John C. Reilly Teases 2027 Dewey Cox Tour: "As Many Dates & As Big Of Places As We Can Do" [Video]

Actor John C. Reilly does want some part of this s–t, as he will resurrect his beloved Dewey Cox character for a 2027 concert tour in celebration of Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story‘s 20th anniversary. Though he’s given no dates or official details, Reilly told Steve-O that Cox and his band, The Hard Walkers, will play “as many dates and as big of places as we can do.”

Looking ahead to 2027, Reilly said that Jack White—who made a cameo in Walk Hard as a karate-loving Elvis Presley—plans to re-release the film’s iconic soundtrack on vinyl. This will go hand-in-hand with his live tour celebrating one of the most quotable movies of all time, which will actually be his second time taking the songs on the road. Reilly staged an eight-city tour when the film came out in 2007; however, due to an ongoing writers’ strike, he was unable to hit the talk-show circuit and explain why he had booked a tour under another name (walking hard so Johnny Blue Skies could run, some might say).

Reilly recalled the 2007 conundrum, “The studio was like, ‘We have a satire that we need to explain to people what it is a satire of, but we don’t have any talk show appearances for you to explain. What are we going to do?'”

The solution was to put Reilly and The Hard Walkers on a private plane for an eight-city tour, each performance preceded by a special screening of the film. Cox’s backing band included guitarist Mike Viola, the singer-songwriter who co-wrote “Beautiful Ride”, “(I Hate You) Big Daddy”, “Darling”, and several other songs from the film, and the tour featured a guest appearance from Dewey’s on-screen first wife, Kristen Wiig (before he went and got double married).

“It worked out great,” Reilly said of the 2007 tour. “It seems insane. No studio would ever pay you to go even one time on a private plane anymore. But they were desperate at the time. … The concerts went great, they really did love the music. They barely knew the songs, though, they had just seen the movie.”

That’s about all Reilly had to say about the 2027 Dewey Cox tour, though he mentioned also talking about it on a podcast with Buddy Miller, which appears not to have dropped yet. Since the film has become a cult classic and a favorite of touring musicians in the 20 years since, audiences are bound to know the songs much better than they did on the first Dewey Cox Walk Hard tour.

Dewey Cox Is Coming Back (And It’s About Time) | Steve-O’s Wild Ride!