Peter Farrelly Talks Dumb And Dumber To

'We didn't want to make Dumb And Dumber Lite'

It's been 20 years – gulp – since Lloyd Christmas and Harry Dunne stunned the world with their infectious brand of moronic mishaps in Dumb And Dumber and pretty soon they’ll be back with more of the same in Dumb And Dumber To, a title that still causes us physical pain. As co-writer / director Peter Farrelly explains in the new issue of Empire, Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels’ bosom buddies “are exactly the same” as we left them.

“At the end of the last movie, they were exactly the same as they were at the beginning,” recalls the older half of the Farrelly brothers. “There had been zero growth. And now they’re still doing stupid fucking shit.”

Two decades on and still running on empty in the grey matter department, Lloyd (Carrey) and Harry (Daniels) are on a Searchers-like quest for an absent daughter in Part Durr. Specifically, the daughter Lloyd didn’t even know he had, who boasts something he thinks he may need. “They want to go and find the child because he’s having a kidney problem,” Bobby elaborated during pre-production, “and he wants to ask him for one of his kidneys.”

When it comes to matching the pratfalls and doofus delights of the first film, the Farrelly brothers are determined to avoid that comedy sequel pitfall of relying on love for the characters to carry them through. (Cough, Anchorman 2.)

“We didn’t want to make Dumb And Dumber Lite,” says Peter. “The first one’s a high bar to beat, so whenever we came up with really dumb jokes that didn’t fit whatever movie we were working on, I just put them into the Dumb And Dumber file.” Yes, there were jokes too stupid for Movie 43 and The Three Stooges.

With a script co-written by Bennett Yellin, Sean Anders and John Morris, the likes of Laurie Holden, Kathleen Turner and Rob Riggle also aboard, and Adam-and-Joe talismans Empire Of The Sun (not to be confused with the Spielberg film) providing the music, Dumb And Dumber To will be veering onto US screens on November 14. It crash lands in the UK on December 19.

from Empire News