The third installment in the hit franchise arrives in theaters Sept. 8.
John Corbett is amazed by Nia Vardalos! In ET's exclusive behind-the-scenes look at My Big Fat Greek Wedding 3, the 62-year-old actor praises the actress, writer and director for her work on the upcoming film.
"She's telling the cameraman what to do, and the guy with the sound, and us actors, and she's acting also, so it's a 10-ring circus -- not a three-ring circus. I haven't seen her get close to cracking," Corbett, who plays Ian Miller, marvels. "... I don't know how she does that. I don't know how she doesn't go berserk, but she's really good at it."
The third film in the franchise, which began with the release of My Big Fat Greek Wedding in 2002, follows the Portokalos family as they travel to Greece. The "outlandish idea" to "make a movie taking the big fat Greek family to Greece" was courtesy of Vardalos, who stars as Toula Portokalos.
"We're coming back here to Greece for a special family visit, and the whole family’s coming, which is fantastic," Corbett says.
It's not quite the whole family that's coming, though, as Michael Constantine, who played patriarch Gus Portokalos in the first two films, died in 2021.
"We of course lost Michael Constantine in the same year that I lost my dad, and I decided to just channel grief through my fingertips," Vardalos explains. "It's hard for me to even speak of him in past tense, because he's so much a part of us."
While Constantine isn't in the franchise's third installment, Joey Fatone decided to honor the late actor by getting a tattoo in his memory. "We feel his energy," Fatone, who plays Angelo, says. "He's in the story, and now it's on my leg."
Though Constantine's absence was felt throughout the making of the film, reuniting with the rest of the cast was a joy for the stars.
"It's like people you go to high school with," Corbett says. "You leave home and you go back home once a year or every few years and you bump into those people, and 20 or 30 years have passed, and you just pick right up."
My Big Fat Greek Wedding 3 will hit theaters Sept. 8.
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