Ariana Grande is following up an Oscar nomination in 2025 with entrance into the circle of trust in 2026.
The first preview for the fourth Meet the Parents movie, Focker-in-Law, has dropped, giving viewers their first glimpse at the next phase of inter-generational drama in the Focker family.
Here’s everything you need to know about Focker-in-Law.
The Trailer
The new trailer quickly sets the stage with Olivia Jones (Grande), the girlfriend of Skyler Gisondo’s Henry Focker, getting strapped into a lie detector by Jack Byrnes (Robert De Niro, back up to his old tricks). It’s later established later that Olivia was an FBI hostage negotiator, causing her potential father-in-law, Greg Focker (Ben Stiller), to become suspicious.
The Cast
Joining Stiller and De Niro in returning to the series are Teri Polo, Blythe Danner, and Owen Wilson. New cast members aside from Grande and Gisondo are Beanie Feldstein and Eduardo Franco.
The Creative Team
John Hamburg, who contributed to the script of the first film and penned the subsequent entries, takes over directing duties from Jay Roach, who returns as a producer.
The Backstory
Ben Stiller, Robert De Niro, Teri Polo, and director Jay Roach reunited at the Tribeca Film Festival last June for a Q&A after an anniversary screening of Meet the Parents. And while the original movie was the night’s main topic, the fourth movie in the series seemed to be on everyone’s mind.
“I can’t really talk too much, I guess, at this point about the movie,” Stiller said. “But the character [Ariana Grande is] playing is — she’s going to be really, really funny and kind of the whole engine of the new movie. So it’s exciting.”
“The script is really fun,” De Niro said. “I’m looking forward to it.”
“I fell in love with that script, the first film script … because imagining what it’s like when you care so much about winning the approval of someone, and you’re right away going to start screwing it up, and the harder you try the worse you’re going to make it,” said Roach, who is returning to produce the fourth movie. “And I think that’s what [writer John Hamburg] has come up with again, and that’s what you always need. That predicament is everything in a story. And I think in this one, John found a really great new predicament. I think everybody’s going to love squirming through it, just like this.”
The film is the first entry in the series since 2010’s Little Fockers, which saw Dustin Hoffman and Barbra Streisand returning as the parents of Stiller’s Greg Focker. That film went on to gross $310 million at the worldwide box office, but that total marked a low-point for the series and didn’t help with the less-than-enthusiastic reviews.
But at Tribeca, the original Meet the Parents received a warm reception, something that Stiller called out during the talk afterward. “It’s so much fun to hear laughter in a theater with comedy that’s 25 years old,” he said. “It still works.”
The film’s lasting legacy has had some downside, however. “When someone yells ‘Focker!’ on the street, it doesn’t necessarily feel respectful,” Stiller said.
A version of this story was originally published on June 9, 2025.
