Most Anticipated 2026 Comedy Movies: Dates, Cast & Full Guide

📋 In This Article

Why the Most Anticipated 2026 Comedy Movies Are Actually Worth the Hype
Full 2026 Comedy Release Calendar
The Devil Wears Prada 2 (May 1) — All Four Stars Back, Plus Lady Gaga
Scary Movie 6 (June 5) — The Wayans Brothers’ 17-Year Reunion
How to Make a Killing — Glen Powell + Margaret Qualley’s Black Comedy Thriller
The Drama — Zendaya + Robert Pattinson’s Unexpected Rom-Com
More Most Anticipated 2026 Comedy Movies to Know
Already Streaming: Happy Gilmore 2 (Netflix, July 2025)
FAQs

The most anticipated 2026 comedy movies include two of the most culturally loaded theatrical events in years: The Devil Wears Prada 2 arrives on May 1 with Meryl Streep and Anne Hathaway back together for the first time since 2006, a cast expanded to include Lady Gaga, Simone Ashley, and Kenneth Branagh, and a story rooted in the collapse of print media that is practically a thesis statement about where culture is right now. Scary Movie 6 follows on June 5 with the entire Wayans family finally reunited after 17 years apart — writing, producing, and starring together for the first time since Scary Movie 2 in 2001.

The most anticipated 2026 comedy movies don’t stop there. Glen Powell and Margaret Qualley are headlining the black comedy thriller How to Make a Killing. Zendaya and Robert Pattinson are in a rom-com together. Ruben Östlund — the director of the Palme d’Or–winning Triangle of Sadness — has made a star-studded airplane horror-comedy. Boots Riley, who made Sorry to Bother You, is back. It is, by any reasonable measure, the strongest Hollywood comedy slate in years.

The original version of this article was published January 26, 2026. It has now been fully updated with confirmed release dates, real cast lists, production details, and plot specifics for every entry.

★ Your Full 2026 Comedy Planner

Full 2026 Comedy Release Calendar

Date	Title	Key Cast	Where to Watch	Status
Jul 25, 2025	Happy Gilmore 2	Adam Sandler, Bad Bunny, Ben Stiller	Netflix	✅ STREAMING NOW
May 1, 2026	The Devil Wears Prada 2 ★	Meryl Streep, Anne Hathaway, Emily Blunt, Lady Gaga	Theaters → Disney+	🎬 UPCOMING
Jun 5, 2026	Scary Movie 6 ★	Anna Faris, Marlon Wayans, Regina Hall	Theaters (Paramount)	🎬 UPCOMING
2026 TBC	How to Make a Killing	Glen Powell, Margaret Qualley	Theaters	DATE TBC
2026 TBC	The Drama	Zendaya, Robert Pattinson	Theaters	DATE TBC
2026 TBC	The Entertainment System Is Down	Kristen Stewart, Seth Rogen, Kirsten Dunst, Daniel Brühl	Theaters	DATE TBC
2026 TBC	I Love Boosters	Kristen Stewart, Seth Rogen, Alia Shawkat, LaKeith Stanfield	Theaters	DATE TBC
2026 TBC	The People We Meet on Vacation	TBC	Theaters	DATE TBC

★ Most Anticipated 2026 Comedy Movie #1 — May 1, 2026

The Devil Wears Prada 2 — All Four Stars Back, Nearly 20 Years On

The Devil Wears Prada (2006) was not, by Hollywood studio logic, a franchise candidate. It earned $326 million on a $41 million budget — nearly 8x its investment — and it launched the careers of multiple people involved in a meaningful way. But it was a single story, self-contained, with a heroine who walked away and an ending that felt complete. For 19 years, neither Meryl Streep nor Anne Hathaway showed any appetite for returning to it. Streep said she was not interested. Hathaway said she’d want to work with the same people on something different.

What changed was both real and narratively convenient: the collapse of fashion print media. Vogue’s Anna Wintour — on whom Miranda Priestly is famously modeled — stepped down as editor-in-chief in 2025, marking the end of a 36-year reign and a cultural moment that was impossible to ignore. The sequel’s central conflict mirrors this exactly: Miranda Priestly facing the declining relevance of Runway magazine in a world that no longer needs what she sells, while her former assistant Emily Charlton (Emily Blunt) — now head of a luxury advertising group — controls the advertising revenue that could save or sink the magazine.

