Screenwriter Billy Ray has confirmed that a sequel to Nicole Kidman‘s viral AMC Theatres ad is already in the works.
“I got a text from the chairman of AMC about a month ago asking me if I would write the next one, and of course the answer to that is yes,” Ray told Vanity Fair. “It’s already written.”
The Oscar-nominated screenwriter, known for penning films like “The Hunger Games,” “Richard Jewell,” “Flightplan” and “Captain Phillips,” was brought to the AMC project by Kidman, with whom he’d previously worked on the 2015 film “Secret in Their Eyes” and Adrian Lyne‘s forthcoming adaptation of author A.S.A Harrison‘s “The Silent Wife.”
Ray added that when Kidman first asked him to write the ad, he decided to do it “as a favor” — that is, until his agent got involved. “My agent said, ‘No, that’s not what’s happening here. You need to be paid for this,’” he added. “And it turns out my agent was right, because it’s had real value.”
Since it debuted last September, the original ad featuring Kidman has garnered so much attention — including spawning a number of spoofs — that AMC Theaters announced last month that it had extended her contract for another year.
As to what the new spot will look like, Ray is remaining tight-lipped, saying only, “All I can tell you about it is we are not dumb enough to fly in the face of the one we’ve already done and try to top it,” he says. “So it’s a very, very different approach that is a little bit of a wink to the one we’ve already done.”
Watch the original ad, which features a lone, sparkly-suited Kidman watching films like “Wonder Woman,” “Jurassic World,” “La La Land” and “Creed” as she utters immortal lines like “Somehow, heartbreak feels good in a place like this” below.