Veteran producer Jeremy Latcham admits he helped make movie comedies an endangered species. “I was at Marvel for 14 years, and I think that the superhero movie ate comedy,” Latcham tells The Daily Wire. Films like “Iron Man,” “Guardians of the Galaxy,” and “The Avengers,” all made under his watch, delivered humor, irreverence, action, and “big popcorn thrills.” The box office subsequently exploded, and “we forgot about just regular people.” Now, Latcham is bringing a comedian who personifies that sentiment to the big screen. Stand-up superstar Nate Bargatze makes his feature film debut with the family comedy “The Breadwinner.” The squeaky-clean comic stars as a husband and father who suddenly finds himself in way over his head caring for his three daughters when his wife (Mandy Moore) lands a big deal on “Shark Tank.” Now, Nate’s befuddled Dad must do the laundry, juggle school drop-offs, and more. Think “Mr. Mom” for the 21st century, based on the comedian’s wildly popular stand-up shtick. Latcham was familiar with Bargatze’s brand of clean comedy, but he didn’t realize how far his star had risen until the pandemic. Suddenly, fellow parents were sharing plans to see the Christian comic again and again, no matter how far the venue might be. “Something’s going on with this guy,” he says. That’s an understatement. Last year, Bargatze’s stand-up shows grossed $77.5 million. That’s nearly 50 percent more than Sebastian Maniscalco, his closest competition. He’s even discussing a Nateland theme park attraction. He routinely sells out arenas nationwide, all without a single swear or political talking point. His 2024 hosting gig on “Saturday Night Live” delivered one of the show’s most popular sketches — the “Washington’s Dream” sketch has more than 30 million views to date. Latcham couldn’t wait to work with him. “I want to make his first movie … introducing him to the screen is so critical,” the producer says. As luck would have it, Bargatze had pitched an idea to Sony about how to bring his Everyman persona to theaters. “’The Breadwinner’ pays homage to his stand-up and the jokes you’ve seen and loved, what would they look like writ large on the screen,” he says. Some comedians are inherently physical on stage, like Jim Carrey or Maniscalco. Bargatze doesn’t follow that blueprint. His act is more cerebral, with smaller, knowing gestures befitting his aw-shucks demeanor. Movie comedies, by comparison, demand a bigger palette. That meant Latcham watched Bargatze’s evolution up close during the production process. One sequence finds the comedian tumbling down the stairs after losing a fight with the laundry. The production had to film “pickup” reaction shots later in the shoot. “You could see the growth as an actor as he figured out how the lensing works, how the camera works,” Latcham says, adding Bargatze often did stand-up gigs on weekends while working on “The Breadwinner” from Monday through Friday. “He realized how the cinematic gear was different than the stand-up gear,” he says. Latcham left the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) to tell more down-to-earth stories. That decision was personal, but he thinks the zeitgeist is now on his side. “We’re at a tipping point when the idea of a regular person is appealing again to audiences,” he says. “We love superheroes but … there’s something equally if not more rewarding to see something you recognize in your life a little bit more.” The year’s biggest live-action hit follows a high school teacher tasked with saving humanity, “Project Hail Mary.” Superhero films have struggled of late, a problem he connects to too many TV shows and not enough high-quality yarns. “When ‘Iron Man’ came out it was a big hit because it was novel,” he says, but it’s too early to pen the genre’s obituary. “I would never ever write [superhero movies] off. It’s a beloved genre … and the new ‘Spider-Man’ movie [“Brand New Day,” opening July 31] might be the best movie Marvel has made.” “The good ones will continue to over index and the bad ones will get punished by the audience,” he adds. Latcham’s prolific resume includes more than MCU smashes. He produced the vibrant “Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves” (2023) as well as “Bad Times at the El Royale” (2018). Now, he has to navigate not just a stand-up superstar’s screen debut but an industry grappling with the AI revolution. Latcham isn’t frightened by the technology. He has faith in his fellow storytellers to wield it properly. “I think it has to be looked at as a tool set that can transform the stories you can tell and who can tell them,” he says. “There’s gonna be work flows that fold AI into a traditional actor driven, artist driven work flow that’s gonna just double what we can do.” And, yes, we’ll likely see a crush of what’s often dubbed “AI Slop” before artists get a handle on what it can deliver. And that means more than crazy car crashes and alien invasions. “Once the price of spectacle is zero, then it really comes down to storytelling, compelling characters, compelling themes, heart and humor spectacle in that order,” he says. “If you lead with heart, you end up with something great.” For now, he’s happy to bring an analog comedy to theaters. For him, it’s more than overdue. “As a father of a 10-year-old, she’s never been to a movie like this in a theater like this before,” he says. “It’s wild. I’m ready to make a lot more of them.” *** Christian Toto is an award-winning journalist, movie critic, and editor of HollywoodInToto.com. He previously served as associate editor with Breitbart News’ Big Hollywood. He’s also the host of The Hollywood in Toto Podcast. Follow him at @HollywoodInToto.