Kevin Hart, the star from Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle has stated that he is keen to remake the Robin Williams classic film Mrs. Doubtfire. Even if you are a fan of Hart’s genre of comedy or not, you can’t deny the fact that he is among the top comedy stars in the arena presently and commands a fanbase that is loyal enough to watch all his new films. Keeping that in mind, it might be a good idea to try and revive Mrs. Doubtfire.
Mrs. Doubtfire was released in November 1993 and it featured Robin Williams as Daniel Hillard, an actor living in San Francisco who also happens to be a divorced dad who undertakes great pain to remain a part of his children’s lives after a judge handed the sole custody of the children to their mother Miranda (Sally Field). The pains include morphing into a female character called Mrs. Doubtfire, a loving old Scottish nanny. He manages to accomplish the feat via his makeup artist pal, who provides him with the desired prosthetic mask and “fat suit” that he needed to look convincing in the character. However, the bluff couldn’t continue forever, and it doesn’t take long before Daniel faces problems in managing the two aspects of his personality.
At a cursory glance, the idea seems to be absurd and highly creepy. However, the insane comic energy of Williams and the likeability onscreen helped him convert Mrs. Doubtfire into a fan favorite. The film was highly successful commercially, and it made $441 million globally compared to a budget of just $25 million. It is going to be a huge challenge for Hart to try and live up to the huge stature of Mrs. Doubtfire since he openly expressed his wish to remake the movie during a recent discussion with Cinema Blend. This is what he said:
“I’ll stay on the Robin Williams train and say that if I could jump into Mrs. Doubtfire. That was a very amazing performance on both ends for him. I think that’s one I’d love to get to play in.”
It is interesting to recall that just a few months before Robin Williams’ tragic demise in 2014, there were reports about the iconic actor and comedian getting associated to a sequel of Mrs. Doubtfire to be helmed by the original movie’s director Chris Columbus (Home Alone). After Williams’ death, the sequel’s plans were trashed because Fox understood that it wasn’t Mrs. Doubtfire’s comeback that was desired by the people, but, a comeback of Robin Williams as Mrs. Doubtfire.
Despite that, in case Hart does get going with the idea of featuring in a remake of Mrs. Doubtfire, he must be ready to be subjected to a great deal of harsh criticism by Williams fans, who would be offended by the continuation of Mrs. Doubtfire character without him and might consider it to be an insult to the legendary actor. As of now, there is not much of scope for the project anyway.
