, and likely final film, came out in 2013 but that has not stopped speculation about whether the team would reunite for another movie.
When Newsweek put that question to Galifianakis, the Between Two Ferns star replied with his trademark humor.
"I guess we would have to make sure Ken Jeong's schedule was clear... we'd have to wait until The Masked Singer was done," the comedic actor said of his Hangover co-star and panelist on the Fox reality singing competition.
But in all seriousness, Galifianakis can't understand where the rumors about a new Hangover movie come from and doesn't think they would ever return to the franchise.
"I've never heard anything like that, no one has said anything to me about that. We've done that dance," he said.
Besides, Galifianakis is interested in pursuing more dramatic roles such as in his current film, Winner, the black comedy based on the true story of Reality Winner. She was the former National Security Agency (NSA) contract worker who was sentenced to five years in jail for leaking documents that proved Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. In 2020, she was released into home confinement due to the coronavirus pandemic and is serving the rest of her sentence at her home in Texas.
In Winner, Galifianakis treads a fine line between deep pathos and subtle comedy playing Winner's tragic dad, Ron Winner. The actor acknowledged he is probably more known for being a "little louder" with his acting, but "didn't want to bring that energy to a movie like this."
"You play it a little differently," he said of the jokes in the movie which he described as being "more from the heart."
"It's a little easier, to be honest, doing it dramatically. Comedy is so opinionated nowadays... the dramatic stuff is something I hope to continue to do, because I don't get to do it that much."
He added, "As a comedic actor you're used to working a certain muscle and then it's fun to figure out if you can tell different stories with different types of acting."
Galifianakis stars alongside Emilia Jones (Coda) who plays the NSA contractor, Connie Britton (Friday Night Lights) and Kathryn Newton (Lisa Frankenstein) in one of several recent retellings of Winner's life. Another recent movie called Reality, starred Sydney Sweeney in a critically acclaimed performance, and was based on the play Is This a Room. That play was based on the transcript of the FBI's interrogation of Winner in the garage of her Georgia home when she was arrested.
Galifianakis and the other actors got to meet with Winner and her family, and the former federal worker gave her blessing for the film.
Filmmaker Susanna Fogel decided to take a different tone entirely when making Winner, describing previous works about her as "dramatic, high stakes in tone."
"In getting to know Reality herself, we found her actual voice as a person to be strikingly idiosyncratic. She totally defies any cliché of a self-serious policy wonk or would-be anarchist. She's irreverent. Funny. Her Twitter is the stuff of SNL monologues. And her family is equally quirky. Basically, the Winners feel like characters from the most beloved dramedies we all adore," Fogel said.
It's those characteristics that Winner has that means we haven't heard the last from her, according to Galifianakis.
"I don't think Reality anticipated that this was how her life was going to go, but she does have the personality to continue to have an amazing life," he told Newsweek. "I think you're going to hear things from her down the road that are going to be pretty amazing."
Winner is now in select theaters and on demand.
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