Barbra Streisand’s ‘Meet the Parents 4’ Snub! Why She ‘Isn’t a Factor’ in Upcoming Film

Ben Stiller and Robert De Niro are getting the band back together for a lucrative new Meet the Parents sequel, but there’s no place for franchise veteran and Little Fockers costar Barbra Streisand as of yet, a source tells Closer exclusively.

“The hard truth you have to understand here is that Ben Stiller has done very little acting over the last six years and the Meet the Parents franchise is one of his most successful projects,” the insider explains. “Ben’s willingness to come back and make another one of these movies is driving everything, including the dealmaking going on now with his costars Robert De Niro, Blythe Danner and Teri Polo.”

“Barbra isn’t a factor at this point, because they are still working on getting the original quartet of stars locked in so that they can shoot this movie next summer. If there’s an opportunity for Barbra to appear, they’ll get around to talking to her, but the real focus of the project is getting Ben and Bob back on camera together,” the source continues.

Ben, 59, Robert, 81, Blythe, 81, and Teri, 55, are in early talks to reprise their roles in a fourth Meet the Parents film, Deadline reported in December 2024. The plot details are being kept under wraps, the outlet said.

Barbra Streisand and Husband James Brolin ‘Truly Love Each Other’

Barbra, 82, and Dustin Hoffman, played Ben’s character Greg Focker’s parents in the 2004 sequel, Meet the Fockers. The two movie titans returned as Roz and Bernie Focker for a third film in the franchise, 2010’s Little Fockers.

“Everybody knows Barbra has an ego about this stuff and is easily offended, but simple economics demands that the studio lock in the main stars first and then they can see what kind of money is left over and look at the question of how to get Barbra in this movie,” the source explained about the casting. “But it’s not the priority right now, making deals for Ben and Bob is the focus, and everybody knows those guys don’t come cheap.”

Barbra has been on a prolonged hiatus from acting. She hasn’t appeared on the silver screen since 2012’s The Guilt Trip opposite Seth Rogen.

It was a major coup for producers when they landed Barbra to play Roz in Meet the Fockers, as she hadn’t starred in a movie since 1996’s The Mirror Has Two Faces, which she also directed.

“I’m just lazy. It’s work when you go do a movie. You’ve got to get up early in the morning and put on make-up and have costume fittings. It’s a pain in the neck,” she explained in a December 2004 cast interview with Time magazine

“It was nice to be wanted. It’s happened to me very few times. I don’t know what it is, whether people are frightened of me, intimidated or what,” the Oscar winner replied when costar Teri asked what convince her to return to acting. She recalled an instance of Barbra saying on set, “Let’s go already. I wanna get home. I hate acting.”

“I didn’t want to do a whole movie. I was asked to do White Oleander, to direct and play the part of the mother, but it seemed so overwhelming. I have to give two or three years of my life to this? This was much more like a fun experiment, to see what it’s like just to act,” Barbra explained about taking on a comedic role after spending so much of her later career in dramas and directing work.

Nick Nolte and Barbra Streisand Have a ‘Special Place’ for Each Other

Barbra wrote in her 2023 memoir, My Name Is Barbra, about how she later learned that Dustin, 87, received a much higher paycheck than her for Meet the Fockers.

“On a side note, this was the first time I felt the effect of Hollywood’s unequal pay scale for men and women,” she told readers.

“I didn’t ask what the other actors were making, but I was definitely hurt when I found out that Dustin was getting three times as much as me, plus a tiny percentage, which is significant on a movie that made $520 million,” Barbra continued.

The Prince of Tides star said she was told the reason for the pay difference was because she was “the last to sign” up for doing the film. “But the only thing that made me feel better was when my dear friend Ron Meyer, who was the head of Universal, gave me a bonus … the first and only time I ever got one. I guess he, too, thought it was unfair.”