Producers Scramble to Cast, Film 'Friday The 13th' Follow-Up After Realizing March 13th Also A Friday This Year

Pictured: conceptual poster for the new film.

The New Line Cinema board of directors was forced to step up all production aspects of a sequel to February's Friday the 13th film when they suddenly realized yesterday that Friday the 13th happens in March as well.

Producers say they had not anticipated another Friday the 13th, which has scientifically been found to be second only to Labor Day as the scariest day of the year, until much later, and planned their timelines accordingly.

"Releasing these movies on a scary day is an absolute must, because otherwise, the movie-going public could easily confuse our venerable horror franchise with a new Harry Potter movie," said Toby Emmerich, President of New Line Productions. "But when we scheduled Friday the 13th for February of 2009, we figured that we'd have at least a few months or a year before the next one came around to plan for a sequel."

"Or a prequel," he added.

Now, producer Michael Bay is tasked with pulling together another installment in the franchise in less than a month's time. Bay says hitting the date is absolutely crucial to his "vision of artistic whatnot" -- namely, promotional opportunities.

The schedule
Above: the movie's planned development schedule

"There's no way we're letting such a great marketing tool slip away," Bay said, adding that he would advance the next Friday the 13th installment "even if all we have for a trailer is a hockey mask, and blood coming out of the hockey mask to form the words 'This Friday the 13th, Evil Comes Home To Hell...Again'. The hockey mask would then explode."

Bay explained that if they miss the March date, they won't have another shot until November of this year -- 10 months after the original [i.e., remake/sequel].

"People will have forgotten all about Friday the 13th by then, and may not even remember that Friday the 13th is supposed to be a scary day," he mused, absentmindedly removing his boot heel from the throat of a fan of the original Transformers cartoon. "Besides, we're going to need at least three months to make them remember Transformers, so that they'll want to see 'Transformers II: Optimus vs. Galvatron vs. Jason'."

Though neither lead nor bit parts have been cast, and the script is still languishing in the conceptual phase, writers have leaked some information about the plot to reporters, indicating that it is likely to involve a group of nubile, innocent teens who stumble upon a deserted cabin in the woods that, they say, will make a great place to host 'Bay View Fuck Fest '09 - Crystal Lake'. Rumors have also begun to circulate that one of the teens finds that he is Jason Voorhees' half-brother, or that his half-sister was murdered by Jason in episode VI, or some shit like that.

The film, says director Marcus Nispel, will make up for lost production time by utilizing extensive footage of previous installations for multiple flash-backs, and a death scene in which Jason's shadow, cast by moonlight against the side of a house, is seen hacking a corpse with a machete for 15 minutes.

"That's almost 20% of the movie right there, and we'll squirt some blood on the wall, maybe an entrail… throw in a cameo by Ari Lehman [the original Jason Voorhees] as an evil sheriff who is in on the whole thing, and you've basically got everything moviegoers really want!" said Nispel. "As long as we do it by 3-13-09, that is."

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