Ethan Coen has a new comedy in the works, alongside “Drive Away Dolls” cowriter Tricia Cooke.
Coen’s upcoming “Honey Don’t!” is cowritten by director Coen and wife, editor, and fellow “Drive Away Dolls” scribe. While the plot remains under wraps, the film was billed as being in a similar comedy style to upcoming queer road trip comedy “Drive Away Dolls.”
“Honey Don’t!” will star “Drive Away Dolls” actress Margaret Qualley, Aubrey Plaza, and Chris Evans. Deadline first reported the casting. “Honey Don’t!” is a Focus Features production, with filming to begin in late March in New Mexico. The film is described to be set in Bakersfield, California, with Evans playing a cult leader, Qualley portraying a private investigator, and Plaza as a mystery woman.
Post-MCU, Evans recently appeared in “Pain Hustlers” and is set to star in holiday film “Red One.” Qualley continues her auteur streak, reuniting with “Poor Things” director Yorgos Lanthimos for upcoming film “Kinds of Kindness,” previously titled “AND.” Meanwhile, Plaza’s “My Old Ass” just debuted at 2024 Sundance.
“Honey Don’t!” will be produced by Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner of Working Title, Robert Graf, and cowriters Coen and Cooke.
Coen recently teased a Coen Brothers reunion to Empire magazine, saying he and brother Joel Coen are “working on writing something” together after a creative split in 2018.
“Nothing happened, certainly nothing dramatic,” Ethan said at the time. “You start out when you’re a kid and you want to make a movie. Everything’s enthusiasm and gung-ho, let’s go make a movie. And the first movie is just loads of fun. And then the second movie is loads of fun, almost as much fun as the first. And after 30 years, not that it’s no fun, but it’s more of a job than it had been.”
He added, “Going our own separate ways sounds like it suggests it might be final. But none of this stuff happened definitively. None of the decisions are definitive. We might make another movie.”
“Drive Away Dolls” is Ethan Coen’s first narrative feature sans Joel Coen, who made his solo debut with “The Tragedy of Macbeth” in 2021.
