The Tragic Real-Life Reason Key & Peele's 'Police Academy' Reboot Was Cancelled

The 1984 comedy film Police Academy has unsuccessfully attempted multiple reboots since 2003.

The box office smash follows the aftermath of a crime-ridden city that lowers its standards for the police academy. A group of misfits and nontraditional police types must navigate the academy while battling the unwelcoming police officers.

It starred Steve Guttenberg, Kim Cattrall, and Bubba Smith.

In the 2010s, a reboot with Jordan Peele and Keegan-Michael Key never made it off the ground because of a tragic real-life event.

On a recent episode of the podcast "Funny You Ask with Ike Barinholtz," the comedian spoke to guest Joel McHale about the Police Academy pitch he and his writing partner, David Stassen, had.

"Years ago, my partner and I got hired to rewrite Police Academy for New Line Cinema," Barinholtz said. "I don't even know if he's still alive; we might have to cut this, but the guy who created the original ‘Police Academy' came with the deal."

He continued, "So they said to us, ‘We want you guys to write it and make it dirty, rated R, modern.' He'll be at some of the meetings, but we don't have to listen to him. All he wanted to do was give us notes."

When the writing duo pitched the project, it did not go smoothly.

"So when we're doing the pitch, my partner was like, ‘So we have this scene and that's when we see all the original cast. We see Hightower, we see Tackleberry, we have…' - he's just naming all dead people. And I was like…he didn't even do research to find out who's still alive in the cast," the comedian shared. "He was not happy. But more importantly, as we were developing the film, MikeBrown got shot and all of a sudden, and we were making the movie for Key and Peele, and people were like, ‘We're not making a cop comedy right now where we're having these two hilarious Black actors play police officers.'"

On August 9, 2014, Michael Brown was shot and killed by a white police officer in Ferguson, Missouri. He was 18 years old. This launched over a week of protests about the use of police force and militarization. There was an investigation, but the officer was never indicted for any civil rights violations.

Barinholtz is currently starring on the comedy series The Studio. Peele is working on his next film, and Key is on set for the Romy and Michele's High School Reunion sequel.

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This story was originally published June 17, 2026 at 5:47 PM.