When Confess, Fletch hit theaters last year, it didn’t exactly blow the roof off the box office. The movie, made for around $20 million, earned less than $1 million at the box office, amid a day-and-date release on digital platforms and a quick turnaround to Showtime and Paramount+. Still, it earned rave reviews and fans of Gregory McDonald’s acerbic investigative reporter have been holding out hope that it performed well enough on home video platforms to earn a follow-up. While the jury may still be out on that one, director Greg Mottolla is not waiting for a verdict to come back. He’s already started work on Fletch’s Fortune, an adaptation of another Fletch book.
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Back in September, word came out that a sequel to Confess, Fletch — which starred Jon Ham m in the title role — was in early development. That it would be based on Fletch’s Fortune was no secret, because Mottola himself has expressed a desire to adapt that book. Confess, Fletch was a passion project for Mottola and Hamm, the latter of whom reportedly gave back a chunk of his salary to help pay for the movie.
“[Producer] Bill Block…he’s been really loyal to this. He’s actually hired me to write a sequel. Will it ever get made? I’m not sure,” Mottola recently told Uproxx, adding that Block had hired him for “Fletch’s Fortune. And Fletch’s Fortune all takes place at a journalism conference, so I’ve got lots of ideas how to bring that into all the insane worlds of today.”
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Fletch’s Fortune is the third Fletch novel from author Gregory McDonald, and the second Miramax has the rights to. Due to an unusual situation with the rights, the original Fletch movie isn’t included in the package Miramax acquired. Mottola didn’t say why, but presumably, those rights are still with Universal, who made a movie based on the original Fletch in 1985. Miramax also doesn’t hold the rights to the Flynn spinoff series, which is why his character had to be replaced in Confess, Fletch.
It seems fair to assume that there are a total of six books Mottola and Hamm could adapt, assuming the franchise does move forward and there continues to be interest. Without Fletch, that leaves ten books in the main-line Fletch series, but four of those are unlikely candidates for adaptation: Fletch Won and Fletch, Too are prequels, set before the events of the first book. While Fletch Won was at the center of two different attempts to adapt the property in the past (one by Kevin Smith, which would have starred Jason Lee as Fletch; and one by Bill Lawrence, which would have starred Zach Braff). Son of Fletch and Fletch Reflected feature Fletch only in a minor supporting role, and introduce a new lead character in the form of Jack Fletcher Faoni, Fletch’s son.
