Adam McKay has shown interest in making amends with Will Ferrell seven years after their fallout over the dissolution of their former media company.
McKay, who was formerly head writer on Saturday Night Live, where Ferrell was a cast member from 1995 to 2002, co-founded Gary Sanchez Productions in 2006 and directed several films that starred Ferrell. Among their memorable movies were Anchorman, Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby, and The Other Guys.
In a 2021 interview with The Hollywood Reporter, McKay compared the end of their partnership and the dissolution of their company in 2019 to "a breakup."
McKay now seems to be in a different space regarding his estrangement with Ferrell. The director recently spoke to Business Insider and reflected on their friendship and expressed an openness to talk to Ferrell.
"I totally have been open to the idea. We always got along great, we were tremendous creative partners," McKay said. "The only thing that caused acrimony between us was when we decided to end our production company, Gary Sanchez. And I know it was reported one way or the other, but that was really it."
The filmmaker added that his split with Ferrell was "a shame" because they had "a great creative partnership."
"I think both of us underestimated the complications that go with not just having a company, but a very successful company," McKay explained, adding that Ferrell "was never someone who wanted to produce."
"It had become too much extra work; it was never his passion," McKay continued. "I was really the one who wanted to produce, but a movie star's life is very different than a writer-director's life. So we split up."
McKay concluded by saying that he and The Hawk star "had a great run." "I certainly have no hard feelings and, who knows, we'll see what happens," the director said.
Also in the interview, McKay detailed his intended plot for a Talladega Nights sequel, which unfortunately did not move to the production stage. The duo planned for the protagonist, Ricky Bobby, to partner with a Formula 1 team and "race in Denmark or the Netherlands and feel like he’s in a communist country because they have nationalized healthcare."
"The only reason we didn’t do it was it's a lot of work to shoot race car stuff," McKay added. "The reason we went and did Step Brothers next was we felt like, can we just go do comedy in a house? We were tired after Talladega Nights. It never got to the point where we wrote a treatment."
