Daniel Craig is back on the big screen as Detective Benoit Blanc, last of the gentleman sleuths. Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery is out today for one week only, as a special sneak preview before the film jumps to streaming. Catch it in theaters now until November 29, or you'll be forced to wait until the film premieres globally on Netflix on December 23.

In the sequel to 2019 hit Knives Out, Blanc's latest case takes him to a tech billionaire's private island, where he encounters a new cast of colorful suspects. As in all the best murder mysteries, each character harbors their own secrets, lies, and motivations, and when someone turns up dead, everyone is a suspect. Returning to the franchise he began, Academy Award-nominated filmmaker Rian Johnson wrote and directed Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery and assembled another all-star ensemble cast to star alongside Craig, including Edward Norton, Janelle Monáe, Kathryn Hahn, Leslie Odom Jr., Jessica Henwick, Madelyn Cline, Kate Hudson, and Dave Bautista.

Last week, SciFi Vision sat in on a press conference with Johnson, producer Ram Bergman, and most of the cast. Craig and Bautista were unavailable, but the rest of the gang spoke at length about what drew them to the project, the great fun they had making the movie, their love for Agatha Christie novels, and more. Read the transcript below!


***Edited for clarity and length***

GLASS ONION: A KNIVES OUT MYSTERY
Global press conference – November 14, 2022

MODERATOR: Hello everybody. My name is Josh Horowitz and welcome to this global press conference for Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery. Yes, the film, of course, is out on Netflix December 23rd; a one-week engagement in theaters, though, November 23rd, I should mention as well. This is, of course, the continuing adventures of the greatest detective in the world, Benoit Blanc, surrounded by an amazing ensemble here. I’m gonna ask some amazing questions from our journalists around the world, some mediocre questions from myself, and we’re gonna have a good time. 

So, without further ado, I’m going to introduce this amazing group: producer Ram Bergman. Madelyn Cline. Jessica Henwick. Leslie Odom, Junior. The incomparable Kathryn Hahn. The equally incomparable Edward Norton.  Kate Hudson. The one and only Janelle Monae. And writer/director/producer, the man we’re all here for, Rian Johnson. 

A couple notes before we launch in. The great Dave Bautista is filming in Poland. That’s not a euphemism, he’s actually filming in Poland, so he regrets he couldn’t be here. I also should mention there is, of course, a hole in this donut that is Daniel Craig. He sadly is feeling unwell this morning. He sends his deep regrets. He wishes he could be here. He’s here in spirit. We love our Benoit Blanc, so we will proceed. 

MODERATOR: Rian, let’s begin with you because these Knives Out mysteries begin with you. This is easy, right? Look, you did it once. Second time’s, you just put Daniel in the middle again. You cast a dozen great actors around him. It writes itself. 

RIAN JOHNSON: Piece of cake. 

MODERATOR: How challenging was this to start essentially from scratch, presumably? 

RIAN JOHNSON: Well, it was challenging but it was also, you know, when Daniel and I were making the first one, even when we were on set, we were just having such a good time. We were like, “If this does even moderately well, it’d be really fun to keep making these.” But the mode in which we were thinking to keep making them was always not to continue the story of the first one, but to treat them the way Agatha Christie treated her books and to do an entirely new mystery every time, a new location, new rogue’s gallery of characters. 

And also something Agatha Christie did that just as a fan, anyone who knows her work, she really shook it up book to book. It’s not just a change of whodunit. She was mixing genres. She was throwing crazy narrative spins that had never been done in whodunits before. She was really keeping the audience on their toes. And every single book had a whole new reason for being.

So, sitting down to write this one, that was kind of the marching orders. Let’s not just turn the crank and do another, let’s come up with something that’s truly different and that actually is gonna make audiences say, “Oh, wow. I’m getting the same pleasure I did from the first one, but I’ve never seen this before.” And that’s the exciting thing. 

MODERATOR: The setting is obviously much different than beautiful New England this time around. Talk to me a little bit about how much, were you searching for a setting that was going with the thematics you were wrestling with in the script? Or did you spin a globe and say, “This looks right”? Like, give me a sense of how you landed where you did. 

