On the surface, “Scary Movie” may seem like just another summer sequel mining nostalgia for profit. But for Marlon Wayans, the film’s writer, producer and star, it represents the culmination of a quarter-century battle to wrest control of his family’s franchise back from its pillagers, as well as a promise he’d made to his dying father. “My father was in the hospital for a few weeks before he passed, and in one of our final conversations, he said, ‘I think you and your brothers should work together again,’” Wayans says.
The youngest of 10 siblings, Wayans had followed the trail blazed by older brothers Keenen and Damon out of a housing project in New York City and into Hollywood, first on their iconic sketch comedy show “In Living Color,” and then teaming with his brother Shawn on the sitcom “The Wayans Bros.” and with Keenen and Shawn on the hit films “Don’t Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood…,” “Scary Movie,” “Scary Movie 2,” “White Chicks” and “Little Man.”
But at the time of his father’s decline, Wayans and his brothers were at different stages of middle age, worked at different paces and wanted different things. It’s not so easy to get the Wayans brothers on the same page. “It’s hard for four Black men to stay together,” jokes Wayans. “Look at New Edition. And in this case, we’ve got four Bobby Browns.”
But his father was adamant. “You guys make magic together,” he said. “I think you should do it.” Then he whispered, “Do it for me.” Wayans’ eyes met his father’s, and he replied, “All right — for you.” “My father put his hand out, and I shook it and promised him that I would make this happen,” Wayans says. “And I did. And I feel complete.”
Directed by frequent collaborator Michael Tiddes and written and produced by Wayans, brothers Keenen and Shawn, nephew Craig and co-producer and co-writer Rick Alvarez, “Scary Movie,” in theaters June 5, marks the first film in the nearly $1 billion parody franchise since 2013’s lackluster fifth installment. More importantly, it marks the Wayans family’s return to the franchise they birthed, after it was cruelly taken from them following the release of “Scary Movie 2.”
The first two “Scary Movie” films, released in 2000 and 2001, were directed by Keenen Ivory Wayans and co-written by Marlon and Shawn, who also starred. A parody of the deluge of horror films that invaded ’90s screens, the movies proved massively profitable for distributor Dimension Films, a subsidiary of Miramax, which was owned and controlled by Harvey and Bob Weinstein. “Scary Movie” grossed $278 million on a $19 million budget, while “Scary Movie 2” did $141 million in business on a $45 million budget.
Given the success of those films, Keenen, Marlon and Shawn demanded a well-deserved raise for the third one. But the Weinsteins, as is their wont, countered with a lowball offer, and when the Wayanses balked, Wayans claims, the Weinsteins stole their idea for the third film and made it without them.
Marlon Wayans in “Scary Movie”
Quantrell Colbert
The way they found out about it still rankles Wayans. “We didn’t even know,” he remembers. “We got an announcement on New Year’s Eve that they were doing ‘Scary Movie 3.’ The franchise was stripped from us. And we were just asking for our fair share.”
To give some insight into the Weinsteins and the way they did business — Harvey’s dozens of sexual-assault allegations and pair of rape convictions notwithstanding — Wayans tells a story about the making of “Senseless,” a 1998 comedy he did with Miramax. Prior to filming, the Weinsteins sent him a copy of Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War.” “I read it and immediately knew who they were,” Wayans says. “They rape and pillage villages. They were tyrants and had a dynasty. But a lot of those dynasties with dictators, they die a terrible death, and then there’s a new regime. There’s a karma to life, and there’s a karma to business.”
On top of the franchise being taken from them, Wayans contends that the Weinsteins screwed him and his brothers out of royalties on the first two “Scary Movie” films, echoing a similar claim made by filmmaker Michael Moore, who accused the Weinsteins of using “Hollywood accounting tricks” in a 2011 lawsuit (that was eventually settled out of court) over the profits from his documentary “Fahrenheit 9/11.”
Exactly how much the Wayans brothers are owed is yet to be determined, though Wayans suggests that he and his siblings are still fighting for their due share. “They absolutely did. Absolutely,” he says of the Weinsteins pulling a fast one on them. “There are auditors that will handle those things. We could’ve sued, and we probably would’ve won.”
“What they did is between them and God,” he says. “I don’t applaud that type of behavior, but I can’t hold hate and hurt in my heart if I want to evolve.”
