Filming on a Prayer
The cast and crew of 'Evan Almighty' braved some rough water and now pray that divine box-office lightning strikes twice.
By Eric Alt
For a film that initially seemed like a no-brainer — a sequel to the Jim Carrey-meets-God comedy hit Bruce Almighty, which grossed over $200 million — Evan Almighty seems to have faced the kind of rough road to the multiplexes that would put anyone's faith to the test. First and foremost, there was the issue of having to approach a Bruce sequel without, well, Bruce.
"We originally thought about [a sequel] with Jim," explains director Tom Shadyac. "Bruce 2: The Ark was going to be the name of that. We even wrote a draft for Jim. But ultimately he felt his character was kind of done. So we thought that there were more stories to be told than just Bruce's."
A quick rewrite later and instead of Bruce getting called upon by Morgan Freeman's Yahweh to build an ark to corral the world's animals, the task fell upon the original film's scene-stealing nemesis, Evan Baxter, played by then-newcomer Steve Carell.
"The first movie I did was Bruce Almighty, and Tom took very good care of me," says Carell. "It was funny, when I went to the premiere I had no idea I would even be in the final cut. So when [Tom] actually came and pitched [the idea] to me, I thought he was going to pitch a sequel starring Jim and maybe featuring me as another thorn-in-his-side kind of character. When he said, 'Well, we'd like you to play the title role,' I was like, 'You had me at hello.' I was there."
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