50 Fun Facts About Knives Out

Who wrote and directed Knives Out and both of its sequels?

He first conceived the film after finishing Brick in 2005 and finally wrote it after coming off Star Wars: The Last Jedi.

Who plays the detective Benoit Blanc?

He initially turned the part down because of No Time to Die, then a three-month delay on the Bond film freed him up.

What is the name of the wealthy mystery novelist whose death Blanc investigates in Knives Out?

Johnson borrowed the surname from a 1981 Choose Your Own Adventure book, Who Killed Harlowe Thrombey?

Which veteran actor plays the dead novelist at the centre of Knives Out, in one of his final film roles?

He described Harlan as a 'stern, bright and rough-hewn' father with a crass sense of humour.

Who plays Marta Cabrera, Harlan's nurse?

Johnson worried she was too beautiful for the underdog part until her audition; she nearly turned it down because the character description sounded clichéd.

What physical reaction does Marta have whenever she tells a lie?

So she gives the police answers that are accurate but incomplete, and the tell is what finally traps the killer.

Which Marvel star plays Harlan's spoiled grandson Ransom Drysdale?

Johnson wanted his Captain America goodwill as 'ammunition' against the audience, and Evans signed on partly because they were filming near his Massachusetts home.

Who plays Linda Drysdale, Harlan's daughter and the family's self-made matriarch?

Curtis said she related to Linda being reduced to her privilege as the daughter of someone famous.

Who plays Joni Thrombey, the lifestyle-guru widow of Harlan's late son?

Collette said her main goal was finding the humour in Joni; the character's daughter Meg is played by Katherine Langford.

Who plays Walt Thrombey, Harlan's youngest son who runs the family publishing house?

Shannon never auditioned; he was hired after an arranged lunch with Johnson.

Which puppeteer and director, the voice of Yoda, plays Harlan's lawyer Alan Stevens?

He reads the will that leaves everything to Marta, stunning the assembled Thrombeys.

How does Harlan actually die?

He does it to protect Marta after she believes she gave him a fatal morphine dose; in fact she had grabbed the correct vial by feel.

When Ransom finally lunges at Marta with a knife from Harlan's collection, what happens?

The 'Wheel of Knives' throne behind him was the art department's most daunting prop, and the script never explained why Harlan owned it.

What is written on Harlan's mug that Marta sips from on the balcony in the final shot?

The shot signals that under the slayer rule she keeps everything, because she never actually killed anyone.

Blanc tells Marta he suspected her early on because of what clue?

He lets her innocence prove itself, because every ethical choice she makes wrecks Ransom's frame-up.

Knives Out is named after a song by which band?

Johnson admitted the film has nothing to do with the song; the phrase had just stuck in his head as a good murder-mystery title.

Where was Knives Out mostly filmed?

Interiors were shot at Ames Mansion in Borderland State Park, and the production earned a $10 million state tax credit.

Under what working title was Knives Out shot?

Another Radiohead song, naturally; filming began on October 30, 2018 in Maynard, Massachusetts.

Which Southern voices did the actor playing Blanc study, via C-SPAN and The Civil War, for the accent?

He worked with a dialect coach for two to three hours a day; Johnson's first idea for Blanc had been 'a Hercule Poirot clone'.

Johnson named the Knives Out characters after what?

Joni Mitchell, Richard Thompson and Steely Dan's Donald Fagen all lent their names.

Who composed the orchestral score for Knives Out, recorded at Abbey Road?

He is Rian Johnson's cousin, and it was his first large-scale orchestral score after years of small ensembles.

Knives Out received a single Academy Award nomination. In which category?

It also picked up three Golden Globe nominations and grossed $312 million on a $40 million budget.

Which studio distributed Knives Out to US cinemas in November 2019?

MRC financed the $40 million budget and partnered with Lionsgate, which was recovering from a poor year at the box office.

How much did Netflix reportedly pay in 2021 for the rights to two Knives Out sequels?

It outbid Amazon and Apple; a losing bidder called the deal 'mind-boggling'.

Who plays the tech billionaire Miles Bron in Glass Onion?

Ethan Hawke appears briefly as his assistant, credited only as 'Efficient Man'.

On which Greek island was Glass Onion filmed in the summer of 2021?

