“Hamunaptra 4” directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillette recently spoke to Entertainment Weekly at the press tour for “Ready or Not 2: Here I Come,” teasing the upcoming sequel by saying, “It’s really, really beautiful and scary and epic and amazing.” Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz will be reuniting for the film as Rick O’Connell and Evelyn O’Connell, respectively.
The director duo, whose credits also include Scream (2022) and Scream 6 (2023), credited longtime producer William Sherrick for giving them The Mummy 4. While Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillette were filming the vampire movie Abigail, Sherrick told them he was preparing for the next Mummy movie. The filmmakers thought, “That’s crazy. There’s no way William could pull it off.”
“We’ve finally completed ‘Abigail’ and are meeting with screenwriter Dave Coggeshall to develop a pitch,” Gillett said. “We’ve been in this work long enough to know that nothing is real until it really, really becomes real. It’s all speculation, and it feels great to give energy to a really great idea, but we’ve learned to keep those opportunities a little bit at arm’s length, because it’s easy to get your heart broken.”
Bettinelli-Olpin added that Coggeshall’s script had “all the heart and character you could hope for,” while Gillett agreed: “I don’t think Brendan and Rachel would get involved unless they liked that script, and I think they really liked what they read. And it’s a good script. It would be fun to make.”
Fraser and Wise headlined 1999’s The Mummy and returned for 2001’s The Mummy Returns, although Wise did not participate in the 2008 trilogy The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor. Maria Bello replaced her in the role of Evelyn. Does Wise’s return mean “Dragon Emperor” will no longer be canon?
“Well, Rachel is in this,” Bettinelli-Olpin said, to which Gillette added, “That answers your question.”
Fraser told The Associated Press last year that he had been waiting 20 years to be able to produce whatever story “Hamunaptra 4” might be.
“The third one was a model…how do I tell an Associated Press reporter? NBC had the rights to broadcast the Olympics that year,” Frazier said at the time. “So they put two films together and went to China. Working in Shanghai was a great experience. I’m proud of the third one because I think it’s a good independent film. We picked up things to do with another crew on deck. But what I wanted to make is almost done. And I’ve been waiting for this call for 20 years. Now? It’s time to give the fans what they want.”
The Mummy 4 is scheduled for theatrical release from Universal Pictures on May 19, 2028.
