Why did Rick Moranis retire? Actor makes comeback after 23 years for Honey, I Shrunk the Kids sequel

'I didn't miss the work, travel or people – I didn't miss any of it'

Jacob Stolworthy
Friday 14 February 2020 10:08 GMT
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Honey, I Shrunk the Kids - trailer

Eighties movie favourite Rick Moranis is returning to acting for a new sequel to Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, which will end his 23-year absence from the screen.

Moranis’s acting career was flourishing in the 1980s following high-profile roles in Little Shop of Horrors (1986), Ron Howard’s Parenthood (1989) and, of course, alongside Bill Murray in Ghostbusters (1984).

The success ran through to the 1990s, when the Canadian appeared in The Flintstones (1994).

But, after that, the actor started declining roles that would come his way, save for voice work in Disney’s Brother Bear franchise.

This was because Moranis’s wife, Ann Belsky, died in 1991 and he decided to focus on the upbringing of his children after struggling to balance his film career.

In 2006, he told The Independent: ”For the first couple of years I was able to make it work – doing one and a half pictures a year for three months with no problem.”

He continued: “But I started to really miss them. It got to the point where I was doing a lot of pictures with kids – really nice kids, but not my kids. So, I was like, ‘You know what? I’m tired of talking to my kids from a hotel room. I’m going home.’ So I turned down the next pictures that came along and the break just got longer and longer.

“I didn’t miss the work, I didn’t miss the travel, I didn’t miss the people. I didn’t miss any of it.”

The actor would decline roles right up until the 2010s. When Paul Feig offered him a role in his all-female ghostbusters reboot, the actor turned it down, telling The Hollywood Reporter: “It didn’t appeal to me.”

That hiatus is coming to an end with Shrunk, which will see Moranis play Wayne Szalinski once again.

Joe Johnston will return to direct the Disney sequel that will see Josh Gad play Wayne’s grown-up son. There is currently no word on a release date.

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