Netflix announced on Wednesday during its Upfront presentation that Grown Ups 3 is in the works, and Adam Sandler is leading the project as a writer and producer. The streamer said the follow-up will bring back the comedy’s core group, and in its announcement Netflix used the company’s long-running relationship with Sandler to frame the news.
Kyle Newacheck has inked a deal to direct Grown Ups 3, and the company highlighted his previous collaboration with Sandler on Happy Gilmore 2. The screenplay is credited to Adam Sandler and Tim Herlihy; Sandler, Jackie Sandler, Jack Giarraputo and Herlihy are listed as producers, with Kevin Grady and Judit Maull serving as executive producers. Adam Sandler, David Spade, Rob Schneider, Chris Rock and Kevin James are all set to return to the franchise.
Netflix’s announcement explicitly named the project — adam sandler grown ups 3 — placing the reunion squarely in the streamer’s slate. The company also underscored that Sandler’s production deal with Netflix has spanned over a decade and resulted in more than 10 films and other projects, presenting the new installment as the latest chapter in a long-running partnership.
The Grown Ups films center on childhood friends who reunite as adults during a summer vacation, a premise that carried the franchise through two theatrical releases by Sony’s Columbia Pictures. The first Grown Ups debuted in the summer of 2010 and grossed around $272 million worldwide; its sequel, Grown Ups 2, arrived in 2013 and took in about $247 million worldwide. Both previous films were directed by Dennis Dugan.
The most immediate weight of Wednesday’s news is the creative lineup: Newacheck replacing Dennis Dugan behind the camera, Sandler and Herlihy re-teaming on the script, and the original comedy ensemble returning. Those names and numbers — the grosses of the first two films and Sandler’s decade-plus output with Netflix — are the concrete measures Netflix used to pitch the project’s marketability during the Upfront presentation.
There is a clear tension running through the announcement. The franchise’s first two chapters were theatrical releases distributed by Sony’s Columbia Pictures and guided by Dugan; the third is being developed within Netflix’s production umbrella and will be directed by someone who previously worked with Sandler on a different follow-up. That dynamic — continuity of cast and writers against a new director and a new production home — is the story’s friction point.
At the same time, Newacheck’s recent collaboration with Sandler on Happy Gilmore 2 offers continuity that undercuts any suggestion of wholesale change. Netflix’s decade-long production relationship with Sandler has already produced more than 10 films and other projects, and the company framed Grown Ups 3 as a natural extension of that output rather than an isolated gamble.
Factually, the announcement settles the basic questions: Netflix has greenlit development of a third Grown Ups film, Kyle Newacheck will direct, the script comes from Adam Sandler and Tim Herlihy, and the principal ensemble — Sandler, David Spade, Rob Schneider, Chris Rock and Kevin James — are expected to return. That is the answer to the headline: the Grown Ups franchise is moving forward under Netflix with its core cast and a new director leading the production team.