RIAN JOHNSON: Well, there are few things. I mean, first of all, it was, like I mentioned, just wanting this to be a whole different movie and signaling to the audience really clearly up front. So, trading the browns of New England for the blue and yellows of Greece felt like a really obvious kind of “Oh, we’re in a whole new deal here.” Also, as much as there’s a rich tradition of murder mysteries in cozy English or, in our case, New English countryside houses, there’s very much a rich vein of tradition of destination murders. Evil Under the Sun, Death on the Nile, The Last of Sheila, which is one of my favorite films. There’s something to draw from in terms of the vacation mystery and so tapping into that.

Also, I wrote the script in 2020 in the middle of lockdown. So, like a lot of us, I was sitting at home kind of wishing I was on a Greek island. So that might have had something to do with it. 

MODERATOR: It does seem like a relatively easy ask for the actors assembled here: work with Rian Johnson and with Daniel Craig, go to Greece. This checks a lot of good boxes. 

EDWARD NORTON: It was more of a bless you forever.

MODERATOR: Okay. Who among here chased Rian? Who did Rian have to chase? 

RIAN JOHNSON: I chased all of you. 

JANELLE MONAE: I manifested this. 

KATE HUDSON: I chased Rian. 

MODERATOR: Did you? 

KATE HUDSON: I did. 

MODERATOR: Kate, how did it happen? How does that happen? How does it happen for an actor that wants to work with a filmmaker? What did you do? 

KATE HUDSON: Sorry, Ram. I was slipped the script [laugh] and we knew that this part was going to be cast. And I was like, “Get me in the room.”  And Rian said, “Sure, come on in the room. Let’s see what you can do with Birdie.” And I did my best, and that best seemed to find me here. 

MODERATOR: How do you begin to approach casting an ensemble like this? Because there’s a domino effect. They all have to work well with each other, feel like the right group. I don’t know. Is it like a board in Seven where you have a lot of string and faces linked up? Or what are you doing? 

RIAN JOHNSON: No. I mean, a little bit, but not really, though. It is kind of as simple as trying to get the best actors you can possibly get. And we got really lucky that we did that with this. 

I mean, my head spins when I think about the fact that we were able to get this group together. There’s also the added elements of it’s a little bit like throwing a dinner party in that it is an ensemble. We know we’re gonna be on location together and all be kind of stuck together for a while. So, you’re also just trying to cast cool people who are hopefully gonna get along and have a good time together.

MODERATOR: You guys seems to actually get along pretty well on and off the set. Talk to me a little bit about when this group first got assembled. Do you remember, was there a table read? Was there a moment, a get together, like let’s all meet each other? 

JANELLE MONAE: Was it Daniel’s house? 

KATHRYN HAHN: It was Daniel’s. Yeah. 

JANELLE MONAE: Yeah, in Greece. 

KATE HUDSON: And Daniel’s house, it was almost like walking into, you know, it was an entrance. You had to walk down these steps. 

EDWARD NORTON: Past the helicopter pad.

KATE HUDSON: [laugh] So every time a new cast member came down the steps, it was like, “Oh, here comes Janelle Monae,” you know? So, it was a real meeting. But it was great. That was fun. I feel like we all immediately just were, like, had known each other forever, immediately. 

EDWARD NORTON: Daniel in a salmon-colored linen shirt with espadrilles serving cocktails. 

MODERATOR: Was this Daniel or Benoit? 

EDWARD NORTON: Daniel. 

KATE HUDSON: Daniel. 

MODERATOR: Oh, wow. 

EDWARD NORTON: There’s a lot more Benoit in Daniel than that other franchise thing he does. 

KATHRYN HAHN: [laugh] But there really had to be, going back to his throwing a dinner party metaphor, which is so true, a real sense of ego-lessness on the part of all of these humans. Because we really did get to and have to spend every single day really together, it felt like there was a backstage and an onstage. We had these holding areas where we were kind of all together. We ate lunches together for the most part. It felt very much like we were in a theater ensemble. Leslie was talking about this last night, and he knows from theater ensembles. And, Rian, you also used the word “grace,” which I think really applied to this experience as well.

He was able to find a group of humans that had that. That is really rare, a group of people that was able to just be there for the thing. And also starting with Daniel, who had been through it before and was there with such a welcoming generosity of spirit for every single person to be able to -- like, there were so many shots where the camera was on one person, but if you turned it around to see the rest of us all crowded around behind the camera for someone's reaction shot to all be there was pretty remarkable and hilarious and just a great metaphor for the spirit of the thing which came from, of course, Rian and from Daniel and Ram. 

