Over the years, there have been a few attempts to produce a Casablanca sequel or remake, but they’ve never seen the light of day. Two short-lived TV shows based on the characters from Casablanca aired in the 1950s and the 1980s, but a proper sequel or remake has never happened. A long list of classic movies have been reimagined decades later by other studios and filmmakers, but Casablanca is one story that’s been largely left alone.
Highly regarded as one of the greatest movies ever made, Casablanca is often mentioned in the same sentence as other beloved classics like Gone With the Wind and Citizen Kane. Released in 1943 by Warner Bros. and directed by Michael Curtiz, Casablanca was a critically-acclaimed box office hit that earned the studio three Academy Awards, including one for “Outstanding Motion Picture”. Casablanca featured a star-studded cast that included Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Claude Reins, Paul Henreid, and popular character actors such as Sydney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre.
The ill-fated romance between Rick (Bogart) and Ilsa (Bergman) is still remembered as one of the best love stories ever brought to life on the big screen. After being faced with a dilemma of whether or not he should help Ilsa’s war hero husband Victor Laszlo (Henreid) escape Nazi-occupied Casablanca, Rick eventually gives in to his conscience and decides to do the right thing. Casablanca ends with Rick and Ilsa parting ways forever, and Rick standing next to Captain Renault (Reins) as her plane flies away. Rick never gets to see Elsa again, but a Casablanca sequel could have continued his story, or a remake could have reimagined the story with new actors. Here’s every failed Casablanca remake and sequel, and why they never happened.
Brazzaville
The closest Casablanca ever came to getting a sequel was immediately after the first movie released. When the studio saw that it had a huge hit on its hands, a sequel was discussed (even though, in those days, sequels were rare). The story for the proposed sequel was developed by Flash Gordon serial writer and director Frederick Stephani. The idea for the movie, which would have been titled Brazzaville, would have seen Humphrey Bogart, Captain Renault, and Sydney Greenstreet reprise their roles as Rick, Renault, and Ferrari, respectively. One of Bogart’s co-stars in 1941’s Dark Victory, Geraldine Fitzgerald, was courted to play the female lead. She likely would have served as a new love interest for Rick.
Instead of attempting to reunite Rick and Ilsa, the movie would have explored Rick’s future without Ilsa. In the final scene of Casablanca, Rick and Renault discussed going to Brazzaville. The sequel would have followed up on this tease and showed what came next for the two characters. What went wrong was that a shocking twist in the movie would have revealed that Rick and Renault had been working as agents for the Allies all this time. Such a revelation would have completely changed Rick’s Casablanca story, and not for the better. Rick’s selfishness and reluctance to “stick his neck out” for anyone in Casablanca was an integral part of his character. So when Stephani’s treatment was evaluated, Brazzaville was quickly abandoned.
Warner Bros. Wanted A Casablanca Remake In 1973
Celebrated French director François Truffaut has talked about a time where he was offered a chance to direct a Casablanca remake. Apparently, the offer came straight from Warner Bros. in 1973, but when Truffaut turned them down, the studio gave up the idea, possibly for the same reason that Truffaut declined. Truffaut said that he couldn’t imagine replacing Bogart and Bergman, and also cited how much American audiences appreciated the original. This is the very reason why there’s so much trepidation over the idea of revisiting Casablanca at all. So many fans and film critics share Truffaut’s sentiment that Casablanca should be left alone.
Return to Casablanca
Sometime in the 1980s, Casablanca writer Howard Koch wrote a treatment for a sequel. The plan was for it take place 20 years after the events of the original. The movie was to follow the story of Richard, the illegitimate child of Rick and Ilsa. Apparently, Rick got Isla pregnant before she left Casablanca with Lazlo. So she and Laszlo ended up raising the child, with Rick never knowing of his existence. At some point, Laszlo and llsa tried in vain to locate Rick, but later, Richard learns the truth about his birth and goes looking for Rick himself. Richard’s journey leads him to him the Middle East where he would eventually find out what happened to his real father.
It was Koch’s intention for his film, Return to Casablanca, to include surviving cast members from the first movie. Koch wanted to have Ingrid Bergman play an older version of Ilsa, but he wrote her out of the story after the actress passed away in 1982. Warner Bros. turned down the treatment, and so a revised version was submitted in 1989. Again, Warner Bros. passed on it. Koch died in 1995, but another attempt to get Return to Casablanca off the ground occurred decades later when the treatment was rediscovered by Cass Warner, the granddaughter of Warner Bros. co-founder Jack Warner. According to Warner, she approached Warner Bros. about producing Return to Casablanca for the studio. WB declined, but Cass Warner has claimed that the studio wasn’t necessarily opposed to making a Casablanca sequel. She said that Warner Bros. was willing to reevaluate the possibility if an interested filmmaker could be found.
Since there have been no updates on Return to Casablanca, it would seem that WB never settled on a filmmaker to make the movie. As for why that could be, the explanation could be linked to what Truffaut and others have said about Casablanca. Since it’s held in such high regard, it would be difficult for any filmmaker to revisit Casablanca in a way that doesn’t ruin the movie’s ending or upset fans. There may always be a writer or a producer interested in exploring the concept of a Casablanca sequel or remake, but getting the studio and filmmakers on board has so far been the biggest obstacle to making that happen, and that’s unlikely to change.