Filming ran from June 30 to October 20, 2025, shooting extensively on the streets of Manhattan — Anne Hathaway was photographed in character as Andy in a Ralph Lauren Purple Label blazer and Valentino Nellcôte bag walking through midtown — as well as at Dolce & Gabbana’s Milan Fashion Week show in late September, where Meryl Streep and Stanley Tucci filmed in character at the Dolce & Gabbana Spring/Summer 2026 show. Donatella Versace filmed a cameo on the Italy set. An airport scene was shot at Newark on September 10. Lady Gaga’s role has not been disclosed by the studio.

The trailer — released in February 2026 — opens on a pair of red Valentino pumps. In the key scene shown publicly, Miranda sits behind her Runway desk and Andy walks in. Miranda, in typical form, claims not to remember her once-trusted assistant. The dynamic between Miranda (declining power, institutional collapse) and Emily (rising power, post-magazine media economy) is the structural spine of the story. Patrick Brammall plays Andy’s new love interest. Adrian Grenier, who played Nate in the original, is not returning.

The casting of the production title — “Cerulean,” a direct reference to Miranda’s famous monologue about the colour blue and the reach of fashion — tells you everything about who is writing this sequel and how self-aware it intends to be.

★ Most Anticipated 2026 Comedy Movie #2 — June 5, 2026

Scary Movie 6 — The Wayans Brothers’ 17-Year Reunion and Parody Cinema’s Comeback

The Scary Movie franchise is one of the most profitable comedy brands ever produced, and one of the most mishandled. The original 2000 film earned $278 million on a $19 million budget — a 14x return that made it the highest-grossing R-rated comedy of its year. It broke the record for biggest opening weekend for an R-rated film and for a Black director. Then the Wayans stepped away. Miramax made Scary Movie 3 and 4 without them, using David Zucker as director. Scary Movie 5 in 2013 — without a single original cast member — earned $78 million worldwide and was almost universally dismissed as a creative nadir for the franchise.

What makes Scary Movie 6 genuinely remarkable — and what elevates it from nostalgia cash-grab to something fans and critics are actually paying attention to — is the completeness of the reunion. Not just Anna Faris and Regina Hall. Not just Marlon Wayans. All three brothers: Marlon, Shawn, and Keenen Ivory Wayans, writing and producing together for the first time since 2001. Their departure after Scary Movie 2 was acrimonious and well-documented — creative conflicts with Miramax over the direction of the franchise. Coming back now, 23 years later, with a script and production built entirely on their own terms, is a different kind of return.

2000

Scary Movie — Written, produced, and directed by the Wayans family. $278M on $19M. Sets record for biggest R-rated opening and biggest opening for a Black director.

2001

Scary Movie 2 — Last Wayans brothers creative collaboration before their departure. Grossed $141M.

2003–2013

Scary Movie 3, 4, and 5 — Miramax continues without the Wayans. Quality and box office decline with each installment. Scary Movie 5 is considered a creative failure.

Apr 2024

CinemaCon announcement — Miramax confirms new Scary Movie in development. Wayans brothers reveal they are returning as writers and producers for the first time in 17 years.

Aug 2025

Anna Faris and Regina Hall confirmed to return — first time the core cast has been together on screen since 2006.

Oct–Nov 2025

Principal photography at Tyler Perry Studios in Atlanta. Shoots for 8 weeks exactly; wraps November 24, 2025.

Feb 27, 2026

Official trailer drops before Scream 7 screenings. Marlon Wayans famously “bootlegs” his own teaser on social media in character.

Jun 5, 2026

Scary Movie 6 opens nationwide in the US via Paramount Pictures.

🎯 Confirmed Films Being Parodied in Scary Movie 6

Per the February 2026 trailer and production details: Scream (2022) · Scream VI (2023) · Get Out · Longlegs · Sinners · The Substance (2024) · M3GAN (2022) · Smile (2022) · Halloween (2018) · Weapons (2025) · Terrifier 3 (Felissa Rose parodying Art the Clown’s mall scene, which was cut then reinstated) · Friday the 13th’s Jason Voorhees · Ma (2019) · Wednesday (Netflix) · Heart Eyes (2025). The original Ghostface from the 2000 film also returns — confirmed by Dave Sheridan (Officer Doofy), who said: “The only thing I can 100% tell you is that Ghostface will return… that is not me in that photo.”

