Ben Stiller's heartbreak over the box office flop of Zoolander 2 was real, even his best Blue Steel couldn't mask it. He dives into the disappointing sequel in an upcoming episode of David Duchovny's new podcast, Fail Better. This podcast explores life's misses and how failure shapes us, and for Stiller, the experience was a rollercoaster of emotions.
"I thought everybody wanted this," Stiller, 58, said of the sequel. "And then it's like, 'Wow, I must have really f---ed this up. Everybody didn't go to it. And it's gotten these horrible reviews.' It really freaked me out because I was like, 'I didn't know [it] was that bad?'"
Stiller's spiral of self-doubt was intense. "What scared me the most on that one was l'm losing what I think what's funny, the questioning yourself," he confessed. "It was definitely blindsiding to me. And it definitely affected me for a long time." But this introspection led him to pursue other creative projects, giving him the space to reflect and grow.
"The wonderful thing that came out of that for me was just having space where, if that had been a hit, and they said, 'Make Zoolander 3 right now,' or offered some other movie, I would have just probably jumped in and done that," he said. "But I had this space to sit with myself and deal with it and other projects that I had been working on — not comedies, some of them — I have the time to actually just work on and develop."
Zoolander, which he directed and co-wrote, was a hit, grossing $45.1 million domestically and $60.8 million worldwide against a $28 million budget. The sequel, however, was a different story. Despite bringing back the original cast and adding stars like Penélope Cruz and Benedict Cumberbatch, the film was panned by critics and flopped at the box office.
"After the movie tanked, I had no desire to do comedy," Stiller revealed. "It was just hurt. Finding yourself in terms of what creatively you want to be and do, I always loved directing. I always loved making movies. I always, in my mind, loved the idea of just directing movies since I was a kid, and not necessarily comedies."
Stiller's post-Zoolander projects, like the miniseries Escape at Dannemora, Severance, In the Dark, and High Desert, showcase his talent and evolution as a director and producer. Tune in to his episode of Fail Better on May 7 to hear more about his journey.
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