'Wedding Crashers' Director Reunites With Will Ferrell For Netflix Movie

Last summer, we learned that comedy superstar Will Ferrell was set to star in a new Netflix movie called Eurovision, based on an internationally popular music competition show. Now that movie has finally found a filmmaker: Wedding Crashers director David Dobkin is stepping behind the camera and reuniting with Ferrell for the first time since the actor made a memorable cameo in his 2005 comedy.

Ferrell and Andrew Steele (Casa de mi Padre, A Deadly Adoption) are co-writing the screenplay for Eurovision, and now Variety reports that Dobkin has signed on to direct. In the film, Ferrell will presumably play a contestant on The Eurovision Song Contest, a real show that began in the mid-1950s and has produced some notable winners over the years, including Swedish pop group ABBA, who won in 1974, and vocal powerhouse Céline Dion, who took home the top prize in 1988. The contest is still going strong today, with 43 countries competing in last year's contest.

Dobkin recently directed episodes of Iron Fist and Into the Badlands, and his film credits include movies like The Judge, Fred Claus, The Change-Up, Clay Pigeons, and Shanghai Knights. But Wedding Crashers is by far the biggest hit of his career, and Ferrell's uncredited and unexpected appearance as the mysterious Chazz is easily one of the best cameos of this millennium:

This may be controversial, but in my mind, this is some of Ferrell's most memorable comedic work. The "meat loaf" bit still holds up, but what I've always found funnier is the funeral scene, where he's loudly cursing a dead man's name at the most inappropriate time imaginable. Ferrell cranks it up to eleven in his small role in Wedding Crashers, and I really hope Dobkin can tap into some of that energy again.

Speaking of Dobkin, he seems like a smart fit for the Eurovision movie, because in addition to the credits I've already mentioned, he's also a big music video director, having worked with performers as varied as 2Pac, Coolio, Elton John, and Maroon 5. Maybe he'll be able to bring some style to capturing the musical performances here.

As I've noted in the past, this film seems like a big deal for Netflix, who is looking to branch out to a more global audience after establishing a temporary dominance as the streaming king of the United States. Dropping a marquee comedian into a story with international appeal seems like a very savvy move on their part.