Zachary Levi To Return To The Spy Comedy Genre In Lonely Island-Produced 'Spy Guys'

Zachary Levi is going to know kung fu...again. The Shazam! star may seem like he was born to play a childlike superhero, but Levi will be returning the genre in which he belongs with the upcoming Jeff Tomsic-helmed Spy Guys, as the lead of the action comedy about a sleek spy who is forced to rely on his moronic college friends. Levi would lead the cast in a production led by the comedy dream team of Lonely Island.Deadline broke the news that Zachary Levi is in talks with New Line Cinema to lead Spy Guys, a new action comedy from Tomsic, the director of last year's Tag. Per Deadline, here is the film's longline:

Levi will play a super spy in the vein of Jason Bourne and Ethan Hunt who gets in a jam on an impossible mission and can only rely on the help of his moronic college friends who happen to be with him to work it out.

Adam Sztykiel penned the script for the film, which is produced by John Rickard (Rampage and the Horrible Bosses films), and the Lonely Island team of Andy Samberg, Jorma Taccone, and Akiva Schaffer.

These are a lot of big comedy names throwing their support behind Levi, who is having quite a year with a career-defining performance in Shazam! and as a scene-stealing romantic interest in Amazon's Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. Tomsic made his directorial debut with 2018's Tag, but is best known for his work on Comedy Central's Broad City and Idiotsitter, on which he is executive producer.

But it's Levi's return to the spy comedy genre that piques my interest. Levi had his breakout role in the NBC action-comedy series Chuck, in which he starred as a computer geek who accidentally becomes an asset to the U.S. government. It was a silly, smart revamp of the Get Smart dynamic that allowed Levi to stretch his comedy chops and hone his charisma — something that he used to maximum effect in Tangled and, of course, Shazam! It will be exciting to see him return to the spy comedy genre but in a reversed role: this time he's playing the efficient super spy instead of the dorky nerd. It would be worth it to see him make a nod to this: