Star Peter Billingsley is set to reprise his role as Ralphie Parker in a sequel to A Christmas Story set 30 years after the events of the first movie. The new picture, entitled A Christmas Story Christmas, hails from Warner Bros. Clay Kaytis (The Christmas Chronicles) will direct with a script by Nick Schenk (Cry Macho, The Mule).
A Christmas Story was released in 1983 but was set in the 1940s. The film flopped at the box office when it was first released but since then, it has become a holiday classic, and each year a cable channel (originally TNT, then TBS) airs it nonstop for at least 24 hours during the Christmas season.
The original movie was based on the semi-autobiographical writings of Jean Shepherd, primarily the 1966 book In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash, with additional anecdotes taken from his 1971 book Wanda Hickey’s Night of Golden Memories and Other Disasters. (Fun fact: Most of this material was published in short story form in Playboy magazine!) Shepherd provided the voice of the narrator in the film, a.k.a. adult Ralphie.
Much of A Christmas Story centers on Ralphie’s desire to get a Red Ryder BB Gun for Christmas, despite everyone warning him — including the local mall Santa — telling him he’ll shoot his eye out. Many other elements are etched into fans’ memories including Ralphie’s friend Flick licking a frozen pole, Ralphie’s “Old Man” receiving a “major award,” and the family’s Christmas dinner at a Chinese restaurant.
The new picture will be set in the 1970s and will show Ralphie taking his kids back to his hometown for the holidays in the aftermath of the “Old Man’s” death. The original movie was filmed in Cleveland and Toronto, but the sequel will begin production next month in Hungary!
PBS’ American Playhouse produced two additional adaptations of Shepperd’s work including the same characters, The Star-Crossed Romance of Josephine Cosnowski and Ollie Hopnoodle’s Haven of Bliss. In 1994, MGM released a sequel entitled It Runs in the Family. After a limited theatrical run, it was released on home video under the title My Summer Story. Shepherd once again narrated the film as adult Ralphie. Tedde Moore, who played Ralphie’s teacher, Miss Shields in A Christmas Story, also returned, but the rest of the characters were recast with Charles Grodin playing the Old Man, Mary Steenbergen as Ralphie’s mother, and Kieran Culkin as Ralphie.
Another sequel, A Christmas Story 2 was released by Warner Home Video and ignored the events of My Summer Story. Braeden Lemasters played Ralphie and Daniel Stern, the star of another Christmas classic, Home Alone, played his Old Man.
In 2012, the original A Christmas Story was turned into a Broadway musical, which received Tony Award nominations. It was later staged for television by FOX in 2017, as A Christmas Story Live!
Most recently, Billingsley was seen as one of Mysterio’s henchmen, William Ginter Riva (above), in Spider-Man: Far From Home, reprising a role that he played in Iron Man. He also directed the comedy Couples Retreat, starring Vince Vaughn and Jon Favreau, the latter of whom directed Iron Man. Billingsley also appeared as Ming Ming the elf in another Christmas classic, Favreau’s Elf starring Will Ferrell.