MODERATOR: By the way we're not gonna get into spoilers 'cause there are a lotta fun, cool spoilers in this film. But invariably, these giant group conversation scenes – of which there's a lot in this film, through the entire cast or much of the cast – that’s a bear sometimes for a filmmaker to shoot and for the actors. You're turning it around a thousand different ways. “Okay, let's get this reaction, this reaction.” How do you keep spirits up? Or is it, “Oh, I've cast the right group, they're gonna entertain each other.” How do you make that work? 

RIAN JOHNSON: It was the right gang of people, it was the right gang of people. And also, the supportiveness, which Kathryn just touched on. I mean, it was people just clapping for each other after they did their monologues and people just truly supporting. And with a group of actors, all of whom can and have carried their own films, to come together as a true ensemble and to come together, not just so it works on the screen, but so that spirit is really infused on set. That's that word grace, all these people have it. It was really fun to be a part of. 

MODERATOR: Leslie, could you speak to what Kathryn was referencing? Did that surprise you, that theatrical kind of spirit? Did it immediately, when you got on set, you're like, “Oh wait, I recognize what this feels like in a surprising but great way?” 

LESLIE ODOM, JR.: Oh yeah. I mean, I think, yes. I've had a couple opportunities to be a part of great ensembles with Hamilton and One Night in Miami. And this is, yeah, this is one of the best. But it's really an impossible thing, I think, to achieve without the leadership. It happens from the top down. You really can't lead from the rear or from the bottom of the call sheet, as it were, or the middle of the call sheet. It's really Rian and Daniel and Ram making it feel that creative and that permissive and that fun. So yeah, I felt it. Yeah. 

MODERATOR: Let's do one of our first questions from our journalists that have submitted questions. This is from Indonesia, the SINDOnews, for all our actors here. When you were first reading the script, who did you think was going to die first? [laugh] And why? Obviously, no spoilers here. 

But I guess the broader question is, are you good at reading, predicting mysteries? Who here can see it coming?

KATHRYN HAHN: I thought I could, but I really was surprised. I also, just a sidebar note to say when I'm talking about the ensemble, there are no spoilers here. There are some humans on the stage that had, while the rest of us were having a great ensemble amount of fun, had to do some pretty serious heavy lifting. So, I just wanna, no spoiler, say those humans, I also think the rest of us would be remiss not to just give a spoiler free. Just like, there's -- 

RIAN JOHNSON: What are you saying? 

KATHRYN HAHN: Nothing! I'm just saying  we all have mad respect for each other.

MODERATOR: We are down a rabbit hole. [laugh] If you can decode that mystery, you will decode this mystery.

KATHRYN HAHN: You'll know after you see it, and then you'll keep it to yourselves. 

EDWARD NORTON: Just based on the flow of this conversation so far, you'll probably understand when I say, when I was reading it, I knew that Kathryn would not get who was the murderer. 

KATHRYN HAHN: [laugh] But then I did. 

EDWARD NORTON: I was on page 40. I thought, “Hahn is completely going for the red herring.” 

KATHRYN HAHN: He knew that before I was even cast, which is weird. 

MODERATOR: That's a classic Hahn move, yeah. Edward, since we're talking, I'm the world's greatest Death to Smoochy fan. Anytime you do some comedy, I'm in. And this is a great role for you. Did you feel like you had license to go to some extreme fun places with Miles? 

EDWARD NORTON: When someone like Rian Johnson calls and says, “I'm basically gonna run a summer camp for deeply unserious people and I need people who are willing to ham it up.”  You know, it was printed in the invite. But I do think when you're with a group of people and it becomes apparent that the words “repetitive” and “boring” have never been applied to any of them, it's a lot of fun. We've talked about it a lot, we've said it.

But I think the experience of a summer theater troupe is kind of in -- For a lot of us who came into this through theater or just that idea of being in a repertory company, an ensemble, it has a special pleasure. It reminds you of your high school drama club, for those of who were dorky enough to be in the high school drama club. But you know, there's a funny irony to making films or doing theater, which is it's a bunch of adults playing dress up and pretending to be other people. And it's kind of amazing how much seriousness we layer over that in so many of the things we do. So, when you strip that off of it, and I'm not saying, obviously this is a hardworking bunch of people but I think when you liberate yourself from any pretention [laugh] to be doing anything other but entertaining the audience, entertaining yourselves, entertaining each other, it's incredibly wonderful. And after a year and a half in your pajamas, it's especially great. 

