Kumail Nanjiani (The Big Sick) and John Cena (Trainwreck) will team up for a buddy cop comedy from director Ruben Fleischer (Zombieland) at Universal. Murray Miller, the writer-director of HBO’s sports spoofs Tour De Pharmacy and 7 Days In Hell, will write the script for the as-yet-untitled comedy.
Universal reportedly won a competitive bidding war for the rights to the film which is set to star two of the more unlikely comedic frontmen to have success in Hollywood over the past year.
Pakistani-born Nanjiani has had huge success with The Big Sick, the real-life inspired comedy he starred in that was written by himself and wife Emily V. Gordon, while Cena has somewhat stepped away from his stardom in WWE to have surprising success appearing in many big Hollywood comedies such as Daddy’s Home and Sisters.
Fleischer is next set to direct Venom starring Tom Hardy, the highly-anticipated beginning of Sony’s Spiderman universe that, at least for now, won’t actually contain Spiderman. This film is thus a large genre shift for the director who last directed 2013’s Gangster Squad, and Fleisher will direct Venom as the pieces for this cop comedy fall into place.
Producing alongside Fleischer is David Bernad, and the duo recently produced Brie Larson‘s directorial debut Unicorn Store and Mike White‘s Brad’s Status, which both premiered to critical acclaim at the Toronto International Film Festival. They’ll be hoping this comedy can have similar success.
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