It’s official: This Is Spinal Tap 2 is filming soon.
During an interview with comedian Richard Herring, director and star Rob Reiner confirmed that the long-awaited sequel to the classic rockumentary will begin filming early next year.
“We’re making a sequel,” he confirmed. “We’re going to start shooting in the end of February and everybody is back.”
That’s right – everybody is back. However, Reiner also teased that Paul McCartney, Elton John, Garth Brooks, and “a few other surprises” would make cameos in the upcoming movie. This Is Spinal Tap starred Christopher Guest, Michael McKean, and Harry Shearer as Spinal Tap, also known as “one of England’s loudest bands”.
Released in 1984, Spinal Tap made just $4.7 million at the box office, but quickly became a cult classic with its ridiculously quotable one-liners, despite much of its dialogue being improvised.
The Spinal Tap sequel was originally announced in 2022, along with plans to get the original cast back as the dynamic British rock band.
“The plan is to do a sequel that comes out on the 40th anniversary of the original film,” said Reiner in an interview with Deadline in 2022. “I can tell you hardly a day goes by without someone saying, why don’t you do another one? For so many years, we said, ‘Nah.’ It wasn’t until we came up with the right idea how to do this. You don’t want to just do it, to do it. You want to honor the first one and push it a little further with the story.”
Now that the movie is set to begin production in February 2024, it’s practically impossible that the film will be ready in time for the 40th anniversary. After all, it was released on March 2, 1984. But perhaps they’ll dial it up to 11.
IGN’s This Is Spinal Tap review gave it 11/10 and said: “There are too many classic moments in this film to possibly count, and I won't even bother trying to quote lines or describe gags – it wouldn't be as funny. Suffice it to say that any piece of film containing these three guys wearing those wigs, talking in those accents, is pure spun gold.”
Want to read more about This Is Spinal Tap? Check out 7 things you didn’t know about Spinal Tap as well as the 20 best comedies from SNL stars.
Ryan Leston is an entertainment journalist and film critic for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.