MODERATOR: Janelle, again, I'm not gonna say too much but you deliver an amazing performance in this film and it's unlike anything we've seen you do before, which is always the goal for any actor. 

JANELLE MONAE: Thank you. I call it a B-side to Moonlight. 

MODERATOR: That's right. Perfect double feature right there. But talk to me. Look, Andi is kind of on the outs with this group of old friends, these disruptors. But it sounds like you didn't decide to go method and be the outsider in this group. If anything, you were almost like a team leader, it sounds like. 

JANELLE MONAE: No, I am a fan of everybody on this stage. I think that being able to work with Rian is a dream. I literally just told myself if I ever had the opportunity, it's a yes. And then after reading this script, it was a hell yes because this is a character that you get to play with. So many layers, so mysterious. It took a lot of focus.

There were moments where the cast was out having a blast after they did their scenes. And maybe I was in a corner upset, jealous, mad? No. No, no, no, I wasn't. We had murder mystery parties outside of filming a murder mystery. We're in Greece, what can I complain about? I got an opportunity to grow as an actor, I got an opportunity to also gain what I like to say [is a] family. Yeah. 

MODERATOR: So, Jessica, when you walk into a murder mystery party and Janelle Monae is in full costume, are you like, “What rabbit hole have I dived into? Or is the greatest job ever?” 

JESSICA HENWICK: It was amazing. Janelle, it was a guaranteed serve. If Janelle was coming to dinner, it was gonna be a look and everybody else was underdressed. I don't even know how you had the time to go find those costumes in Serbia. Like, where were you going? Did you go to [Smizla?] 

JANELLE MONAE: Well, I packed. I packed.  I traveled; I have one suitcase of just murder mystery, just in case I get invited to a murder mystery party. 

JESSICA HENWICK: Props. [laugh] 

EDWARD NORTON: There are very few people in the modern world who travel with one of those old-fashioned armoire chests -- 

RIAN JOHNSON: Steamer trunk. 

EDWARD NORTON: -- that open into a full three compartment closet. 

JANELLE MONAE: As you can see, we were so not serious the entire time filming this.

MODERATOR: Madelyn, what's the call like when you finally find out you get a role like this? Because this is a big moment for any actor and for a young actor in their career to get to be a part of this ensemble. 

MADELYN CLINE: So okay. I was landing in New York and you know when you get close enough to the ground when everybody's phones start pinging? And I got a message from Rian. He was like, “Would you have time for a call?” And I panicked. I was like, “He's gonna tell me I didn't get it.” [laugh] And so I said, “In an hour.” [laugh] I had to prepare myself. Then I was like, “Wait. No, no, that's stupid. Yes, of course.”

And so, I was huddled in a corner at baggage claim 'cause it was so loud and Rian was over the phone asking me if I wanted to be a part of it. I was like, “You're asking, is that even a question? Of course, I do.” And then I proceeded to, like, have the best weekend of my life and cheers to that. It was amazing.

EDWARD NORTON: She's a lot younger than the rest of us and she hasn't learned yet that if you don't get it, you hear from the Israeli producer. [clears throat] “Do you have time to talk for a minute?”

KATE HUDSON: Yeah. You rarely get a call saying you don't get it from anyone involved in the production. 

MADELYN: [laugh] You're forbidden from this role. [laugh] 

JANELLE MONAE: Rian's so sweet. I would think Rian, would you ever call anybody and be like, so -- he's such a sweetheart just in general. I feel like he would be like, “You know what? This person deserves a nice call to let them down.” 

MODERATOR: Ram, what are the biggest challenges of a production like this, besides making sure the cast actually is acting and not participating in murder mystery parties?

RAM BERGMAN: Honestly, just make sure none of them got COVID. Other than that, my life was pretty easy. I mean, you got Rian, you got Daniel, you got amazing cast. You just stayed out of the way, make sure they do their thing and that's it. 

KATE HUDSON: Ram is playing this down. Ram was really, you were busting your ass trying to make sure that everybody was staying in place. [laugh] 

KATHRYN HAHN: Spies, hired spies.

