Granted, Michael Winterbottom tends to have a few projects on the go at once so we’ll forgive you if this one somehow slipped under your radar. While the director’s biggest profile release last year was the controversial “The Killer Inside Me,” he had another project quietly hit festivals on our shores and television in the U.K.
“The Trip,” starring Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon, finds the actors reprising their roles from “Tristam Shandy: A Cock And Bull Story” in a largely improvised film that finds the duo touring some very posh eateries in Northern England and chatting. For those of you in the U.K., the project already arrived as a 6-part BBC mini-series last year and while there is no word yet if those of us in North America will ever get to see the expanded version (we really hope so), IFC will be releasing a theatrical cut that, though whittled down from its television counterpart, will contain some exclusive footage.
The film will hit theaters this summer on June 10th, and we’re definitely looking forward to it. You can check out a full synopsis and a couple of clips below.
Playing loose versions of themselves, Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon reprise their hilariously fictionalized roles from TRISTAM SHANDY: A COCK AND BULL STORY and reunite with acclaimed director Michael Winterbottom (24 HOUR PARTY PEOPLE) for an acerbically witty, largely improvised ride through the English countryside. Tapped by The Observer to review fine restaurants throughout the Lake District and Yorkshire Dales, Steve (Coogan) finds himself without a traveling companion after his girlfriend decides not to go at the last minute. After being turned down by everyone else he knows, Steve extends an invitation to Rob (Brydon), and together the pair attempt to navigate the winding back roads of rural England, impersonating popular celebrities such as Michael Caine, Woody Allen and Liam Neeson (among many others) and bickering along the way. Over the course of six different meals at six different restaurants, the ultimate odd couple tests the limits of their friendship, questioning what is most important to them and along the way discover the limits of what they are and are not willing to give up for fame.
