Dicks: The Musical Trailer: The First Musical From A24 Sings Into Theaters This September
You've seen A24 films about somewhat literal man-eating aliens ("Under the Skin"), people being turned into walruses ("Tusk"), farting corpses ("Swiss Army Man"), talking shells ("Marcel the Shell with Shoes On"), and the multiverse ("Everything Everywhere All at Once"). Now, the studio is trying its hand at a musical for the first time with "Dicks: The Musical," a film that, contrary to my expectations the first time I saw that title, is not about singing penises. I mean, A24 only just made a film featuring a giant penis monster, so it wasn't out of the question.
Backing up — "Dicks: The Musical" comes from relative newcomers Aaron Jackson and Josh Sharp, who both wrote the film — which is based on their original two-person stage musical "F***ing Identical Twins" — and star as a pair of obnoxious business bros who find out they're literal twins and conspire to get their divorced parents back together. Yes, it's essentially an R-rated "The Parent Trap," only with a lot more singing, Megan Thee Stallion, and "sewer babies." You can check out the trailer below.
Watch the Dicks: The Musical trailer
"Dicks: The Musical" was directed by "Borat" and "Brüno" helmer Larry Charles, who's working comfortably in his wheelhouse with this raunchy, bizarro musical. (He's also a vocal supporter of the ongoing writers' and actors' strikes and was in favor of the directors' guild going on strike, too, so good on him.) The film itself centers on "two self-obsessed businessmen (writers Aaron Jackson & Josh Sharp) [who] discover they're long-lost identical twins and come together to plot the reunion of their eccentric divorced parents." Nathan Lane, Megan Mullally, and Bowen Yang round out the cast, joining Jackson, Sharp, and Miss Stallion.
While I can't say this trailer blows me away, I also suspect this isn't the type of film whose anarchic spirit can be readily encapsulated in a two-minute promo. "Dicks: The Musical" will be making its world premiere as the opening night film of Midnight Madness during the Toronto International Film Festival, so presumably A24 is confident they've got the next potential cult low-budget musical hit on their hands here (à la "Anna and the Apocalypse," "Repo! The Genetic Opera," and so forth). I'm mostly just amused this trailer plays up the fact the film was backed by "The Greatest Showman" producer Peter Chernin — as though the families who turned out for Hugh Jackman's squeaky-clean Disneyfication of deplorable real-life con artist P.T. Barnum are going to be interested in watching A24's latest.
"Dicks: The Musical" opens in theaters on September 29, 2023.