When you’ve had as much success tapping into the “grey pound” (or dollar) as Fox Searchlight did with The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, it makes perfect sense to try again. The sequel was announced last October and Variety reports that David Strathairn and Tamsin Greig are joining the cast for John Madden’s follow up.
Also on board is Richard Gere, rumoured as in talks the last time the new film was mentioned. Ol Parker has written a script that reunites most of the surviving characters as played by Judi Dench, Maggie Smith, Bill Nighy, Celia Imrie, Ronald Pickup, Penelope Wilton, Diana Hardcastle and Dev Patel.
The story this time around finds Patel’s Sonny and Smith’s Muriel co-managing the hotel for elderly types seeking a sunny getaway, with one vacancy still to fill. Gere and Grieg will be new occupants, and how Strathairn fits in is still not clear.
“This film presented us with an irresistible opportunity: to continue a story we realized we had only just begun,” Madden says in a statement picked up by the trade magazine. “Not to tell the same story again, but to pursue where the lives of these very different characters lead, with an audience which already holds them in great affection.”
Also this time, the team will be facing off against rogue robot Ultron, who threatens the… Hang on, no, that’s something else.