Ben Stiller dot Net

According to the New York Daily News, Ben Stiller had a painful wipeout snowboarding this weekend, and was admitted to the Mount Sinai Hospital for treatment of a broken hand.

He stayed through the afternoon while his phalanges got patched up, and is expected to be fully recovered in time to promote his next film, Night at the Museum 2.

See: NY Daily News

Update: UK’s Daily Mail has a picture of Stiller with his new cast.

Blue Steel, revisited

Enthusiastic glee has spread across the Interwebs that Ben Stiller will shortly be revisiting the role of Derek Zoolander in a sequel. In a brief interview with The UK Sun, Ben said earlier this week, “I’ve been trying to get Zoolander 2 together and we’ve had a few scripts. I feel that is the sequel I really would like to do some day, because I like the original and I would make sure it was something new and worthy of it first.”

Most reports seem to clip out the critical part “some day“.

Not to throw cold water on the excitement, but it’s a long way from looking at a few scripts to shooting.

Back in December 2006, on the release of Dodgeball, Stiller was asked about a Zoolander followup:

I would love to do a Zoolander sequel. There are a couple of obstacles - one is the studio hasn’t asked! That’s the biggest one! I’m waiting for them to ask; I don’t want to go to them. The other, bigger obstacle is that Drake Sather, who created the character, passed away, really tragically. He was a really good friend of mine, and it’s hard for me to figure out how to do it. He created the character, then me, John Hamburg and him wrote the script. So that’s frustrating to me that he’s not there, because he was the heart and soul of all the shorts and the script. I think John and I could address it, but that really took the wind out of my sails for a bit.

A more recent mention of a sequel was in March this year, from Will Ferrell, who said in an interview with MTV that Zoolander 2 was on the back-burner:

“Yeah, there was a little talk,” Ferrell admitted. “I brought it up to Ben really five years after the fact. Just for whatever reasons, it’s just not crystallizing.”

It may happen eventually, but Stiller also has a buffet of other in-development projects on his plate, including:

• What Makes Sammy Run - a personal project he’s been working on since at least 1996. He revised the script countless times, with a third rewrite in 1998 supposed to go into production ten years ago.
• Date School - written by Abby Cohn and Mark Silverstein, sold to DreamWorks in 2004, with Owen Wilson attached. Still on the production roster.
• The Hardy Men (with Tom Cruise attached) - development began in at least 1999, announced to be “fast tracked” in February 2007, with the script going through re-writes still.
• Master Mind (animated, with voicework by Robert Downey, Jr.) the script for which was originally sold in April 2007 to DreamWorks, and more recently revised with Downey Jr attached, as revealed in August.

It’s time again for reader’s questions! Today’s comes from “Trowilson” who asks,

i wanna send Ben something small  (but bigger than a letter) in the mail… Does anybody know what address he is likely to actually get it at?

Like most celebrities, Ben doesn’t give out his direct contact info. However, a good bet to get something to him is to send to his publicist, ID-PR:

Ben Stiller
c/o ID-PR
8409 Santa Monica Blvd.
West Hollywood CA 90069

Alternatively, you can try his production company:

Red Hour Films
629 N. La Brea
Los Angeles, CA, CA 90036

Either way, don’t expect a personal response, as unfortunately, Ben has stated previously that he doesn’t reply to fan mail.

Notice: The contest is now closed. Check back in later for the posting of the winning entries. Thanks all and Happy New Year’s!

Today, in 1965, Benjamin Edward Stiller was born in New York City to the comedy duo Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara. That makes him 43, for those keeping count.

This has been a banner year for Ben, with Tropic Thunder which he co-wrote and directed becoming a box office hit; and the sequel to Madagascar exceeding the success of the first (and guaranteeing a third installment). Earlier this month, Ben was saluted for his work by his home town’s Museum of the Moving Image Black Tie event.

In honor of his many accomplishments– and in celebration of ten years of BenStiller.net– I’m giving away presents for his true fans, in a sort of essay contest:

Continue reading "The Happy Birthday Ben Stiller Contest - Closed" »

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In an interview with UK’s Heart FM radio station, Ben Stiller declares the term “Frat Pack” as “weird and unnecessary.”

“It’s such a weird thing that people come up with a name that doesn’t really exist,” he says.

“I think the whole thing about the Frat Pack group is completely fabricated anyway. The group doesn’t exist but it rhymes, at least there’s that, so it must be true right?”

Tell that to Wikipedia, which has an article on the subject noting the phrase’s origin in a 2004 USA Today article about The Wedding Crashers, and its accompanying chart.

And it’s surely news to the Frat Pack Tribute Site.

Ben just appeared on one of the UK’s leading chat shows, Friday night with Jonathan Ross. He talked about the origins of Tropic Thunder, including his early attempt to audition for Platoon, as well as his appreciation of Tom Cruise.