Josh O'Connor says it was "a dream come true" working with Daniel Craig on upcoming Knives Out sequel Wake Up Dead Man – and that he "really learned" from the way the "humble and charismatic" actor approached the movie.
"He's such a gentleman," O'Connor, who follows in the footsteps of Ana de Armas and Janelle Monáe as the unwitting sidekick of Craig's Benoit Blanc this time around, tells GamesRadar+. "You know, one of the things that was most surprising about making this movie – and I imagine it's the same on the other two – you really go on a journey as an audience member, but it was the same for the actors, too.
"One moment, you're doing a sort of double act with Daniel and real comedy set-pieces, and then in the next, there's a real opening of your heart," he continues, attempting to explain how he and the James Bond star established their super-fun onscreen chemistry. "And watching Daniel, I really learned from him, in the way that he can be light and playful when he needs to be, then he's got his earphones on and walking around, getting into a headspace where he can attack a scene that needs more thought or feeling.
"The way he operated at work was really inspiring to me. In terms of our double act, it was all there on the page, but [writer-director] Rian [Johnson] definitely allowed us to play around with things. There's this one particular moment, which I won't divulge, that we didn't think would ever make the movie but it did, so…"
It wouldn't be a Knives Out movie without a star-studded cast surrounding O'Connor and Craig, and Wake Up Dead Man is no different. When O'Connor's boxer-turned-priest Jud Duplenticy gets transferred to a parish in upstate New York, he immediately clashes with its congregation leader Monsignor Wicks (Josh Brolin). Despite his brutish ways, his followers are devoted; his right-hand woman Martha (Glenn Close), sardonic sci-fi author Lee (Andrew Scott), tightly-wound lawyer Vera (Kerry Washington), shallow influencer Cy (Daryl McCormack), newly-divorced town doctor Nat (Jeremy Renner), and disabled ex-cellist Simone (Simone). But when Wicks gets killed in the middle of an on-stage sermon, Blanc is quick to deduce that any one of them could've done it.
"To a certain extent, these movies are kind of mouse traps. So it's not like you can just go off and riff. But I also think that if you get a group of actors like this together, it would be stupid to not let them play," says Johnson. "I love to get together with the actors before we start shooting, and go through the scenes. 'Are any of these lines bumping?' If any actor feels like something doesn't feel right, or there's a better way of saying it, I'm always encouraging and open to that."
"Rian's very, very good at casting. I think that's really important with a film like this. So everybody was well suited to their characters," adds Andrew Scott, who plays misanthropic, moated house-owning Ross. "It's just the power of the imagination; we didn't have any rehearsal time beforehand. If it's well-cast and the script is good, that ease and chemistry just happens. [Rian] creates an atmosphere where you're all together a lot of the time; there's no retreat to our trailers and all that kind of jazz. We just hung out, all the time for months. It's lucky that we're here, still getting on with each other now that we know a lot of each other's deep, dark secrets."
Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery releases in cinemas on November 26, arriving on Netflix worldwide on December 12. For more, check out our guide to all the other upcoming movies heading our way.
