MEET THE PARENTS 4: John Hamburg Re-Teams with Ben Stiller for Another Entry in Popular Comedy Franchise

John Hamburg to Direct New Meet the Parents Film

John Hamburg will be re-teaming with former collaborator Ben Stiller as Hamburg is set to direct the fourth entry in the Meet the Parents series.

While we don’t know if it will be titled with Ben Stiller’s character’s last name, Focker, in it, there is a fourth Meet the Parents movie brewing over at Universal. John Hamburg, who worked with Stiller and Jennifer Aniston on Along Came Polly, is slated to be behind the director’s chair for Meet the Parents 4 though it seems as if former co-stars in the franchise, Barbra Streisand and Dustin Hoffman, have long put their roles in the comedy series behind them and they aren’t mentioned to be returning for the fourth film unless the filmmakers have cameos in mind.

Teri Polo and Blythe Danner will, not surprisingly, be returning for Meet the Parents 4. Of course, what would a Fockers movie be without the one and only Robert De Niro in it? Without De Niro, there would be no excuse for another Fockers movie. Watching Stiller and De Niro’s characters in these films is what makes them worthwhile although the last time out, Little Fockers, the third movie in the series, received horrible reviews despite solid box-office returns. Released in 2010, Little Fockers earned an astonishing $148 million domestically and another $162 million internationally. It scored mostly unfavorable notices from both audiences and critics.

Rumors had once circulated that a fourth entry in the series would be called Mother Fockers, but those rumors have long been squashed and never seemed to really have any validity to them. As of now, there is no set title for the fourth Meet the Parents movie that we are aware of.

Meet the Parents came out in 2000, earned an “A-” CinemaScore grade, and made a lot of money at the box-office while touching upon its theme of an engaged couple dealing with overbearing soon-to-be in-laws. Robert De Niro’s character was the one who made Ben Stiller’s character in the film feel insecure and nervous to the point of spray painting another cat to pass it off as De Niro’s character’s cat. That film’s 2004 sequel pumped up the box-office grosses even more than what the original took in thanks to the presence of esteemed co-stars, Barbra Streisand and Dustin Hoffman. Meet the Fockers made $522 worldwide compared to Meet the Parents which earned $330 million worldwide.

John Hamburg also directed Why Him? which was a 2016 comedy in the vein of Meet the Parents. It starred James Franco, Bryan Cranston and Zoey Deutch, but sort of crashed and burned at the box-office with a mere $60 million domestically. It saved face internationally by almost matching that domestic amount overseas.

Along Came Polly is possibly John Hamburg’s biggest claim to fame so far and that movie also starred Jennifer Aniston and the late, great Philip Seymour Hoffman as well as Stiller. It made $88 million domestically and $90 million internationally. Reviews weren’t its strong point but at least it did better with critics than Little Fockers did.

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