Refill your anxiety medication and brew a pot of chamomile tea, because the Safdie Brothers and Adam Sandler are teaming up for a second, sure-to-be-nerve-wracking feature follow-up to Uncut Gems for Netflix. Deadline reports the untitled movie is expected to shoot “in the second quarter of 2023,” and the Safdies are still finishing the script, which “is likely set in the world of high-end card collecting.”
When Sandler joined Uncut Gems in 2018, it seemed like an intriguing match between an established, but often complacent superstar and two hungry young filmmakers, but few could’ve expected their project to be such a success. An excruciatingly tense, quasi-thriller and frantic portrait of New York City, Uncut Gems proved a critical and commercial success, turning Sandler’s gambling-obssesed jeweler Howard Ratner into an instantly iconic character. (Sandler was pitched the script more than a decade before it came out, and initially passed on the idea.)
Netflix’s involvement in a Sandler project is hardly surprising, since the comedy star signed a massive deal with the streaming service back in 2014 to make exclusive projects for them, and re-upped in 2020. Though most of the Netflix films have been critically-maligned, typically goofy Sandler comedies, his 2022 basketball drama Hustle, co-produced by LeBron James and co-starring several NBA players, was exceptionally well-received.
The fact that the three would be collaborating again was not a secret: Sandler spoke about the Safdie Bros. unnamed project in an October 11 interview with Vanity Fair, and said that they were going to start it “in the late winter.” He explained that he expects a rigorous filmmaking process akin to Uncut Gems, “because of how much these guys care. And how much I don’t want to let them down.” He emphasized their intense attention to detail, something that has helped Uncut Gems and their first film, the equally gritty Good Time with Robert Pattinson, rise above the crowded indie field. “I see how hard they work, and just like when I’m working on my comedies with my friends, it means a lot to us. Every joke means a lot. The Safdie boys, every word means a lot to them, every frame of the movie means a lot,” he said. “So I don’t want to walk through anything. I care about it, and I respect those guys so much.”
Sandler’s Uncut Gems performance is widely considered one of the finest in his career, earning him the Best Male Lead award at the 2020 Independent Spirit Awards. (His acceptance speech, a masterclass in self-deprecation, is awards-worthy in its own right.)
This next Sandler collaboration will be the Safdies’ first directorial effort since Uncut Gems, though they’ve stayed busy producing and directing shorts, while Benny has earned acting roles in Licorice Pizza, Stars at Noon, and Oppenheimer. He is also working on a comedy series titled The Curse, alongside Nathan Fielder and Emma Stone.