How much of Anchorman 2 was improvised

When it comes to making comedy movies, few people have done it quite like Will Ferrell has in Hollywood. The man has a ton of hit comedies that he helped bring to life, and they all had a hand in making him one of the biggest stars of his era. He may not dominate the box office like he had before, but Ferrell's place in history is cemented.

During the 2000s, Ferrell helped write a little movie called Anchorman, and the film was a huge hit that featured an amazing cast. Steve Carell delivered a memorable performance in the movie, and he eventually revealed that one of his character's most famous lines was one that he actually improvised.

Let's hear what Carell had to say about the famous Anchorman line that he improvised.

'Anchorman' Was A Huge Hit

Back in 2004, Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy was released into theaters, and the Will Ferrell flick was able to deliver the goods en route to becoming a financially successful film. The movie was a showcase for amazing comedic talent, and the cast was able to shine while working off of a hilarious script.

Names like Will Ferrell, Steve Carell, Paul Rudd, David Koechner, and Christina Applegate all starred in the flim, and with that much talent on board, it was practically impossible to fail. Thankfully, these performers all gave maximum effort while filming, and they helped turn Anchorman into a classic.

The script, which was written by Will Ferrell and Adam McKay, certainly laid the groundwork for what was to come, and McKay's brilliant work behind the camera really got the best takes possible for the film. Instead of just forcing the actors to adhere perfectly to the script that he and Ferrell had penned, McKay was more than willing to let the cast have some fun improvising.

The Cast Was Able To Improvise Quite A Bit

Now, plenty of filmmakers like to have their actors stick to the script and read off their lines perfectly, but there are those that are far more flexible when it comes to what they choose to film. In fact, there are some filmmakers that really encourage the use of improv while filming, as this can be a great way to get hilarious dialogue that otherwise would not have ended up in the movie.

According to IMDb, "Many of the actors and actresses were good at improvisation. They would sometimes do up to 20 different versions of reaction lines, trying out the first thing that popped into their heads."

That is a lot of takes to get a single line of dialogue down, but clearly, the cast had some great ideas for improv that helped out in making the movie as funny as possible. Improv is wildly unpredictable, and this can yield amazing results when it is done by the right people in the right project.

The improvising that was used in Anchorman helped the movie become a classic, and it even gave way to one of the most quoted lines from the entire movie.

"I Love Lamp" Was Improvised

So, which infamous line from the film was improvised by Steve Carell? Turns out, it was a line that people have been quoting for some time.

"Adam was like, ‘We should have more lines for you, but we don’t have any on the page.’ He literally said ‘Just say something,’ and hence came ‘I ate a big red candle’ [and] ‘I love lamp.’ The ‘I love lamp’ thing was just me at the end of a scene staring at a lamp and I said ‘I love lamp’ and [Ferrell] picked up on it and said, ‘You’re just saying things you’re looking at,'" said Carell.

It may have seemed completely silly at the time, but Carell did an excellent job with his delivery and made the most of his opportunity to improvise. It's cool to hear that Will Ferrell picked up on it and was able to play off of what Carell had just done. The line made it into the movie and the rest is history.

Anchorman is still a film that is loved by many people, and the incredible work done by the actors is largely why it has maintained its legacy. The second film might not have been able to reach the same heights at the first, but this did little to diminish the legacy that the first film had established for itself years earlier.

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