IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE SEQUEL

For the love of classic movies, I hope this sequel never gets made...

George Bailey had such a wonderful film life that he's getting a sequel. A new version of Frank Capra's 1946 classic Christmas tale It's a Wonderful Life is underway, the Hollywood trade publication Variety reported on Monday.

The sequel, titled It's A Wonderful Life: The Rest of the Story, is expected in theaters for the 2015 holiday season.It has a bit of the original movie's magic with a twist.

Karolyn Grimes, who played George Bailey's daughter Zuzu in the original, will return for the sequel as an angel who shows Bailey's unlikable grandson (also named George Bailey) how much better off the world would have been had he never been born.

"The new film will retain the feeling of the original, and it simply must be shared," Grimes said. "I've probably read close to 20 scripts over the years suggesting a sequel to It's a Wonderful Life but none of them were any good."

Producer Bob Farnsworth and Martha Bolton have written the screenplay. There was no word on who would play the new George Bailey. They are big shoes to fill.

The original Bailey, who despondently tries to kill himself before an angel shows him how bad life would be without him, was played by Jimmy Stewart.

"The story line of the new film retains the spirit of the original – every life is important as long as you have friends," Farnsworth said.

The producers have also begun discussions with original cast members who portrayed the Bailey family to reprise their roles in the sequel -- Jimmy Hawkins, who played Tommy Bailey, and Carol Coombs, who played Janie Bailey...

SOURCE

WHERE ARE THEY NOW: KAROLYN GRIMES

Who can forget Jimmy Stewart's daughter in IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE(1946)?

Karolyn Grimes (born July 4, 1940) is an American actress known for her role as "Zuzu Bailey" in the Frank Capra classic It's a Wonderful Life. Grimes also played Bing Crosby's daughter in the big budget musical BLUE SKIES in 1946. She also played "Debbie" in the 1947 Christmas film, THE BISHOP'S WIFE starring Cary Grant, David Niven, and Loretta Young.

Grimes was born in Hollywood, California. Her mother pushed her into acting, but her acting career declined with her mother's health. The latter died from illness when Grimes was 14, and she lost her father from a car crash a year later. A court ruling sent her from Hollywood to Osceola, Missouri, where she lived in what she called a "bad home" with her aunt and uncle. She went to college, married, raised kids, and became a medical technologist.

 

Years after her movie stardom, she gave local interviews in the 1980s and national interviews in the 1990s. Her first husband's death in a hunting accident, 18-year-old son's suicide in 1989, and second husband's death from cancer in 1994 made it difficult for Grimes to move on. After she suffered a serious financial setback during the early 2000s recession, she made a career of her advocacy for the film, whose hopeful and optimistic message she now says she can relate to.

Today, she tours big-screen showings of It's a Wonderful Life at dinner theatres worldwide, signing autographs, sharing tidbits, and pointing out small 'goofs'. One such mistake is that she, 6 years old at the time, faked the lyrics to "Auld Lang Syne" in the movie's famous closing scene. "If you watch closely, James Stewart is holding me tightly and he looks at me and begins to laugh because he knows I'm not singing the right words", she says...