When Jonathan Glickman, the CEO of Miramax, reached out a couple of years ago to revive the “Scary Movie” franchise, Wayans remembered the promise that he’d made to his father. “Me and my family don’t hold grudges,” he says. “So when Jon hit me up to do ‘Scary Movie,’ I was like, I can’t do this without my brothers. So I got Shawn and Keenen on board. This is a return back to the franchise we all created, so forget all the bad years! This isn’t ‘Scary Movie 6’; this is a reboot.”
Glickman was appointed CEO of Miramax on April 2, 2024. His first day on the job, he says, he called Wayans to see if he had any interest in reviving what he calls the “sleeping giant” that is “Scary Movie.” Glickman also had a personal connection to the Wayans brothers: His first job in the film industry out of college was as an intern to producer Joe Roth, and the first script he read at that job was Keenen Ivory Wayans’ “A Low Down Dirty Shame.” He was determined to do right by the Wayanses after their sour experience with the Weinsteins.
“When I came to Miramax, I saw the deals that were made with Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez, and the Wayanses didn’t have a similar deal — even though they had a similar amount of success that those filmmakers had had as creators-directors-stars and they deserved it,” Glickman says in a phone call from Cannes. “So we ultimately gave them that same type of deal that they should have gotten when ‘Scary Movie’ came out in 2000. They’re truly our partners in making this movie, and they had control over who was cast and how the script is, and that comes from our tremendous faith in them.”
As the story so often goes, in “Scary Movie,” a killer resurfaces from the gang’s past, prompting them to get back together. In addition to Wayans and Shawn reprising their roles from the first two “Scary Movie” films, the reboot also brings back Anna Faris and Regina Hall as Cindy Campbell and Brenda Meeks, its two tormented protagonists, along with Jon Abrahams, Anthony Anderson, Cheri Oteri, Damon Wayans Jr., Kim Wayans, Gregg Wayans and Chris Elliott.
When the “Scary Movie” trailer debuted online, people were shocked by how the filmmakers had managed to parody recent films like “Sinners,” “Weapons” and even the Michael Jackson biopic “Michael,” which is in theaters. And the way Wayans and Co. pulled it off is even more shocking: They did three days of additional photography in April — as in last month.
“When you’re raised in sketch, you’re turning over every week,” explains Wayans. “We did that additional photography in April and thought, let’s run and gun. And so we shot all these pages of new stuff that wound up being hilarious and made it into the movie. We work fast.”
Though principal photography had been completed on “Scary Movie,” Wayans felt a burst of inspiration upon seeing the trailer for “Michael,” and immediately hit up Alvarez with an idea and the perfect actor to help execute it. “It took us less than half a day to write a really funny scene, and we thought Kenan Thompson would be a perfect Michael because he’s so lovable, and it would be such a great mashup to see someone from ‘SNL’ in the ‘In Living Color’ world.”
From top: Keenen Ivory Wayans, Marlon, Shawn and Kim Wayans
FilmMagic
While Wayans is tight-lipped about the details of “Scary Movie,” he does tease that “our opening kill is really special and something that the audience is not going to expect.”
He can also confirm one person who won’t be in the film despite his best efforts: Dave Chappelle.
“I wrote two really funny scenes for Chappelle and pitched them both. And he was like, ‘Ahhhh,’” says Wayans, mimicking his friend’s dismissive sigh. “I love Dave and he’s like a brother, and I hope one day I’ll get that cameo.”
More than anything, though, Wayans believes that now is the perfect time for another “Scary Movie.” “This is coming at a time where the world needs a laugh,” he says. “And look, we’re not here to save the world. We’re here to remind people what it’s like to laugh and feel good. We’re all too in our phones. There’s nothing more infectious than sitting and laughing in a theater with a bunch of people with different age ranges and backgrounds. We want you to go be 15 again. Post-COVID, we need this.”
Wayans needed it too.
He and his siblings grew up poor in Fulton Houses, a housing project in Manhattan. Wayans credits his father, Howell, a supermarket manager and Jehovah’s Witness, for instilling in the family a sense of faith, while his mother, Elvira, a social worker, is responsible for their sharp comedy chops.
