Ben Whishaw doesn’t know if Paddington 3 is happening or not

Last February, voice actor Ben Whishaw shared that the third Paddington film was scheduled to enter production by the end of 2022. A year later, things aren’t looking so promising for the beloved Peruvian-born bear.

“I haven’t read this script and I don’t even know when we’re due to shoot it,” the This Is Going To Hurt star tells Collider. “I don’t know. I thought it would be happening by now, but I don’t know. It’s gone silent in the way that sometimes these things do. Maybe that just means they’re still working on it, or maybe it means it’s not happening, or you just don’t know.”

Paddington 2 was one of the many standout cinematic achievements of 2017, no easy feat for a year that also delivered other instant classics like Phantom Thread, Lady Bird, and Get Out. Naturally, demand has been high for a follow-up as the world continues to descend into a darkness that can only be brightened by a very polite bear wearing a little coat and hat.

The first hiccup in the Paddington 3 pipeline came when director Paul King, who helmed the first two pictures, stepped aside in favor of working on Wonka, the Charlie And The Chocolate Factory-based musical starring Timothée Chalamet. However, it was announced last June that Dougal Wilson had signed on to make Paddington In Peru and that principal photography had been delayed until 2023. While there’s still quite a lot of the year left, it would be nice if someone could keep Whishaw in the loop, though it sounds like the No Time To Die actor is ready to hit the studio whenever he gets the call.

“Some days I just go in and do like about 30 or 40 different growls [growls] for like the whole day,” Whishaw says of his Paddington process. “You get the list of things you have to do, and it goes, ‘tiny growl,’ ‘small beary growl,’ ‘small, disappointed growl.’”

Of course, you can’t rush greatness, so if the marmalade needs to take a little more time to simmer, so be it. Until then, you can catch Whishaw on the big screen as part of the stacked ensemble of Women Talking, albeit with his regular human form and an American accent.