Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy is notable for its unique humor and offbeat storytelling, but an original version of the movie sounds amazing as well. Critics had mixed responses to Adam McKay’s directorial debut when it released in 2004. However, the movie has since become a much-quoted cult classic, with audiences appreciating its absurdist, tongue-in-cheek comedy style and outrageous cast of characters.

Will Ferrell recently joined his Anchorman co-star Christina Applegate on an episode of her podcast, Messy, where the actors discussed behind-the-scenes moments and the history of the film’s development. Ferrell referenced a terrible test screening of Anchorman that led the creative team to completely restructure the film’s climax, creating the movie we now know and love. However, even earlier than that, there was a completely different version of Anchorman, which sounds like it could’ve been hilarious.

Anchorman’s Original Version Sounds Hilarious

The Original Version Of Anchorman Was Completely Different

In a 2017 interview on The Ringer‘s Bill Simmons Podcast (via IndieWire), Ferrell revealed that the original version of Anchorman was a parody of the 1993 survival film Alive. Directed by Frank Marshall and starring Ethan Hawke, Alive tells the true story of a Uruguayan rugby team whose plane crashes in the Andes mountains. It details the extreme conditions the team endured and the lengths they had to go to so they could stave off starvation.

The original Anchorman script had all the news correspondents from around the country flying to Philadelphia for a big convention. Along the way, Ferrell’s over-confident character, Ron Burgundy, convinces the pilot he can fly. However, he immediately crashes the plane in the mountains, and like in the original Alive film, the characters all must do what they can to survive.

During the crash landing, the plane also hits a cargo plane full of orangutans and Chinese throwing stars, so, as Ferrell explained, “throughout the movie we’re being stalked by orangutans who are killing, one by one, the team off with throwing stars.” Applegate’s Anchorman character, Veronica Corningstone, tries to convince the others that they can reach civilization, but all the male anchors dismiss her pleas. Ferrell said, “We keep telling her, ‘Wrong.’ She doesn’t know what we’re talking about.”

Why Anchorman’s Alive Parody Was Scrapped

The “Kooky” Original Version Of Anchorman Was Too Absurd

Anchorman was conceived when Ferrell and McKay were working together on Saturday Night Live. The two initially developed a different script, which made its way to Boogie Nights director Paul Thomas Anderson. The other movie was never made, but, based on it, Anderson encouraged Ferrell and McKay to write whatever they wanted. From that encouragement, the Alive version of Anchorman was born. Although Anderson was one of Anchorman‘s first “guardian angels,” Ferrell explained that the initial script with the Alive parody was “maybe a little too weird for Paul,“ with Ferrell later admitting himself that it “was a little too kooky.”

The original version of Anchorman does sound pretty absurd, and it’s hard to imagine the movie being more successful than it already is. However, with Ferrell and McKay’s combined experience in the years since, it’s easy to imagine that first version of Anchorman being made today, and likely pretty successfully. It may simply be the case of a story before its time. Maybe Ferrell and McKay will get the chance one day to do a different take on an Alive parody.

Sources: The Ringer (via IndieWire)