You Happy Now, Academy? Adam Sandler Agrees to Make Four More Netflix Movies

The Sandman shall have his vengeance

On the heels of Adam Sandler’s exclusion from this year’s Oscar nominees, the Happy Madison head honcho and Uncut Gems star seems to be making good on his recent threat to “make [the Academy] pay,” extending his deal with Netflix to the tune of four new movies. “Good news: Sandman signs a new deal with Netflix,” their press release reads. “Bad news: Sandman might have to start wearing suits again.”

Sandler’s latest for Netflix—Murder Mystery, in which he starred alongside Jennifer Aniston—was also his greatest, according to the streamer, who calls it his “most popular Netflix film to date.” They also say Netflix subscribers “have spent a whopping two billion hours watching his films since 2015—the year that The Ridiculous 6 premiered.”

The aggressive mediocrity of Sandler’s Netflix films, which include the aforementioned Ridiculous 6, The Do Over, Sandy Wexler and The Week Of, is well-documented—though, to be fair, his Emmy-nominated 2018 Netflix stand-up special 100% Fresh was quite good, as was his performance in Noah Baumbach’s Netflix film The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected). At any rate, we can only conclude that Sandler’s Netflix deal extension is his method of exacting his revenge on the film world. It’s a power move, quite frankly. The Sandman is a Sandman of his word.

“Whether you know him as Sandman, the Water Boy, Billy Madison, Happy Gilmore, Nick Spitz or simply Adam, one thing is clear: our members can’t get enough of him,” said Netflix head Ted Sarandos in a statement. “They love his stories and his humor, as we saw with Murder Mystery. So I could not be more excited to extend our partnership with Adam and the Happy Madison team and deliver more laughs around the world.”

Many cinephiles now know Sandler as Howard Ratner, the kinetic center of Josh and Benny Safdie’s stellar Uncut Gems. It’s a shame the Academy didn’t recognize his performance, particularly given the threat he made during a December conversation with Howard Stern: “If I don’t get [an Oscar nomination], I’m going to fucking come back and do one again that is so bad on purpose just to make you all pay. That’s how I get them.” That’s how he wins.

Uncut Gems comes to Netflix internationally today, Jan. 31, and in the U.S. in May. Sandler’s forthcoming Netflix projects include: family holiday comedy Hubie Halloween, coming later this year, in which he’ll star alongside Kevin James, Julie Bowen, Ray Liotta, Maya Rudolph, Rob Schneider, Kenan Thompson, Steve Buscemi, Michael Chiklis, Tim Meadows, Noah Schnapp, Paris Berelc, China Anne McClain and Shaquille O’Neal; and an untitled animated film he will write, produce and star in as a voice actor.

You can revisit our 2017 predictions for Sandler’s next four (nailed it!) Netflix films here.