Universal and Imagine Entertainment are developing a sequel to 2000’s “How the Grinch Stole Christmas,” with Jim Carrey in talks to reprise the title role and Ron Howard returning to direct, The Hollywood Reporter reported Wednesday. Brian Grazer, Howard’s longtime Imagine partner, will produce.
The sequel is untitled and its plot is being kept under wraps, though Carrey would again play the green, Christmas-hating recluse from the outskirts of Whoville. Talks are ongoing, and the deal could still fall apart before it firms up.
The script comes from a trio with deep “Curb Your Enthusiasm” roots: Alec Berg (“Barry,” “Silicon Valley”), Jeff Schaffer (“Dave”) and David Mandel (“Veep”). All three also worked on the 2003 Dr. Seuss adaptation “The Cat in the Hat,” the Mike Myers vehicle that landed several Razzie nominations.
The original was a monster. Released right before Thanksgiving in 2000, “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” finished as the top domestic film of the year with $260 million, and pulled in $345 million worldwide. It won the best makeup Oscar for Rick Baker and Gail Rowell-Ryan, who buried Carrey in green fur through a process that ran roughly eight hours a day at the start.
Carrey has not been quiet about how brutal that shoot was. In an oral history for Vulture last year, he recalled wanting to quit on day one and hand back his $20 million fee. He got through it, he said, with help from a man who trained CIA agents to withstand torture, and once the makeup team trimmed the daily application down to about three hours.
Carrey’s return is not locked. He has talked openly about stepping back from acting since “Sonic the Hedgehog 2” in 2022, and in 2023 his rep denied separate sequel rumors swirling at the time. Those earlier reports traced back to fan sites. The current ones are sourced to the trades, which is why the “in talks” wording carries more weight now.
The 2000 film has aged into a streaming staple. It has landed in Nielsen’s top 10 most-streamed holiday movies in each of the past five years. Over the two weeks bracketing Christmas last year, December 15 through December 28, it hit No. 2 on the movies chart with 962 million minutes viewed, trailing only “Home Alone.” It even outdrew the 2018 animated “Dr. Seuss’ The Grinch,” the Benedict Cumberbatch-voiced Illumination feature, which sat at No. 8 in the week before December 25.
Susan Brandt, CEO of Dr. Seuss Enterprises, is overseeing the project for the rights holder. Britt Hennemuth and Christina Hoffrogge are shepherding it at Universal. Howard, for his part, is coming off “Alone at Dawn,” a war drama with Adam Driver, Anne Hathaway and Betty Gilpin that he directed for Amazon MGM.
No release date has been set, and no deal has closed. The next concrete step is whether Carrey signs.
