Back when Matthew McConaughey was king of the romantic comedy, one of his biggest successes was How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, and Variety reports that Paramount is developing a sequel. It’s still early days yet, but the plan is to have McConaughey and Kate Hudson reprise their roles from the original.
The original film follows Andie Anderson (Hudson), a magazine writer who sets out to deliberately drive a man away in ten days for an article about common dating mistakes. Her unwitting target is advertising executive Benjamin Barry (McConaughey), who has made a bet that he can make any woman fall in love with him in the same amount of time. As Andie becomes increasingly clingy and outrageous while Ben desperately tries to keep the relationship alive, their competing schemes collide—and genuine feelings begin to develop.
Plot details for the sequel are still being worked out, as the project is currently seeking a writer. Hudson is attached to produce the project.
I’d imagine there’s little point in developing a sequel if the original cast isn’t coming back, but the two stars have previously expressed a willingness to return. McConaughey even recently said the original movie gives him the best residual checks of any project he’s done.
“How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days is the gift that keeps on giving,” McConaughey told the Happy Sad Confused podcast earlier this month. “I think it’s probably my favorite rom-com I’ve done. And a lot of people love that rom-com. It still pays the best ‘mailbox money’ of any film I’ve ever done. By far. … When [home video] used to be just DVDs or cable [instead of streaming or VOD], every March I’d get a big check because of Valentine’s Day.“
As I mentioned, McConaughey was one of the biggest rom-com stars of the 2000s. In addition to How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, there was also The Wedding Planner, Failure to Launch, Fool’s Gold, Ghosts of Girlfriends Past, and more. It’s been a while since he stepped back into that genre, and it might be interesting to see him return.