In the 25 years since My Cousin Vinny was released, there’s been one Oscar win for a cast member (Marisa Tomei) and one real attempt at a sequel. In 2012, Dale Launer, who wrote the original script, proposed a follow-up to Vincent LaGuardia Gambini’s (Joe Pesci) surprise Alabama victory that would see the Brooklyn native practicing law in the United Kingdom, where he would undoubtedly run afoul of procedures and protocols, with possibly hilarious results. Pesci and Tomei had reportedly signed on for Vinny and Mona Lisa’s ongoing adventures as fish out of water, but the Spider-Man: Homecoming actress eventually dropped out, and the project was shelved.
There’s still hope for people who are just dying to know what life would look like for the bumbling, occasionally brilliant lawyer who misrepresented himself in a capital case—The New York Post reports that a My Cousin Vinny book sequel is on the way. Lawrence Kelter, a Long Island-based crime novelist and MCV superfan, is publishing Back To Brooklyn, which will see Vinny defending an accused murderer in his home turf. The familiar circumstances will go beyond the setting, though, as Vinny and Mona Lisa remain unmarried, and continue to have money problems. It’s unclear if the book takes place in the ’90s or the present, but either works, since “financial difficulties” is a timeless comedic premise.
Kelter says the original film left him “tingling from laughter,” which inspired him to reach out to Launer, and, after securing the screenwriter’s blessing, spend over a year in negotiations with 20th Century Fox and the Writers Guild Of America to get the rights to the characters. Despite Kelter’s obvious passion for the project, he hasn’t managed to drum up the same excitement in the cast—Pesci declined (via his rep) to provide a book jacket blurb, and Tomei never responded to the request. But Ralph Macchio, who’s got his own sequel project in the works, did take the time to praise Back To Brooklyn.