“One of the funniest people that ever walked this earth was Elvira Wayans. She was brilliant,” Wayans says. “Her point of view of the poverty we were in, of religion, of my father — everything was a joke to my mother, and she was fearless. I think we inherited that comedic genius that my mother had. Instead of being a part of all the negative things that were happening in our neighborhood — from drugs and drug dealing to gang violence and prostitution — we chose to make fun of it.”
Though his father never successfully recruited him to the Jehovah’s Witnesses, Wayans did inherit from him a strong belief in God — and the following warning: One day, he would experience unimaginable heartbreak and fall before God on his knees and beg Him for the strength to carry on.
And then the COVID pandemic hit. “My world crumbled,” Wayans says, his voice breaking. “I lost 62 people that I loved, including my mother and my father. I had friends and people that are very special to me — some OD’d with fentanyl; others died of brain aneurysms, strokes. Sixty people that I loved died, and then my mother and my father died. And then my child transitioned from my daughter to my son. And this was all happening at once. I finally understood what my father meant: Sometimes you need faith to bring you through the darkness.”
Wayans has been refreshingly outspoken when it comes to his support for his transgender son, Kai, who is 25, defending him from hateful trolls like the rapper Soulja Boy and decrying transphobia. By his estimation, it took him “a week to go from denial to acceptance” of his son’s transition, and they’re now in a very good place.
“It taught me true, unconditional love,” he says of Kai’s transition. “I’ve never been married because I was never ready for marriage. And I went through this journey with my child, and it taught me to love unconditionally. At the end of the day, are my children happy? And if they’re happy, then I’m happy for them. My job as a father is to protect, respect and honor my children, and make sure they feel supported. It’s not my job to judge them; it’s my job to love them.
“All of my kids are gifts, and our love is the wrapping paper. I’m not here for hate. Transphobia is a form of hate. Homophobia is a form of hate. Racism is a form of hate. All those small-hearted, small-minded people, there’s a hell for you. And if you think you’re gonna bully my child, go somewhere else. It’s not going to happen. I won’t stand for it.”
I ask him how he negotiates his good friendship with Chappelle and having a transgender child, given the heavy backlash the comedian’s received for his jokes in his recent Netflix comedy specials aimed at the trans community — jokes that led to a walkout by Netflix employees who felt that the material was transphobic.
“I wouldn’t hang with Dave if he was full of hate. I don’t hang with people like that,” Wayans maintains. “I know Dave’s heart, and his intention isn’t to punch down. Dave wants to freely tell his jokes, and if you’re going to be anti-comedy, then he’s going to keep attacking you until you learn to have a sense of humor. He’s just standing there and defending his front line as a comedian.”
Dave Chappelle and Wayans in 2019
GC Images
As Wayans sees it, Chappelle was locked in a bitter censorship “war” with his detractors and had dug in his heels, refusing to cede any ground for the sake of comedy. Nobody was going to tell Chappelle who he could and couldn’t joke about, and Wayans says, “You have to be a comedian to understand that.”
“As a comedian, I respect his journey. And as a friend, I respect his journey. And for my child, I respect their journey,” Wayans continues. “And as the father of my child, I can appropriate my feelings toward my friend and my feelings toward my child, and how we can put those two things together and I can explain both sides. I’m between them, so I can explain both sides to each other.”
Wayans is currently on the road, practicing material for his sixth stand-up comedy special. It’s a very moving hour, he says, that in part explores what it’s like to be the parent of a transgender child. “I bare my soul on the stage, and I give other trans parents the guide on how to get there. And they come up to me after the show and thank me for that, and they cry.”
He says he hasn’t had a day off in 18 months — not a single day — owing to writing, producing and editing “Scary Movie” while developing two other films, performing stand-up comedy every weekend to prep for that upcoming special, and promoting “Scary Movie.” If the film does well, he says that could mean the studios will greenlight the sequels he’s envisioning to two of the most celebrated comedy films in his canon: “Don’t Be a Menace” and “White Chicks.”
But there’s no stopping Marlon Wayans. This is the dream he’s had since he was a child crowded around the TV with his siblings watching older brothers Damon on “SNL” and Keenen on “The Tonight Show” with Carson.
“It doesn’t feel overwhelming to me,” he says. “I feel like, ‘Oh, this is the shit I’ve asked for.’ I’ve got the most energy I’ve ever had, and I’m looking forward to the next 20 years being my
best years.