Marlon Wayans has described the goal as bringing back what he calls the original “Wayans flavor” — the specific blend of sharp cultural satire, absurdist physical comedy, and genuine surprise that the later sequels, produced without the family, consistently failed to recreate. The involvement of all three brothers writing together — Marlon, Shawn, and Keenen Ivory — along with co-writer Rick Alvarez (their long-term collaborator), and producer Neal H. Moritz, gives this the infrastructure of a proper franchise revival rather than a contracted nostalgia project.

★ Most Anticipated 2026 Comedy Movie #3

How to Make a Killing — Glen Powell and Margaret Qualley’s Black Comedy Thriller

Glen Powell has spent the last three years becoming one of the most reliable comic presences in mainstream Hollywood — from Top Gun: Maverick through Hit Man through Anyone But You, he has demonstrated a rare ability to make moral ambiguity charming and danger funny. How to Make a Killing, also known as Digger in some pre-release tracking, is designed to push that quality to its edge. Powell plays Becket Redfellow, a blue-collar worker who was disowned at birth by his wealthy family and who, now an adult, will do almost anything — including dangerous and criminal activities — to claim the inheritance he believes he is owed.

Margaret Qualley, who played a supporting role in Happy Gilmore 2 (now streaming on Netflix), is cast as his childhood friend. Ed Harris and Jessica Henwick round out a supporting cast that Screen Rant described as giving the film “a lot to be excited about.” The premise blends Into the Wild-adjacent class rage with the tone of a Coen Brothers crime caper — a black comedy with genuine thriller mechanics underneath the laughs.

★ Most Anticipated 2026 Comedy Movie #4

The Drama — Zendaya and Robert Pattinson’s Rom-Com

The Drama is the most conceptually interesting rom-com of 2026 precisely because it features two actors who are primarily known for anything but light romantic comedy. Robert Pattinson has spent much of the last decade in prestige and experimental filmmaking — The Lighthouse, The Batman, Tenet, Good Time — and Zendaya’s recent dramatic work in Challengers was acclaimed as one of 2024’s best performances. Putting them together in a film where Pattinson plays a buttoned-up English museum director and Zendaya plays a Louisiana bookstore clerk, as a couple approaching marriage whose secrets about each other begin to surface, is a casting decision that feels genuinely fresh.

The film leans into its comedy elements rather than treating them as secondary to the drama. Screen Rant called the leads’ dynamic “predicated on secrets about each other” that unspool as the film approaches their wedding — a structure that generates both comedy and genuine stakes. No specific release date has been announced as of March 2026, but multiple comedy round-up lists have positioned it as one of the year’s most-anticipated theatrical comedies when it arrives.

★ More Most Anticipated 2026 Comedy Movies to Know

More Most Anticipated 2026 Comedy Movies to Know

The Entertainment System Is Down — Ruben Östlund: The director of Triangle of Sadness (2022 Palme d’Or winner) and Force Majeure returns with a black comedy set entirely aboard a long-haul flight from England to Australia whose entertainment system breaks down. The ensemble cast includes Kristen Stewart, Seth Rogen, Kirsten Dunst, Daniel Brühl, Samantha Morton, Nicholas Braun, Tobias Menzies, Vincent Lindon, and Connor Swindells. Östlund’s last film became famous for its extended, deeply uncomfortable vomiting/dining sequence — and for being hilariously, brutally accurate about class and performance in tight social spaces. His airplane premise is a natural evolution: trapped passengers, malfunctioning technology, and nowhere to go. No release date confirmed yet, but Marie Claire called it essential viewing for 2026.

I Love Boosters — Boots Riley: Boots Riley’s first feature film since Sorry to Bother You (2018) is a sci-fi comedy starring Kristen Stewart, Seth Rogen, Alia Shawkat, LaKeith Stanfield, Zack Fox, Tony Hale, and Kumail Nanjiani. The plot follows a ragtag group of shoplifters targeting a cutthroat fashion professional. Riley described it as “a stoner girl comedy” that’s “really fucking stupid” — which, coming from the director who made Sorry to Bother You, almost certainly means it is neither. His debut blended absurdism with Marxist critique and racial satire in ways that made it one of the most discussed American films of its year.

The People We Meet on Vacation: A When Harry Met Sally-inspired rom-com following two polar-opposite best friends who meet up once a year for a vacation — and whose connection begins to shift over time. Based on Emily Henry’s novel of the same name. Multiple outlets tracking the film have highlighted the undeniable chemistry between its leads as the film’s central selling point. No confirmed cast or release date as of March 2026, though it has appeared on multiple anticipated 2026 rom-com lists.

