Ben Stiller's There's Something About Mary Getting Surprise New Adaptation 28 Years Later

One of Ben Stiller‘s most iconic films is being reimagined in a brand-new way.

In an interview with ScreenRant‘s Grant Hermanns for his new movie Driver’s Ed, Bobby Farrelly revealed that he and Peter Farrelly (aka the Farrelly brothers) are working together to adapt the 1998 rom-com There’s Something About Mary, which they co-directed together, as a Broadway musical.

“We just feel like we have a lot of ideas about songs and things like that a little bit,” he explained, before comparing the endeavor to the hit Broadway musical The Book of Mormon.

The filmmaking duo has been working on the stage adaptation for a while. “Broadway musicals take a long time” to create, Farrelly acknowledged, but he hopes that the There’s Something About Mary musical will debut “maybe by next year.”

Looking back on his time directing There’s Something About Mary, Farrelly contrasted it with the current environment by saying that not as many comedies are being made nowadays, and when they do get made, “they’re usually smaller budgeted things…because the studios really don’t support them like they used to.”

He hopes that movie studios start investing in comedies again, which will give him and his brother a chance to keep working together outside of the musical.

“We’ve taken our story, There’s Something About Mary, and we’re working together trying to adapt it as a Broadway musical. So that would be a little bit different, but we just feel like we have a lot of ideas about songs and things like that a little bit, maybe like The Book of Mormon or something like that. But we’ll work together again too, Pete and I. It’s just the movies have been — the comedies, there’s not as much of them being made, and they’re usually smaller-budgeted things. This one was not a very big budget at all. We didn’t have much time to shoot, and that’s just how it is. You’re lucky to get enough money to even make a comedy, because the studios really don’t support them like they used to. But if they start coming back and making more, which I hope they do, we’ll definitely work together again. But, yeah, we’ve been working on it for a while, but Broadway musicals take a long time. So we’re in the middle of a couple-year project, and we will hopefully have it maybe by next year.”

There’s Something About Mary was released in 1998 and went on to gross $369 million at the box office against a reported budget of $23 million. The rom-com was also a hit with critics, who gave the film a Certified Fresh score of 84% on Rotten Tomatoes.

In There’s Something About Mary, Stiller plays Ted Stroehmann, one of many men who becomes romantically obsessed with a surgeon named Mary Jensen, played by Cameron Diaz. Matt Dillon, Lee Evans, Chris Elliott, Lin Shaye, Jeffrey Tambor, Markie Post and Sarah Silverman also appear in the movie.

This was one of the Farrelly brothers’ very first films they worked on together, after Dumb and Dumber and Kingpin. In the years since, they’ve directed movies such as Me, Myself & Irene, Shallow Hal, Fever Pitch, Hall Pass, The Three Stooges (2012) and Dumb and Dumber To, and TV shows like Loudermilk.

While Stiller had already appeared in movies like Stella, Reality Bites and The Cable Guy, his career surged after There’s Something About Mary.

The actor then went on to star in Meet the Parents, Zoolander, Starsky & Hutch, Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy, Madagascar, Night at the Museum, Tropic Thunder, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty and Happy Gilmore 2.

In recent years, Stiller has served as a director and executive producer on the hit Apple TV thriller Severance, which has been renewed for a third season. He also directed and appeared in the documentary Stiller & Meara: Nothing Is Lost about his parents, Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara.

Now Ben Stiller‘s iconic comedy There’s Something About Mary is being adapted for the stage, with the Farrelly brothers spearheading the effort. Not many details are known at this time, but the cast and full creative team will likely be revealed in the coming months if the Farrellys plan to debut the production next year.