As first reported by Deadline, Ron Howard and Bryan Grazer are partnering with Disney for a reboot of Splash, the 1984 fantasy-comedy that launched the careers of up-and-coming actors Tom Hanks and Daryl Hannah. And it comes with a twist: The new Splash will switch the genders of the two lead roles.
In the original film, Hanks played a small business owner who fell in love with a mermaid (Hannah) that he’d initially encountered as a child. The upcoming remake, which has no director attached as of yet, will flip the script: Jillian Bell—who first pitched the idea to Howard—will play Hanks’ part, and Channing Tatum will play a merman. (You may remember Bell from her work on Workaholics, or as a hilariously antagonistic college student in 22 Jump Street.) No word on whether this Splash will further bolster Tatum’s sex (and queer) appeal, but anyone familiar with Hannah’s look in the original should have a pretty good idea.
