‘Horrible Bosses’ Writers John Francis Daley & Jonathan Goldstein To Make Directorial Debut On ‘Vacation’ Reboot

Do you know what audiences are really crying out for? Remakes, remakes, and more remakes. That's what they want. And if it's not remakes then it's reboots. And if it's not reboots it's new projects closely spun-off from a pre-existing popular property. Basically if it lacks originality in any way then audiences will love it…at least that seems to be the thought process that lands us with a reboot of National Lampoon's "Vacation."

We know, you must have been waiting with bated breath ever since the Griswolds' last "Christmas Vacation" back in 1989 (unless you count their Vegas trip in '97) and lost sleep at night wondering what ever would happen to young Rusty Griswold when he grew up. Well now you're going to find out, and the New Line project now has it's director(s).

Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley — the writing team behind "Horrible Bosses" and the upcoming "Burt Wonderstone" — were originally only hired to write the script, but after rumors of Pete Segal ("Get Smart") and Paul Feig ("Bridesmaids") being linked to direct, the gig has eventually gone to the writers themselves. The studio are clearly enamored by the pair whose script earned them $200 million at the box office last summer and are willing to give them a chance to replicate their success as directors. Last we heard produced David Dobkin was producing the project, but it seems that he's moved on.

We think this sounds like a pretty tricky gig for the pair. Translating the humor of the originals into something that will appeal to today's mainstream cinema audiences doesn't seem like an easy task, and getting them to care about the franchise again seems similarly difficult. Fair play to Goldstein and Daley though, there can't be many writers out there confident enough to follow in the footsteps of the late great John Hughes (yep, he penned "Vacation" back in the day). If it is to succeed we're hoping the script was wise enough to include Chevy Chase and Beverly D'Angelo in some capacity, and we imagine casting will be key (although Chase has already said he's writing his own "Vacation" movie, reboot be damned). Do they turn to an established comedian for Rusty (like a Will Ferrell maybe), or maybe  "The Big Bang Theory" star Johnny Galecki who played the character in "Christmas Vacation" could find an expanded role> But then again, do we really care either way? [THR]