The screenwriters, David Guion and Michael Handelman, virtually disowned the finished film. Handelman said, "I think what we wrote was meant to be a bit less broad than the film that came out. I think a lot of what you see in either of those films is stuff that was not written by us even though we’re the only credited writers on that." Guion added, "That movie was a bit of a cautionary story for screenwriters in terms of that it was a movie that struggled a little bit and didn’t test well initially, and the financers panicked and said, 'We better show a lot of people getting hit in the balls'... It was unfortunate because the director, Jesse Peretz, is great and very talented, but the movie was ultimately taken out of his hands."