The comediennes costarred in the raunchy, all-female comedy in 2011, which was nominated for two Oscars.

Bridesmaids stars Kristen Wiig and Rose Byrne recall cast’s male strip club jaunt: ‘Kristen’s a party animal’

The comediennes costarred in the raunchy, all-female comedy in 2011, which was nominated for two Oscars.

By Ryan Coleman

Ryan Coleman

Ryan Coleman is a news writer for with previous work in MUBI Notebook, Slant, and the LA Review of Books.

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February 25, 2026 11:30 p.m. ET

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Kristen Wiig and Rose Byrne in 'Bridesmaids' (2011). Credit:

Suzanne Hanover/Universal

Kristen Wiig and Rose Byrne are looking back on *Bridesmaids* 15 years after it made movie history.

The beloved comediennes locked in on a PG-13 field trip when asked about on-set memories in a *Vanity Fair** *retrospective published Tuesday.

"Kristen hired a party bus for the whole cast. And we went," Byrne began.

"To a very classy place," Wiig finished. "We went to a male strip club."

Kristen Wiig and Rose Byrne in New York City in 2024.

Kristina Bumphrey/Variety via Getty

The *Barb & Star *actress also joked that it was "kind of" a research trip, which also included costars Melissa McCarthy, Maya Rudolph, Rebel Wilson, and Ellie Kemper.

Beginning to remember, Byrne exclaimed, "That’s right, there was a whole sequence!"

Wiig then fully elaborated on the extracurricular excursion as a "lesson to me of just having that experience where we all get to be together, and shooting something like that with that many women—I’d never had that experience before. Some of us had known each other for a long time, and some of us were just literally meeting. It was fun."

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An oral history of 'Bridesmaids,' one of the raunchiest rom-coms of all time

Byrne concurred: "Kristen's a party animal."

Directed by Paul Feig, *Bridesmaids *tells the story of best friends Annie (Wiig) and Lillian (Rudolph), whose close bond undergoes severe strain when the latter gets engaged, tapping the former to be her maid of honor.

Over the course of a raucous luncheon, bachelorette party, and extending even into the ceremony, Annie, Lillian, and the rest of the bridal party descend into a chaotic disorder fueled by drinking and underlying, unexpressed interpersonal tensions.

The comedy was hailed as a breakthrough for not only stacking its core characters with women, but employing a screenplay written by women (Wiig and her *Barb & Star *castmate Annie Mumolo), as well. The film picked up two Academy Award nominations, for Wiig and Mumolo's screenplay, and for McCarthy's supporting performance, but lost in both categories.

In **'s 2019 oral history of the modern classic, Feig noted that while Byrne had only done a single previous comedy, *Get Him to the Greek*, its director, Judd Apatow, encouraged him to "go down and take a look at some of her dailies." Getting Byrne and Wiig into an audition together resulted in immediate fireworks, as Feig recalled: "Just seeing the two of them together was so funny, because they were so different."

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Source: “EW Comedy”