Now that he’s had his revenge several times over in the Taken thriller movies, Liam Neeson is turning to parody. The action movie star has been tapped for a reboot of Naked Gun, and he reckons it might end his career – or usher a new era for him.
“I’ve been approached by Seth McFarlane and Paramount Studios to maybe resurrect the Naked Gun films,” he told People. “It’ll either finish my career or bring it in another direction. I honestly don’t know.” News that McFarlane was looking into bringing back the comedy movies first made the rounds last year, when Neeson himself spoke about discussions. It sounds like the plan is still for him to lead, likely as sergeant Frank Drebin, Leslie Nielsen’s character for the first trilogy.
A parody of police procedurals and spy movies, Naked Gun satirised many of the tropes found in detective films and TV series. It was based on the show Police Squad!, developed by the filmmaking group Zucker, Abrahams and Zucker, who were also responsible for Airplane! and Top Secret!.
There’s no word on when we might see Neeson start looking into his comedic side. He hasn’t done a huge amount of laugh-inducing material, the occasional rom-com like Love Actually aside.
In fact, he’s currently promoting Blacklight, an action film directed by Mark Williams. In it, Neeson plays Travis Block, an FBI agent who becomes part of a high-level conspiracy. Emmy Raver-Lampman, Taylor John Smith, and Aidan Quinn co-star, while Nick May and Mark Williams wrote the screenplay. Definitely no laughing matter.
Blacklight is due for release February 11, 2022.