Jake Gyllenhaal’s first starring role came in October Sky, but the Oscar-nominated actor truly offered a glimpse into his future as one of the most unique and versatile movie stars with his second film, Donnie Darko. The Richard Kelly-directed production wasn’t fully appreciated during its initial release in 2001, but has become a cult classic, thanks to critical praise and word of mouth about Gyllenhaal’s iconic performance as a teenaged insomniac plagued by visions of a 6-foot tall rabbit. With Donnie Darko celebrating its 15th anniversary, Kelly has been asked about a sequel and the director is more than willing to play along.
In a new interview with hmv, Kelly was asked if he was tempted “to go back to the world of Donnie Darko and do more.” The short answer is he’s definitely interested, but the long answer is he needs the right resources — aka a proper budget — to be put into place to do the story justice, without any compromises.
(Read: Jake Gyllenhaal’s Top 10 Performances)
“I think there’s something much bigger and more ambitious to do in that universe,” Kelly says. “It’s big and expensive and I think there’s time to get to that. I want to make sure we’ve got the budget to do it justice and not to compromise anything.”
“Another story in this world needs resources and we need to have that in place. I need to get my next film out of the gate and then we can go back and look at it.”
Whether Jake Gyllenhaal has any free time to sign on for the sequel is a different story, but it won’t take much for him to get in the right headspace — recent movies like Nightcrawler and Demolition show he hasn’t lost a penchant for playing weird protagonists.
Watch the original trailer for Donnie Darko below:
