Ricky Gervais in Talks to Star in 'Muppets' Sequel

[Beauregard]

I stopped liking Gervais when I saw him making tasteless and mostly unfunny cancer jokes in a stand-up tour.

That said, his part in Night of the Museum 1 and 2 is good, but that's only a small part...

 

[Muppet fan 123]

I stopped liking Gervais when I saw him making tasteless and mostly unfunny cancer jokes in a stand-up tour.

That said, his part in Night of the Museum 1 and 2 is good, but that's only a small part...

Who did he play in Night at the Musuem? I don't remember him being in there..

I feel bad for people who can't stand the guy, cause he'll be in the movie a lot. I hope he's not going to be hogging up the screen for too long, I just can't see it happening, with him as the main human character.
I'm glad he's in the movie, I just don't see him as the main role. I just hope his and Burrell's time are equal. If we have many great lead celeberties it's not so bad.
So far so good.

 

[Pinkflower7783]

Wait wait wait...are there humans in this movie?

 

[D'Snowth]

Look people: as much as we would like a movie, or any production for that matter, only include strictly a cast of Muppets, they wouldn't be able to pull it off. If it were a cable special, like, say, Muppet Musicians of Bremen, or Emmet Otter, that'd be one thing, but in this case, the Muppets alone aren't going to be enough to bring in the masses (not just Muppet Freaks, but the public in general), they pretty much have to rely on some star power to really pull 'em in. Now, whether some people like it or not, Ricky Gervais does possess that kind of star power: he's relevant to mainstream media right now, as a writer, actor, and comedian - in fact, he's responisble for what was America's biggest hit for a while: The Office, as he was behind the original U.K. version of which the U.S. version with Steve Carell was adapted from. Now, if all the hubub is over him being an atheist, think of what Jim would do. Jim was all about inclusion: he hired white, black, straight, gay, righties, lefties, and I'm sure he hired religious and irreligious; so it's not really a matter of whether or not an actor is Christian, Jewish, Atheist, Agnostic, Muslim, Buddhist, Scientologist, etc, it's whether or not the actor is good enough to carry the film along... I think Gervais can carry the film along, and I give him the support and trust that I, unjustly, denied Jason Segel in the previous movie. Plus, Gervais is part Canadian, so that automatically gets thumbs up from this Canadaphile.

Now then, as far as the human cast, in general, goes... they've only announced, what... three human leads thus far? Three? And that's some how too many? Think back to GMC again, the main human cast consisted of Lady and Nicky Holiday, as well as Nicky's entourage of three lady spies... that's five humans in the main cast of a Muppet movie. Think to MTM: there was Pete, Jenny, and eventually Ronny as the main human cast, there's three. The Muppets (2011): Gary, Mary, Veronica, Tex Richman, and Jack Black... that's five again. And of course, most of the Muppet movies are known for their countless additional celebrity cameos. So, like, what's the deal with humans in the sequel?

 

[Beauregard]

Now I know this is obviously all assumption at this point, but the difference for me between the 5 mainish humans in GMC and the idea of a "human lead" is really the idea that in the old movies the Muppets were our POV of the world, with the humans as people they interacted with, whereas often in later movies (*cough* Mwoo, The Muppets *cough*) we see the Muppets through the eyes of the humans.

As long as we see Muppets first, then humans, I don't mind at all. Even Scrooge was seen first through the eyes of Dickens, and Jim Hawkins (who had great chemistry with the Muppets) had the opening of Muppet-animals observing humans in Shiver My Timbers before he was introduced.

In the original movies the Humans were often there to make the Muppets seem normal (the Muppets looked at them and thought, "Wow, what a weirdo...") whereas more lately the humans look at the Muppets and think, "Freak."

 

[Ignatz]

I agree with Beuregard. If they are trying to get non-Muppet fans they don't neccesarily have to have a celebrity as the protagonist, the celebrity will obviously be on the poster and when they get into the cinema what does it matter what role that celebrity is playing they've already payed to get in. In my view the Muppets should always be the protagonist and humans are either antagonists, allies or speaking extras. In the original movies it was all about as Beuregard says the view of the human world from the Muppets (the exception being MCC and MTI which showed a human in a world of muppets) so just keep the Muppets as the protagonists and the humans in the antagonist and minor roles.

 

[Drtooth]

Wow. The negativity here is astounding. Gervais is a perfect pick!

I just have to ask... who were we expecting to be in the film? Gervais is a big name celebrity. I don't see how he's such a big problem when the last couple telefilms before the Muppets had C listers (except for Quentin Tarrentino). As long as it isn't another dated Kelly Osborn style cameo, I don't mind.

Besides... what would you rather have? A celebrity you don't much care for that is a huge fan and has worked with them wonderfully before, or someone who's going to be aloof and wooden and only there for the sake of being there? There are plenty of people who worked with the Muppets that just seemed awkward because they didn't like the experience. Would we want an entire movie like that?

What exactly is/was wrong with Charles Grodin? I have a feeling I must have missed some thing; granted, I haven't seen a lot of his other work (except for maybe one of any of those Beethoven movies), but he seems like a pretty decent guy to me.

How about availability? Remember, they tried to get him to cameo in character in the last film, but he was unavailable filming something else at the time. Maybe he'll come back for this one, but if he can't, he's an actor. Like what happened with Christopher Waltz... if someone's unavailable, nothing can be done.

 

[Pinkflower7783]

I'm just gonna go to the theater and eat my popcorn and enjoy a GREAT MUPPET MOVIE!!

 

[Frogpuppeteer]

I should Clarify, again im not saying i hate Ricky Gervais, i love some of his movies..Ghost Town and Invention of Lying are underrated in my book...ok maybe i like Invention of Lying cause its filmed in my home state...

ill be there atleast as many times as i was for the first one, i stopped counting after 10,

what im saying is i really hoped the Muppets wouldve been main billed this time around , i still believe in them, and like many said cameos of stars can bring in people too, BUT what D'snowth said is also true, that's not the case anymore, we may never see another Muppet movie where the Muppets are second characters, its true in any theatrical movie no matter the franchise.

 

[D'Snowth]

And not only that, but the actors themselves aren't going to accept being billed AFTER a bunch of puppets, that's some thing that dates way back: the actors weren't entirely pleased playing second fiddle to a puppet on ALF, and likewise, even further back, all of Sid & Marty Kroffts' shows had the live actors billed during the main titles, and all the puppeteers billed during the end titles.

Even within the Muppet universe too, they had a hard time booking guests on TMS during the first season, and were only able to get those who happened to be friends of Jim's, or Bernie's... it wasn't until after it was successful that people wanted to be on the show.