Wake Up Dead Man: Josh Brolin says the new Benoit Blanc mystery is more like Knives Out than Glass Onion

Earlier this year, writer/director Rian Johnson got his latest film Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery – which, as you can glean from the title, is indeed the latest installment in the series of murder mysteries that Johnson began with Knives Out in 2019 and continued with Glass Onion in 2022 – through production. At the heart of these films is private investigator Benoit Blanc, played by Daniel Craig, and Johnson always surrounds him with an impressive cast. This time around, Craig’s co-stars include Josh Brolin (No Country for Old Men), Josh O’Connor (Challengers), Glenn Close (Dangerous Liaisons), Mila Kunis (Black Swan), Jeremy Renner (The Hurt Locker), Kerry Washington (Scandal), Andrew Scott (All of Us Strangers), Cailee Spaeny (Alien: Romulus), Daryl McCormack (Good Luck to You, Leo Grande), and Thomas Haden Church (Spider-Man 3). During a panel at the New York Comic Con, Brolin said working on Wake Up Dead Man was one of his favorite jobs and that the movie is more like Knives Out than Glass Onion.

People reports that Brolin started out by saying he loved both of the previous movies. “I loved the acting in both of them. I preferred the first one, and the third one felt more like the first one. [Rian] doesn’t come off as this, but he has this incredible control over his set. You know, he just has a major presence that reminds me of Denis [Villeneuve, Dune and Sicario director], that reminds me of the Coens [directors of No Country for Old Men, True Grit, and Hail, Caesar!], that reminds me of those types of directors. And he’s a great writer.“

Speaking of the script, Brolin said he read it and “I was just like, ‘God, this is so well written. We just don’t read things like this anymore.’” As for the cast and his character, “It turned out that it was a cast, a lot of people who I had worked with, a lot of people who I loved and hadn’t met yet, like Andrew Scott and Josh O’Connor, and people like that. Then doing it turned out, I mean, still one of my favorite jobs that I’ve ever had. I can’t say what I played. It scared me, which I wanted to be scared.“

Glenn Close has also told People that working on Wake Up Dead Man was “truly one of the best experiences of my life.“

Like Glass Onion, Wake Up Dead Man will be released through the Netflix streaming service. Here’s the logline: Benoit Blanc returns in his most dangerous case yet. We know the actors had a great time with it, so here’s hoping that viewers will as well.