Johnson wrote it during lockdown, craving travel; the cast lived together at the Amanzoe villa in what he called 'a summer vacation where we also made a movie'.

Who plays twin sisters Andi and Helen Brand in Glass Onion?

Helen, an Alabama schoolteacher, poses as her dead sister at the party to help Blanc investigate.

What is the name of Miles Bron's supposedly revolutionary, and actually dangerous, hydrogen fuel?

Helen finally throws a lump of it on a bonfire, blowing up the mansion and the Mona Lisa with it.

Which priceless artwork does Miles have on loan in his glass onion, and lose in the finale?

The switch for its safety enclosure is modelled on the Beatles' 'The Fool on the Hill'.

How does Miles kill Duke Cody in Glass Onion?

Duke was deathly allergic; he'd tried to blackmail Miles after seeing a news report about Andi's death.

Who plays Duke Cody, the men's-rights streamer, in Glass Onion?

Johnson phoned him out of the blue and encouraged him to audition.

Which British actor cameos as Phillip, Benoit Blanc's domestic partner, in Glass Onion?

Johnson said revealing Blanc as gay 'did not feel like a big decision' and came naturally from showing his home life.

Glass Onion is dedicated to two of its cameo stars who died before its release. Who?

Both appear as themselves in a Zoom game of Among Us alongside Natasha Lyonne and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

Glass Onion is named after a song by which band?

Johnson wanted a title meaning something hidden in plain sight, searched his phone for songs with 'glass' in them, and the song plays over the credits.

Miles Bron's friend group in Glass Onion call themselves what?

Their invitations arrive as intricate puzzle boxes; Blanc, who was not invited by Miles at all, solves the party's murder game in seconds.

Wake Up Dead Man is set against the death of a priest at a parish in which US state?

Johnson chose a 'grounded' setting on purpose to subvert expectations of another lavish destination.

Who plays Father Jud Duplenticy, the boxer-turned-priest who becomes Blanc's ally in Wake Up Dead Man?

Critics singled out O'Connor and Craig for the strongest performances in the film.

Who plays the firebrand Monsignor Jefferson Wicks in Wake Up Dead Man?

He and Thomas Haden Church joined the cast a month after the rest, in June 2024.

Who plays Martha Delacroix, the devout church secretary in Wake Up Dead Man?

Mila Kunis plays the police chief and Kerry Washington the lawyer Vera Draven.

In Wake Up Dead Man, what is the murder weapon found in Monsignor Wicks's back?

Jud had drunkenly stolen an identical finial from a bar the day before, which makes him the prime suspect.

What is 'Eve's Apple' in Wake Up Dead Man?

Reverend Prentice Wicks converted his fortune into it and then swallowed it; it ends up hidden inside the church's new crucifix.

Wake Up Dead Man takes its title from a song by which band?

Johnson said the phrase really comes from the folk song 'Ain't No More Cane on the Brazos', but the film series follows a pattern of British-and-Irish rock titles.

Which frequent collaborator of the director plays Trooper Wagner, Derol and Nikolai across the three films?

Joseph Gordon-Levitt is the other regular, with voice cameos as Detective Hardrock, the Hourly Dong clock and a baseball announcer.

Which 1973 mystery about a murder game on a rich man's yacht did Rian Johnson cite as Glass Onion's key influence?

It was co-written by Stephen Sondheim and Anthony Perkins, which is one reason Sondheim got a cameo.

Where did Wake Up Dead Man have its world premiere in September 2025?

All three Blanc films premiered at Toronto before their releases.

Which detective-fiction author's film adaptations did Johnson credit as his childhood inspiration for the series?

He modelled the star-packed casting on the Peter Ustinov Poirot films Death on the Nile and Evil Under the Sun.

What was the production budget of Knives Out?

Shooting ran from October to December 2018 and the film went on to gross $312 million worldwide.

Which legal principle would strip Marta of her inheritance if she confessed to killing Harlan?

It bars a killer from profiting from a victim's estate, which is why the family pressures her.

Knives Out was which numbered collaboration between cinematographer Steve Yedlin and Rian Johnson?

The two storyboarded the film's compositions together before shooting began.

What Rotten Tomatoes approval rating did Knives Out hold as of 2025?

Metacritic scored it 82 out of 100, and it earned three Golden Globe nominations plus one Oscar nod.