Editor’s note: The following is a satirical article for The DisreGuardian, a series of articles published annually for The Guardian’s April Fool’s issue. A&E will resume publishing normal content next week.
Last summer Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie” dominated cinemas, earning over a billion dollars at the box office. Now, with the news that Mattel will be developing films featuring their other toys such as Polly Pocket, Hot Wheels, and Uno, everyone wants a piece of the action; including Hefty.
Hefty has announced they are developing their hit product Zoo Pals into a feature film for the big screen. If you did not grow up in the early 2000s you might be asking yourself: what are Zoo Pals? Zoo Pals are paper plates that take the form of different animals (cows, pigs, tigers, whales, etc.) that children – for some reason – extremely enjoy. These plates grew in popularity in the early 2000s, and kids have been happily eating dino nuggets and ketchup out of them ever since. Now, they will be coming to the big screen in a new and exciting way.
The film will reportedly be a fresh look at the Zoo Pals as they leave the wonderful world of Hefty – where paper and plastic products live in harmony – to the harsh realities of the real world, and learn what it means to be a real pal.
“We want to give more depth to these paper plates than ever before, and I think there’s no better time than now,” said executive producer Matt Damon. Damon came on board the project after learning he didn’t buy a zoo in his 2011 film “We Bought a Zoo.”
“My kids were eating off the zoo pals plates one day and inspiration struck,” said Damon. “The next day I walked into the Hefty building and I sat down with the Hefty president and I said ‘I wanna make history’ and that’s what this is.”
The screenplay, written by Emmy and Golden Globe winner Tiny Fey, is finished. Fey stated that the reason she chose to write it was so she could have a cutaway joke in her “30 Rock” reboot series coming to Peacock this fall. Hefty is currently shopping around the screenplay to different studios such as Warner Bros. Discovery, Universal, Paramount, Apple TV+, and more.
“We originally were going to go to Warner but we quickly realized the chances of it getting locked away for tax write-offs were too high,” said Hefty CEO Lance Mitchell. “We then realized Paramount+ has a bad habit of making something and canceling it, so Tubi might be our best option.”
No director has been attached yet, however, Damon and Mitchell have some ideas in mind. “There are a lot of people in director’s jail at the moment that desperately want to get out and this project will be the one to get them out,” said Damon.
Although there is no director at the helm, a few stars have signed on to the project including Maude Apatow, Alexa Demie, Eric Dane, and Dominic Fike.
“It’s not a coincidence that we’re all from Euphoria,” they said in a group statement. “We just got word that Sam probably won’t have season three done for another five years so we decided to find work elsewhere.”
It has also been reported that they might have mistakenly signed on thinking it was an adaptation of George Orwell’s “Animal Farm” but are now contractually obligated to stay on.
“Zoo Pals has inspired millions of children all over the world,” said Mitchell. “A movie about plastic animal plates learning that they are contributing to waste and pollution, and having existential crises that drive them to the brink of insanity is what our kids need right now.”
Images courtesy of The Today Show and IMDb
