Trey Parker and Matt Stone have publicly apologized for repeated delays to their long-gestating musical comedy with Kendrick Lamar, a rare admission from creators known for skewering everyone but themselves.
“We take full responsibility for the schedule delay of this movie,” the pair said in a statement to The Ankler. “We apologize to our partners at pgLang and Paramount, and we appreciate their patience. ‘South Park’ and life’s circumstances have gotten in the way, but we still believe in the project.” Representatives for Paramount, Parker and Stone had not responded to requests for comment as of Wednesday.
The film, working title “Whitney Springs,” has bounced around Paramount’s release calendar for more than a year. An initial July 2025 date slipped to March 2026 before the studio pulled it from the schedule entirely, leaving it undated. Principal photography reportedly wrapped in October 2024, meaning the project has sat in some stage of completion for nearly two years.
Parker and Stone are producing through their Park County banner, while Lamar works alongside Dave Free through their company pgLang. Early plot descriptions centered on a Black man working as a slave reenactor at a living history museum who learns his white girlfriend’s family once enslaved his ancestors. More recent reporting describes a somewhat different setup: the reenactor clashing with a racist small-town mayor, a role Parker is expected to play himself. Lamar has recorded original songs for the soundtrack.
The project marks Parker and Stone’s first feature film in more than two decades. Their last was 2004’s “Team America: World Police,” preceded by the Oscar-nominated “South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut” in 1999.
The apology lands days before “South Park” returns for its 29th season on September 16. The show’s last two seasons ended a two-year hiatus and drew attention for casting Donald Trump as a recurring antagonist, a target the writers have continued needling in the off-season, including a joke rebranding the show itself as “South America.”
