“Dear Santa” has been 15 years in the making for Bobby and Peter Farrelly.
During that time, the brothers parted ways for solo careers, with Peter Farrelly famously winning Best Picture for “Green Book.” Now, a decade after last working together on “Dumb and Dumber To” in 2014, the Farrelly Brothers are back together for a subversive new holiday film starring Jack Black.
Black plays Satan, who is summoned by a kid (Robert Timothy Smith) who accidentally sends his letter to Santa Claus to the underworld. Keegan-Michael Key, Brianne Howey, Post Malone, Hayes MacArthur, Jaden Carson Baker, and Kai Cech co-star.
Ricky Blitt (“Loudermilk”) co-wrote the script with Peter Farrelly; Bobby Farrelly directs. Last year, during an interview for his solo effort “Champions,” Bobby Farrelly told IndieWire, “It’s a much zanier comedy than this one, closer to what we did, I think, originally.”
“It’s a long-percolating movie, like all our movies,” Peter told Entertainment Weekly. “By the way, ‘Dumb and Dumber’ took five years to get made. ‘There’s Something About Mary’ was a 10-year-old script when we rewrote it. ‘Kingpin’ was an old script when we rewrote it. They take a while to get there, and this was the case with this one.”
Bobby added that casting was key for “Dear Santa.” “We never wanted to make it a horror movie or something like that,” Bobby said. “We wanted it to be comical. So it was a delicate ball of playing this iconic character but doing it in a way that the audience can have some fun with it. And Jack was the perfect guy. Jack is just that guy that with his arching eyebrows and his faces and all that, there’s a little bit of mischievous to him at all times, but he’s eminently likable, and that’s just Jack.”
Bobby continued that “Dear Santa” is a quintessential Farrelly brothers film. “It is a family story because it is Christmas. But you know what? Pete and I, we’re the Farrelly Brothers, so we wanted to put our skewed version on a Christmas story like this, but at the same time, we don’t want to just blow it up,” he said. “We wanted it to have a sweetness to it underneath all the edge and all that, so that’s the Farrelly Brothers Christmas movie.”
“Dear Santa” is executive produced by Kevin Barnett, Pete Jones, and Gretel Twombly. The Farrelly brothers and Jeremy Kramer are producers.
Peter recently directed comedy “Ricky Stanicky.” He will also direct a film inspired by the true story of how writer/actor Sylvester Stallone made his iconic 1976 Oscar winner “Rocky.” Titled “I Play Rocky,” the feature will “follow a struggling actor with a partially paralyzed face and a speech impediment who writes a script that a big movie studio wants to buy, but he refuses to sell it unless he gets to play the lead. Turning down an offer of life-changing money, he instead works for pennies to get the movie made with himself in the starring role.”
“Dear Santa” premieres November 25 on Paramount+ and on digital. Check out the trailer below.