The Akiva Schaffer-directed reboot of Naked Gun, starring Liam Neeson and Pamela Anderson, has been pushed back from its original July 18 release date to August 1, 2025. It’s going to be a crowded weekend, with DreamWorks Animation and Universal’s The Bad Guys 2, Sony’s Beneath the Storm, and an untitled Warner Bros event film all set to drop on the same day.
The cast also includes the likes of Cody Rhodes, Liza Kozhy, CCH Pounder, Busta Rhymes,Paul Walter Hauser, Kevin Durand, and Danny Huston. Neeson will take on the role of Detective Frank Drebin, originally played by Leslie Nielsen, with Hauser as his partner Ed. Durand is expected to take on the role of the film’s villain, though roles for the rest of the cast have not been revealed. The screenplay was written by Dan Gregor, Doug Mand, and Schaffer. Producers Seth MacFarlane and Erica Huggins are involved through Fuzzy Door, with Daniel M. Stillman also serving as an executive producer.
Liam Neeson is Excited to Be in ‘The Naked Gun’
Earlier this year, Neeson spoke to Collider‘s Robert Brian Taylor about taking on the role of Drebin, who was of course played in iconic fashion by the late legend of comedy and deadpan, Leslie Nielsen. Neeson admitted he was hoping that the cast would be filled out with “funny and sexy” actors so that he could focus on being the straight man in the chaotic slapstick shenanigans that the Naked Gun films has become known for throughout the years.
Well, obviously, the script has got to be funny, you know, and have a kind of a theme, a kind of a story — albeit quite loose — going through it, rather than just a series of gags, which can get boring very, very quickly. Yes, I’m honored to be offered the part of Frank Drebin and a little bit nervous about it. I’ve done a couple of [comedy] skits before that were just very short TV things, but this would be 95 or 100 minutes of a film. They’re still casting it. So, hopefully, my other cast members will be funny and sexy, so that I can just be dead absolutely straight. There has to be lots of visual gags going on, too.
Directed and executive produced by Akiva Schaffer, the reboot is set to be released on August 1, 2025. The original movie is streaming now on Max.
via Collider