Forbidden Fruits: A witchy horror-comedy produced by Jennifer’s Body screenwriter Diablo Cody, based on the play Of the Women Came the Beginning of Sin by Lily Houghton. Set in a mall, following co-workers who run a witchcraft cult in the basement after hours. Stars Gabrielle Union, Lili Reinhart, Alexandra Shipp, Lola Tung, Emma Chamberlain, and Victoria Pedretti. Opening March 27, 2026.

✅ Already Streaming: Happy Gilmore 2 (Netflix, July 25, 2025)

If you missed it: Happy Gilmore 2 is now streaming on Netflix. Adam Sandler returns alongside Julie Bowen, Christopher McDonald (Shooter McGavin), and Ben Stiller, with new cast members Bad Bunny (as Happy’s caddy Oscar), Benny Safdie (energy drink CEO), Margaret Qualley, Travis Kelce, Eminem, and a roster of real pro golfers including Rory McIlroy and Scottie Scheffler. The plot follows Happy returning to golf to fund his daughter’s ballet school after the death of his wife, triggering his relapse into alcoholism. Directed by Kyle Newacheck. Rotten Tomatoes: 62%. It holds a 6.1 on IMDb. Critics called it nostalgic and crowd-pleasing but reliant on recycled callbacks. Notable production detail: Carl Weathers, who played Chubbs in the original, had a major role written for him before his death in February 2024, forcing a significant script rewrite that Sandler addressed directly: “We had a painful change. Carl Weathers had a massive part… We made a lot of nice references to how great Chubbs was in the movie.”

FAQs: Most Anticipated 2026 Comedy Movies

When is The Devil Wears Prada 2 releasing?

May 1, 2026, exclusively in theaters via 20th Century Studios. It will stream on Disney+ after the theatrical window. Directed by David Frankel. Written by Aline Brosh McKenna. Cast: Meryl Streep, Anne Hathaway, Emily Blunt, Stanley Tucci, Kenneth Branagh, Lady Gaga, Simone Ashley, Lucy Liu, Justin Theroux, Pauline Chalamet, B.J. Novak, and Donatella Versace (cameo).

When is Scary Movie 6 releasing?

June 5, 2026 nationwide in the US via Paramount Pictures. Directed by Michael Tiddes. Written and produced by Marlon, Shawn, and Keenen Ivory Wayans (first collaboration in 17 years). The full original cast — Anna Faris, Regina Hall, Marlon Wayans, Shawn Wayans — reunites for the first time since 2006. Filmed at Tyler Perry Studios in Atlanta. The official trailer was released February 27, 2026 before Scream 7 screenings.

What are the most anticipated 2026 comedy movies?

The most anticipated 2026 comedy movies are The Devil Wears Prada 2 (May 1), Scary Movie 6 (June 5), How to Make a Killing (Glen Powell + Margaret Qualley, date TBC), The Drama (Zendaya + Robert Pattinson, date TBC), Ruben Östlund’s The Entertainment System Is Down, and Boots Riley’s I Love Boosters. Happy Gilmore 2 is also worth noting — it released on Netflix in July 2025 and is currently available to stream.

What is the plot of The Devil Wears Prada 2?

Andy Sachs (Anne Hathaway) returns to Runway magazine. Miranda Priestly (Meryl Streep) is navigating the collapse of print media and approaching retirement. The main conflict pits Miranda against Emily Charlton (Emily Blunt), now head of a luxury advertising group, over control of the advertising revenue Runway needs to survive. Kenneth Branagh plays Miranda’s husband. Adrian Grenier (Nate from the original) does not return.

What horror films does Scary Movie 6 parody?

Confirmed parody targets include Scream (2022), Scream VI, Get Out, Longlegs, Sinners, The Substance, M3GAN, Smile, Halloween (2018), Weapons (2025), Terrifier 3 (with Felissa Rose reprising her presence in a parody of Art the Clown’s mall scene), Jason Voorhees, Ma, Wednesday, and Heart Eyes. Ghostface from the original 2000 film also returns.

Is Happy Gilmore 2 streaming?

Yes — Happy Gilmore 2 is streaming now on Netflix. It released July 25, 2025. Stars Adam Sandler, Bad Bunny, Ben Stiller, Julie Bowen, Christopher McDonald, Margaret Qualley, Travis Kelce, and Eminem. Rotten Tomatoes: 62%. Worth watching if you enjoyed the original 1996 film.