Posted in: Movies, Orion Pictures | Tagged: alex winter, anna faris, bill & ted 3, Bill & Ted Face The Music, Brigette Lundy-Paine, Female stone comedy, keanu reeves, Samara Weaving, Smiley Face
How Bill & Ted Can Spark Another Revolution: Female Stoner Comedy
When it comes to stoner comedies, it's a man's world. Pairs like Cheech and Chong, Harold and Kumar, Jay and Silent Bob, Dale and Saul, Craig and Smokey (Friday), Bill and Ted help make the careers for the actors who played them. All the aforementioned except for Dale and Saul from Pineapple Express (2008) got sequels. Credit does go to the Anna Faris comedy Smiley Face (2007) and television shows like Weeds on Showtime and That 70's Show on Fox, there just hasn't been any serious attempt in Hollywood to get more female comedic talent together in such a setting. Is it that really hard to create a pair of female stoners who adventure together finding mischief along the way? Hell, even though Bridesmaids (2011) is more an ensemble in the vein of The Hangover, there hasn't been a sequel where their male counterparts had TWO MORE. I'm 99 percent certain Part 3 (2013) didn't need to be made. Not all hope is lost though come to the end of August 2020; we have Bill & Ted Face the Music.
What do Bill & Ted have to do with the near non-existent female stoner comedy? If you have been paying attention to the trailers, they have daughters in Billie Logan (Brigette Lundy-Paine) and Thea Preston (Samara Weaving). If the existing footage is consistent with the rest of the film, then we won't see blatant copies of their fathers. Lundy-Paine and Weaving said they made sure they didn't copy stars Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter. Who knows? Bill, Ted, Billie, and Thea can unite the world in 2020 the way nothing else could, especially during the current pandemic. Plus, if a fourth film is made, the daughters can take the lead.
Who among other comediennes and/or actors can lead a stoner comedy? How about any current female SNL cast member and alum? Tina Fey and Amy Poehler worked together on several occasions. Kate McKinnon, Cecily Strong, Leslie Jones, and Vanessa Bayer can easily star. Look at this SNL parody commercial for E-Meth and tell me McKinnon can't star in her own stoner franchise. You're sitting on a gold mine here, Hollywood! Plus, you won't have to fork over a comic book film budget on it.