Jason Bateman has no problem admitting that audiences gave Horrible Bosses 2 a pink slip.
The actor was a recent guest on Marc Maron‘s WTF podcast, and the host asked Bateman about his experience making the follow-up to the successful 2011 film.
“The second one was garbage, as far as box office goes,” said Bateman of the Sean Anders-directed film that came out over Thanksgiving weekend in 2014. “Who knows whether it was on the merits or when they released it, but it did not do any money.”
Bateman, who called the film “a paycheck for [the cast],” jokingly blamed the audience for encouraging the studio to make a sequel that didn’t need to be made. “Don’t go out and buy a bunch of tickets for the first one unless you want a second one because we don’t have any discipline in this town,” admonished Bateman. “It’s a path of least resistance.”
He pointed out that he and the rest of the cast, including Charlie Day, Jason Sudeikis, Jamie Foxx and Jennifer Aniston, tried their best to make a good film but that audience members had gotten their fill from the first one.
“It’s just a question of, did anybody really care [about a sequel]?” continued Bateman, who said he loves both films. “People basically just weren’t interested in seeing another one. [People thought,] ‘And it’s Thanksgiving, and I’m with my family, and I’m not going to take my mom and dad to go see cock jokes.’ I guess there is a reason R-rated comedies don’t get released during a big family vacation.”
Email: Ryan.Gajewski@THR.com
Twitter: @_RyanGajewski