KATE HUDSON: Yeah. You were amazing and we got through it without one shutdown, yes. 

MODERATOR: Amazing. Let's talk a little bit, even though he couldn't be here with us, the great Daniel Craig as Benoit Blanc. Of course, doesn't happen without him. I don't know, if I was on set, I would just want him to do the voice, do the voice, keep talking. Because it just makes me happy to hear him talk as Benoit. When you first heard him speak in that unique Benoit Blanc vernacular -- 

KATE HUDSON: Yeah. It kind of lifts the veil. Like, “Oh shit, I'm actually here. I'm in a Knives Out mystery.” For me, I think just watching Daniel work was a privilege and he's a consummate professional. I mean, he shows up ready to deliver every line. He honors Rian's words and he brings something just spectacular, as any movie star would. Just to be a part of that and to learn from that and to watch was, for me, really something. 

KATHRYN HAHN: His physical comedy too, I was just floored by. Just his use of, his control of his body and how he throws himself into this part physically is something that I was so excited to watch. He really is a gamer in that department, it's really thrilling. 

MODERATOR: It's funny you say that. When I saw the film a second time, there's a small moment where he's running towards the pool. And I'm like, “That is not James Bond running.” That is acting right there, 'cause that man knows how to run, I know that for a fact. 

EDWARD NORTON: No, James Bond is acting. Blanc is Daniel.

MODERATOR: That's the Daniel Craig run? I wanna talk about what may be the greatest fashion ensemble I've seen also. I mean, every costume in this so reflects your characters so particularly, so uniquely. Who has bragging rights? Who had the best wardrobe, you think? 

RIAN JOHNSON: Definitely Kathryn, right? 

KATHRYN HAHN: Yeah. [laugh] 

RIAN JOHNSON: Yeah. [laugh] 

KATE HUDSON: Yes. 

EDWARD NORTON: Actually, in the wardrobe thing, you know, they often have the Polaroids up of everybody who's been in before you. And I came in pretty late and I hadn't met anybody. And I looked at the Polaroid wall and thought, “This movie's gonna be pretty funny.” Like, I did, you know. And I saw Bautista in the crocodile skin bikini and I thought there's at least one really good laugh in this film.

KATE HUDSON: My favorite was every time someone would walk into the green room, if it was a new costume, it'd be like, oh my God. Like, and then every time Kathryn walked in with a new beige. It was so damn funny. 

KATHRYN HAHN: All the rage, the beige. 

KATE HUDSON: It was so deeply funny. And that is the genius of Rian's writing. But [Costume Designer] Jenny Eagan, talk about knowing how to create each iconic look, and it just was so dreamy. And the fittings. I think, for all of us, after talking about it so much, when we walked into Jenny's fitting, immediately you saw your character come to life. It was like stepping right into the character and, at least for Birdie, it was like looking at Birdie's closet. It was insane. 

KATHRYN HAHN: So fun. 

KATE HUDSON: But everybody, I think, had that, and Jenny was a real dream to work with. 

MODERATOR: Leslie, I'm curious. This is a group that plays a group of disrupters. Who among your castmates here would you consider the greatest disrupter? Who stirs the pot the most, in the best possible way? 

LESLIE ODOM, JR.: It's probably a toss-up between Janelle and Kathryn, for me. Right? I mean, super disruptive. Listen to that laugh. 

JANELLE MONAE: It's definitely Kathryn, hands-down. 

LESLIE ODOM, JR.: This one's disruptive. 

KATHRYN HAHN: I'm flattered to be in the same sentence with you, Janelle. 

EDWARD NORTON: I think we should be nuanced here. There's disrupters, and there's disruptive. 

MODERATOR: [laugh] There's a reason why Edward and Kathryn are furthest apart on this [stage].

KATHRYN HAHN: Yeah, why are they keeping us so far apart? 

MODERATOR: [Edward], did you model Miles on any current billionaires? 

EDWARD NORTON: What's amazing, Rian and I have been talking about this a lot, the list of people it could be grows longer every day. [laugh] And even some of the ones we might not have thought were candidates have proved themselves to be just in recent weeks. 

I said to Rian, I think that it's sort of like Carly Simon's song, "You're so vain, you'll probably think this song is about you." I think that there's a lot of tech illuminati who probably will and should think that it's in reference to them. Men and women. 

