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Lord & Miller Still Want To Make A Hall And Oates Biopic Starring Dave Franco, Reveal Possible Plot [Exclusive]

Channing Tatum and Dave Franco on the set of The Afterparty Christopher Miller/Twitter
By Ben Pearson/

One of the funniest surprises in "The Afterparty" season 1 when it debuted in the beginning of 2022 was the quick look we got at a movie-within-the-show called "Private Eyes," a Hall and Oates biopic starring Channing Tatum and the obnoxious musician/actor Xavier, played in the series by Dave Franco. A parody of the stale biopic format we've seen trotted out time after time in the past 20 years, "Private Eyes" was writer/producers Phil Lord and Chris Miller's chance to poke fun at the format without fully committing to making a feature-length version.

Although, as it turns out, everyone involved had enough fun riffing while making the short version that Lord and Miller told us they actually did want to make that Hall and Oates biopic for real.

A year and a half after that interview, I caught up with the duo again to talk about "The Afterparty" season 2, and while Hall and Oates don't make an appearance this season, I wanted to check in and see if that whole "let's do it for real" thing was just a lark or if it was actually a serious ambition for the busy pair of writer/producer/directors. When I reminded them of their previous answer, they doubled down. "Hall and Oates biopic, by the way, not entirely off the table," Lord said. "That's right," Miller followed up excitedly. "We still hope we can actually do that for real."

'A not insurmountable hurdle'

Tatum and Franco in Private Eyes Apple TV+

When I pressed them and asked if they have had any real conversations about developing the concept into a feature, Lord laughed and said, "Define 'real,'" before getting (slightly) more serious about the topic. "We hung out with Davey [Franco] once and we're like, 'What if the movie is written and directed by your characters, and you are desperately trying to get the rights for the Hall and Oates songs but can't get them?'"

Miller agreed and added that "in reality, I think the holdup would be getting the actual rights from Hall and Oates, from understanding how much we love them and cherish their music." Lord closed the topic by referring to snagging the music rights as "a not insurmountable hurdle."

To quote Jim Carrey's "Dumb and Dumber" character Lloyd Christmas: "So you're tellin' me there's a chance!"

Dear Daryl Hall and John Oates, in the event that you have a Google alert set up for your name, allow me to take this opportunity to humbly request that you grant these guys the rights to your songs. It's been more than 15 years since "Walk Hard" skewered the biopic formula so much that it should have died forever. But as Hollywood continued to cash in on the formula with hits like "Bohemian Rhapsody," we can only hope that a comedic duo like Lord and Miller come along and follow in the footsteps of "Weird: The Al Yankovic Story" and put their own spin on your timeless music. And hey, think of how many extra records you'd sell!

While we all wait to see if this project becomes a reality, you can revisit the hilarity of the original sneak peek, which appears at the end of this late night clip:

"The Afterparty" season 2 debuts on Apple TV+ on July 12, 2023.

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