Not too long ago our pals over at TheDisinsider reported that Canadian comedic actor Rick Moranis was in talks to reprise his role as Wayne Szalinski from the Honey, I Shrunk The Kids franchise.
Disney had been putting together a soft-reboot titled Shrunk with Josh Gad (Frozen 1-2, Murder On The Orient Express) set to play Wayne’s son Adam (from the second film) and potentially focus on another shrinking accident and getting Moranis to reprise his role would likely be key to making sure it wasn’t a hard reboot.
The only problem is that Rick has been self-retired for years and the potential of his return was kind of slim.
Well, Deadline has now confirmed that Rick has closed his deal with Disney for Shrunk, which will be directed by Joe Johnston.
Joe had directed the original film along with The Rocketeer, Captain America: The First Avenger, and Jurassic Park III.
HN Entertainment had recently confirmed that production designer Jim Bissell (Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation, Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol) would be working on the film, who has worked with Johnston on previous projects which meant that Joe is a lock to direct.
At one point, Ant-Man franchise director Peyton Reed had hoped that he could convince Rick Moranis to play the father of Scott Lang (played by Paul Rudd) possibly in Ant-Man 3.
Shrunk is currently without a release date from Disney.
When kids sneak into inventor Wayne Szalinski’s (Rick Moranis) upstairs lab to retrieve an errant baseball, his experimental shrink ray miniaturizes them. When Szalinski returns home, he destroys the device — which he thinks is a failure — and dumps it in the trash, throwing out the kids along with it. The four children, now 1/4-inch tall, must survive the journey back to the house through a yard where sprinklers bring treacherous storms and garden-variety ants stampede like elephants.
SOURCE: THE DISINSIDER