MODERATOR: Yes. We learn a little bit more of the personal life, the background, a little bit, of Benoit in this one. Are there character bibles, mini stories that you provide each of your actors, or is it kind of all in the page, what you tell them? 

RIAN JOHNSON: Not really, no. I mean, I think we probably all had conversations kinda separately. To me, it's all just about what do they need. But for me, the characters are very much created in the context of the story that's on the page, and anything anyone needs beyond that, I'm happy to make shit up. And the same with Benoit Blanc. It's not like Daniel and I have a whole backstory bible. And in fact, we kinda purposefully try to remind ourselves with these movies that the movie is not interesting because you wanna know more about Benoit Blanc. The movie's interesting because of the mystery and the ensemble, and the detective plays his role in the center of that, in solving it. But the notion of doing some backstory for him or something? Yeah, it's all about the mystery. 

MODERATOR: So, does anyone here share the passion and love of the Agatha Christie stories, this genre, that Rian does? Did anybody have long-standing affection for this genre prior to this? 

LESLIE ODOM, JR.: When I grew up, it was a weekly thing. You know, it was Murder, She Wrote and Perry Mason, and my parents were still watching Columbo and Baretta, you know what I mean? So, I have sort of warm and fuzzy memories around a weekly murder and a person that you have a real affection for getting to the bottom of it. 

JANELLE MONAE: I just like murder mystery parties. 

KATE HUDSON: Yeah, me too. [laugh] 

JANELLE MONAE: Hosting them, dressing up. A werewolf is one of my favorites, and assassin is another. And I'm a villager, and I'm not. Really. 

MODERATOR: Who is the easiest mark? Like, who is the one that you could see right through their story? In the murder mystery context. 

RIAN JOHNSON: I mean, Bautista was pretty bad at it. Dave was pretty bad. Because he's such an open soul. Yeah. 

KATE HUDSON: He's so vulnerable and available that you're like, "Oh, he could never be a spy." 

EDWARD NORTON: And it's ridiculous, but he is the least violent person of all of us. I think he's probably the gentlest person and could crush all of us at the same time. 

MODERATOR: In the context of our conversation, this is probably the hardest question to ask, but I'll ask it 'cause it was sent in from the Philippines, GMA News Online. Can the cast share the funniest, most memorable blooper from the shoot? Feels like that was nonstop, but what stands out? 

RIAN JOHNSON: This is not a blooper, but we shot a little thing that we then ended up using, which was in this basement bar in Belgrade, at the very end of our shooting day, so it was like one in the morning. Was it Moonage Daydream you guys did? 

JANELLE MONAE: Oh, my god, yes. [laugh]

RIAN JOHNSON: So, it was Janelle singing and Edward playing guitar. And Kate and Kathryn dancing on the side like go-go dancers. To Bowie's Moonage Daydream. 

JANELLE MONAE: 'Cause I had covered it years back. 

EDWARD NORTON: We were trying to think of things that they might've done in the bar when it was good, when, like, we're bonding. 

JANELLE MONAE: To show the deep connection. 

EDWARD NORTON: And I knew that Janelle and I have a Bowie uber fandom, and I knew she had covered Moonage Daydream in shows, but not recorded. Then we got talking about that. Then we threw out the idea, what if there was an open mic night back in The Glass Onion bar back in the day? And Rian indulged us with two takes. I know someone at Gibson, and Gibson rushed me a replica of Mick Ronson's Black Beauty Les Paul.  So yeah, we actually had the guitar. But Rian cut it. Let's be clear. Rian cut it.

RIAN JOHNSON: I almost never wanna show it. 'Cause it's such an incredible memory of just this surreal late night, the best concert in the world for like seven people standing around in a basement bar in Belgrade. It's so romantic, I almost wanna burn the footage. [laugh] 

EDWARD NORTON: We're working it into Janelle's next tour.

JANELLE MONAE: Yes. 

MODERATOR: Janelle, how would you characterize Edward as a singing partner?

EDWARD NORTON: I wasn't singing. I was playing. 

MODERATOR: Oh, you were playing the guitar. 

JANELLE MONAE: No, he's a great guitarist. Rhythm guitarist. No, he was great. We were backstage, green room. When he gets into anything he's doing, he's gonna take it serious. He was like, "All right, Janelle, we need to rehearse." And I'm like, "Listen. Give me a couple beers, let's do this." 

