Everything old must be new again, and so it was only a matter of time before the reboot gods got around to Police Academy. And so they have, according to original star Steve Guttenberg. The actor, also known for Cocoon, Three Men and a Baby, and for rollerskating down Manhattan’s 5th Ave. in the opening of the Village People movie Can’t Stop the Music, broke the news on Twitter early Labor Day.
In an exchange caught by The Hollywood Reporter, an enthusiastic fan of the franchise, which spawned seven films beginning in the ’80s, bugged The Gute over Twitter for more details, prompting The Gute to tell him, “Adam, the next Police Academy is coming, no details yet, but it is in a gift bag being readied!”
https://twitter.com/SteveGuttbuck/status/1036533146026692608
For the first four films in the Police Academy cycle, Guttenberg played Mahoney, the smirking prankster of a cabal of Keystone-ish cops that also included Michael Winslow’s mouth-noise enthusiast Jones, Marion Ramsey’s mousy Hooks, Tim Kazurinsky’s mousier Sweetchuck, among others. Guttenberg left after installment four, aka Citizens on Patrol, and Mahoney was last seen riding off in a hot air balloon with Sharon Stone (this happened).
Bobcat Goldthwait, who played the rambunctious Zed starting with the second film, aka Their First Assignment, also left the franchise then and has since criticized the films for being, in his estimation, not very good. Presumably Goldthwait, now an acclaimed filmmaker and content creator who directed a heartbreaking doc about the late comedian Barry Crimmins, will not be returning.
No details on who will come back, but among those who’ve since passed on are Bubba Smith (Hightower), David Graf (Tackleberry) and George Gaynes (Commandant Lassard). Meanwhile, some actors who made one-offs in various episodes — and are presumably free — include Kim Cattrall (of the first one), Howard Hesseman (Their First Assignment), David Spade (Citizens on Patrol), Ron Perlman (Mission to Moscow), and the aforementioned Sharon Stone.
