Pitch Perfect 2 hit all the right notes at the box office for Universal, so it comes as absolutely no surprise that the studio is moving ahead with a third installment in the high-grossing college a cappella comedy franchise.
Scribe Kay Cannon, who penned the first two installments, is now in negotiations to write Pitch Perfect 3. It’s unclear whether producer/co-star/sequel director Elizabeth Banks would again sit in the director’s chair after making her filmmaking debut on Pitch Perfect 2, but the terrific end result suggests Universal would certainly want her back.
What’s also unclear – and likely up to Cannon to figure out – is how to reunite the Barden Bellas now that most (spoiler alert) have graduated college. And if Anna Kendrick and Rebel Wilson came back for Pitch Perfect 3, it would likely be for a pretty huge sum – the pair were paid about $2 million each for the sequel, which in total cost about $29 million. One unconfirmed report in April suggested that Wilson has already signed on the dotted line, but Kendrick is just as much the face of the franchise, so it’s hard to see any progress being made without her also attached.
Hailee Steinfeld, a new addition for the second installment, however, will definitely be involved in the third film. Her deal requires her to reprise the role of new Bella recruit Emily Junk in Pitch Perfect 3 and possibly beyond.
Regardless of what Pitch Perfect 3 ends up looking like in terms of plot and cast, the overwhelming success of the sequel has proven to Universal that the music-heavy comedy franchise has legs, so it’s more than likely that we’ll see the third pic by 2017. In the meantime, a-ca-acolytes can sound off below – is a third installment in the series a good idea, or did the sequel give enough of a swan song to the characters that further entries would hit a rather flat note?