Seems fitting that there were two different cuts of the “Anchorman 2” trailer this week, since Paramount is considering something genuinely unprecedented when they release the film in theaters in December.
We recently spoke to McKay along with a group of people when we spent some time in the editing room with him, and while what we saw and most of what we discussed is sill under embargo, thanks to Empire in the UK, we can now discuss one of the things that McKay brought up with us.
If you haven’t noticed, we’ve been doing a lot more in-studio video here at HitFix recently, and that’s because we are finally in an office suite as a group. For the last five years, we’ve all been working out of our homes, and that’s been great, but we have a big enough team now that it seems like we need to be in one place, all of us working together.
Part of that is a heavier emphasis on taking news like this and dealing with it on video, especially when we have something like this worth talking about.
Right now, they aren’t sure what they’re going to do, but they are indeed exploring the option of creating an alternative cut for film and it may well get some sort of theatrical release. I’m excited about the idea, and if anyone can pull it off, it’s this team of filmmakers. I love McKay’s comparison of how he would have felt if “Airplane!” had been released with 250 new jokes, and it’s exciting to think of seeing two radical takes on this within a few weeks of each other.
Check out the video, and get ready, because there’s a lot more of it coming as we get comfortable in our new space.
“Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues” will open on December 25, 2013.