Back in 2019, Rebel Wilson starred in a meta romantic comedy called Isn’t It Romantic, which was released by Warner Bros. / New Line Cinema in the United States and Canada and received a Netflix streaming release throughout the rest of the world. Now Deadline reports that Isn’t It Romantic is getting an unexpected sort of follow-up – one that will dive into horror territory! This follow-up is called Isn’t It Scary.
New Line Cinema has hired April Prosser, who earned her first writing credit with the Netflix romantic comedy Look Both Ways, to write the screenplay for Isn’t It Scary. Look Both Ways had the following synopsis: On the eve of her college graduation, Natalie’s life diverges into parallel realities: one in which she becomes pregnant and remains in her hometown to raise her child and another in which she moves to LA to pursue her dream career.
Isn’t It Romantic was directed by Todd Strauss-Schulson from a screenplay by Erin Cardillo, Dana Fox, and Katie Silberman. Here’s what it was about: Natalie is a New York architect who works hard to get noticed at her job, but is more likely to deliver coffee and bagels than design the city’s next skyscraper. Things go from bad to weird when she gets knocked unconscious during a subway mugging and magically wakes up to find herself in an alternate universe. Always cynical about love, Natalie’s worst nightmare soon comes true when she suddenly discovers that she’s playing the leading lady in a real-life romantic comedy. So, basically, “a woman who finds herself in a world where everything around her plays out like a clichéd PG-13 romantic comedy.” (And just to avoid confusion: no, the Natalie played by Rebel Wilson in Isn’t It Romantic was not the same Natalie played by Lili Reinhardt in the Prosser-scripted Look Both Ways.)
Deadline hears that Isn’t It Scary will take the same meta approach to horror as Isn’t It Romantic took to rom-coms, “riffing on the tropes of the horror genre.” It’s not clear if Rebel Wilson is expected to return for this one.
Isn’t It Scary is being produced by Todd Garner for Broken Road Productions, along with Gina Mathews and Grant Scharbo of Little Engine Entertainment. Garner, Mathews, and Sharbo are also working on What Kids Want, a follow-up to What Women Want and What Men Want.
I watched Isn’t It Romantic once five years ago and remember enjoying it at the time, but I definitely never thought it would get a horror comedy follow-up. I’m interested to see how Isn’t It Scary is going to turn out.
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