Camila Mendes Returning for Upgraded 2 — and She’s Producing It Too

Camila Mendes is officially checking back into first class — and this time, she’s calling the shots from behind the camera too.

The 32-year-old actress is set to reprise her role as Ana Santos in Upgraded 2, the sequel to her 2024 Prime Video romantic comedy, and she’ll also serve as a producer on the project, The Hollywood Reporter revealed on Monday. Production is expected to kick off later this month in Italy, which is honestly the perfect setting for a rom-com about an ambitious young woman stumbling into a glamorous lie. (Somebody at Amazon MGM Studios knows exactly what they’re doing.)

Plot details are being kept firmly under wraps for now, but the pieces are coming together. The screenplay is being written by Luke Roberts and Justin Matthews, the same duo who penned the first film, and Becca Gleason is on board to direct the follow-up. Honor Role and Gulfstream Pictures are producing. Like the original, the sequel will be available to stream globally on Prime Video, though Amazon MGM Studios hasn’t announced a release date yet.

For anyone who somehow missed it the first time around, here’s your refresher on the original Upgraded. Mendes played Ana, a bright, eager art auction house intern whose work trip to London takes an unexpected turn when she gets bumped up to first class — literally. A handsome stranger named Will, played by Archie Renaux, mistakes her for her famously demanding boss, Claire (the always-delightful Marisa Tomei), and instead of correcting him, Ana just… goes with it. You can guess where that leads. The film landed a Certified Fresh rating of 76% on Rotten Tomatoes across 51 reviews, which, for a streaming rom-com, is no small thing.

A sequel that actually makes sense

Let’s be honest: romantic comedies on streaming services have a pretty uneven track record when it comes to sequels. For every one that works, there are three that feel like the producers just hit copy-paste on the premise and hoped nobody would notice. But Upgraded is one of those rare cases where a second chapter feels genuinely earned.

The first film left plenty of room to grow. Ana ended the story having learned some real lessons about ambition, honesty, and the difference between the career you think you want and the life that actually makes you happy. A sequel set in Italy — production is reportedly heading there this month — opens up a whole new playground. Will and Ana, established couple now? Ana navigating a bigger role in the art world while a new misunderstanding threatens to blow everything up? The original’s writers are back, which suggests they’ll be building on what made the first one charming rather than starting from scratch.

And then there’s the Mendes factor. Adding a producer credit to her name for the sequel is a real statement. She’s not just the face of the franchise — she’s helping shape it. That’s the kind of move that tends to separate the actors who are here for a long, interesting career from the ones just collecting paychecks. When a star puts their own creative stamp on a project like this, the odds of a sequel with actual substance go way up.

The streaming rom-com renaissance rolls on

Upgraded 2 arriving on Prime Video also fits a much bigger pattern. Streaming platforms have essentially become the home of the modern romantic comedy, and audiences keep showing up for them. The first Upgraded did solid numbers for Prime Video and, more importantly, generated the kind of word-of-mouth buzz that streamers live for — the “have you seen this?” chatter that no marketing budget can buy.

Amazon MGM clearly saw the potential for a franchise. Marisa Tomei’s Claire, in particular, is the kind of supporting character fans would happily follow into a dozen more movies. No casting announcements beyond Mendes have been made yet, but it’s hard to imagine a sequel working without Renaux and Tomei back in the mix. Fingers crossed the rest of the ensemble signs on — and that the sequel finds a fresh way to bring back the first-class-mistaken-identity magic without literally repeating the same plot.

The choice of Italy as a production location is another smart play. European settings are catnip for the rom-com audience — think of how much mileage the genre has gotten out of Paris, Rome, and the Amalfi Coast over the years. There’s a reason filmmakers keep going back. Italy photographs like a dream, it gives the marketing team gorgeous poster material, and it lets the story breathe outside the corporate art-world grind of the first film. If the plot involves Ana traveling for work again, the Italian setting could be the sequel’s not-so-secret weapon.

Mendes’ post-Riverdale glow-up continues

It’s worth stepping back for a second to appreciate the run Camila Mendes has been on since Riverdale wrapped. For seven seasons, she was Veronica Lodge on The CW’s gloriously unhinged teen drama — a role that made her famous but also carried the risk of typecasting her forever as the glossy, sharp-tongued queen bee. She’d be the first to admit that breaking out of that box took deliberate effort.

And she’s done it. Palm Springs, the time-loop comedy with Andy Samberg, showed she could hold her own in a smart ensemble. Dangerous Lies proved she could carry a thriller. Do Revenge, the Netflix dark comedy, let her play against type as a razor-sharp, slightly unhinged mean girl in a completely different register from Veronica. Then came Upgraded, where she anchored a classic romantic comedy with real warmth — the kind of performance that reminds you the old-fashioned movie-star leading-lady archetype never really went away, it just moved to streaming.

She also starred in Música, the 2024 Prime Video film directed by Rudy Mancuso, which drew on Brazilian music and culture in a way that felt personal — Mendes, born in Charlottesville, Virginia to Brazilian parents, has spoken often about her heritage and even spent part of her childhood in Brazil. And earlier this year, she appeared as Teela in Amazon MGM Studios’ Masters of the Universe, stepping into full-blown blockbuster territory. A rom-com sequel she also produces, a big fantasy franchise role, and a steady stream of lead parts? That’s a résumé most actors would kill for.

What stands out about Mendes’ choices is how intentional they all feel. She hasn’t chased every franchise offer or settled into one lane. Instead, she’s built a filmography that bounces between genres — comedy, thriller, fantasy, romance — while steadily taking on more creative control. The producer credit on Upgraded 2 is the latest and clearest sign of that trajectory. This isn’t just a star lending her name to a sequel. This is an actress building a body of work on her own terms.

What comes next

There’s still a lot we don’t know about Upgraded 2 — no plot synopsis, no release date, no confirmed returning cast beyond Mendes herself. But the bones are strong: the original creative team is back, the star is invested as a producer, and the film has a proven audience waiting on Prime Video. In a genre where sequels often feel like afterthoughts, this one has the makings of something that was actually planned.

For Mendes, the timing couldn’t be better. She’s riding one of the most interesting career waves of anyone in her generation of TV-to-film stars, and Upgraded 2 gives her the chance to deepen a character audiences already love while flexing new muscles behind the scenes. Ana Santos got her upgrade in the first film. Now it’s the franchise’s turn — and if anyone’s going to pull it off, it’s the woman who’s been quietly upgrading her own career for years.

Source: Just Jared