Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos recently drew the ire of the internet with his comments last week at the Times100 summit, where he called the theater system “an outdated concept” and claimed his streamer was actually “saving” the industry by delivering big-budget affairs directly to homes. One person who wildly disagrees, however, is one of the biggest-name creators in the platform’s employ — Rian Johnson. The director signed up to deliver two sequels to his wildly successful Knives Out after reaching a $400 million deal with the service back in 2021, but the downside was made clear in 2022, when Glass Onion only got a limited one-week release before being locked to the platform. With his third and potentially final installment, Wake Up Dead Man, set to premiere this year, he’s now speaking out about his desire for a much wider and longer run in theaters from Netflix.
Johnson recently sat down with Business Insider to promote Season 2 of his Peacock howcatchem series, Poker Face, and, when asked, expressed his thoughts on Sarandos‘s comments. “Obviously, I don’t agree,” he replied before taking a moment to clarify that there may be more nuance than that quote from the Netflix CEO. “I love movies. I love going to see movies. But also, I have a feeling, talking to Ted, it would be a different thing than one quote taken and kind of tossed at me in this context. So, I don’t want to phrase this as I’m having a proxy discussion with Ted right here.” Even so, he took the opposite side of Sarandos‘s comments about the global box office, pointing to the recent successes of A Minecraft Movie and Sinners as evidence that “if you put a movie people want to see in the theaters, they are going to show up for it, and that experience of being in a full house and having that experience is so important. It’s something that I love and I want more of in the world.”
At the time, Glass Onion‘s limited release was a unique deal for Netflix, which traditionally never released its films on the big screen. A similar deal with theater chains has yet to be made for another project, save for an arrangement to give Greta Gerwig‘s Narnia movie a two-week run in 2026. Proving Johnson‘s point, his luxurious sequel earned a surprising estimated haul of $15 million despite releasing in just around 600 theaters over its week on the big screen. He believes Wake Up Dead Man is similarly made for the moviegoing experience and is ready to fight to make that a reality. “I want this in as many theaters for as long as possible,” he added. “We’re going to push for everything we can get in terms of theatrical, because I want as many people as possible to see it in that form.”
Rian Johnson Isn’t Alone in Wanting ‘Wake Up Dead Man’ in Theaters
Johnson isn’t the only Knives Out team member calling for Netflix to let Benoit Blanc take on the big screen again. The super sleuth with a Southern drawl himself, Daniel Craig, has made it known on multiple occasions that he laments the sequels’ streaming-exclusive status. He most recently spoke out about the situation in Variety‘s Actors on Actors series with his Wake Up Dead Man co-star Josh O’Connor, where he highlighted the unexpected success of the first film with its $312.9 million box office haul and the widespread appeal of the murder mystery series as reasons why audiences should get the chance to see these films on the biggest screen possible.
“The first one was such a surprise, and it was a fully released film. It made lots of money and things. And, listen, I’m not knocking where it’s gone to and where it is. But it saddens me that there isn’t more of a theatrical moment for these movies. These movies seem to have a cross-generational appeal. And the idea that families go and see that movie just fills me with massive joy. It’s not just a niche movie we’re doing here — it’s for everybody. And the fact is, to have a collective experience in the cinema, blah, blah, blah. I know everybody says this, but it’s the truth.”
Wake Up Dead Man will team Craig and O’Connor up with another star-studded ensemble, including Glenn Close, Josh Brolin, Mila Kunis, Jeremy Renner, Kerry Washington, Andrew Scott, Cailee Spaeny, Daryl McCormack, and Thomas Haden Church. The plot is being kept tightly under wraps at this time, but we’ll likely learn more as the film nears its release later this year.
via Collider