EDWARD NORTON: She's like, "Okay. Okay, amateur." 

JANELLE MONAE: [laugh] Well, he's great. 

EDWARD NORTON: I have a, well, it's not a blooper, but Daniel did a thing. I asked him what drink he'll have, and Blanc said, "What do you have?" And I said, "Well, I have everything." And I think he ad-libbed this, 'cause it's not in the script, right? He goes, "Oh, well, in that case, I'll have a Chateau le Cristo pastis, s'il vous plait." Then he immediately laughed and he turned and he said, "Did I go too far?" And we were like, "Don't change a thing." I found the clip, so I've made Daniel saying, "I'll have a Chateau le Cristo pastis, s'il vous plait" as my ring tone for him. 

MODERATOR: We talked about all these great ensemble moments, these large group scenes. Who gave the best reaction shots?  

RIAN JOHNSON: Oh, jeez. This is gonna be a cheat, but everybody for different reasons. I mean, I feel like you could always cut to anybody in this room. I will say, first of all, Maddy always was doing something hilarious in the background of every single shot. And then after I was editing and staring at this footage for months, I would realize, there's a whole thought and intent. She's playing a whole joke that's a whole other screenplay in the background. 

It's incredible, yeah. It's amazing. Also, though, I love Kate’s reaction shots because you had the best descriptor of how you played your part, which is, you said Birdie understands every third word. And if you watch her listening and reacting? Incredible. So good. 

KATE HUDSON: Sort of there and kind of not. 

JANELLE MONAE: A three-second delay.

KATE HUDSON: But you know what? Can I add to this? 

JANELLE MONAE: Ten-second delay. 

KATE HUDSON: Because this was the most fun. There were times when we would be sitting there, and it would literally just be a reaction. Rian would go to each one of us and it would be like, "And scream." And you're like, "Aagh." And we'd all have to just do the reaction. And then I remember Leslie and Kathryn were like, "Was that okay?" "Oh, yeah, no, that was great." And then it was someone else's turn. And so, the reaction shots were actually, we were all there cheerleading each other. 

MODERATOR: This is from Mary Sue in the United States of America, for Rian. You have mastered the modern art of telling a murder mystery. What has been your favorite thing of bringing a new audience into this type of story? You've really helped bring back this genre that you love so much. That's got to be a source of pride. 

RIAN JOHNSON: I feel like we've kind of rode a beautiful wave of people rediscovering these, which has been really nice with a lot of other great filmmakers bringing them to life. As a whodunit junkie myself, it makes me really happy. 

And then what makes me the happiest, I guess, I mentioned Agatha Christie's books but those movies that were based on her books in the late '70s and early '80s, when I was a kid watching those with my family, just remembering how big of an impact they had. And now the coolest thing for me is talking to friends who have kids around that age, and seeing them get into these movies and recognizing, oh, that's what we made these for. And it's super, super cool that they can inspire whoever's gonna, 30 years from now, do their own version of it. That makes me really happy. 

EDWARD NORTON: But can I say, with all love for every version of it, I think a lot of what we've seen is reheated beans in a way. And I think the reason that Knives Out was so much fun is that Rian has done, as he pointed out, what Agatha Christie was doing which is actually weaving it into the zeitgeist of the moment. He's found a way to have all the fun of the convention and the mechanisms and the traditions but laced through with jokes about how no one can remember what country Marta's from, and an alt-right cousin. And I think anything, you can see the times you're living in and characters who represent the foibles of our moment, gives it that extra thing. And I think in this, maybe even more abundantly so, but I think to take something and make sure that it's for the audience, that it's of the moment that they're living in, I think that's not trying to revitalize the old trope and the old costumes. Because then it's kind of like someone observed once, that if something's opaque, you watch it in a different way. If something's transparent -- 

MODERATOR: The museum piece as opposed to an alive thing, yeah. 

EDWARD NORTON: Yeah, exactly. If you can see through a thing and see yourself and your moment in it, you enjoy it more, I think. Or relate to it more. And I think Rian has pulled that off very uniquely within this rekindled affection for the form. 

MODERATOR: You're two for two. Here's to many more Benoit Blanc mysteries. Thank you for this one. The Glass Onion is, as you can tell, these guys had a decent time, and you'll have an even better time watching it. 

The movie has a one-week engagement in theaters November 23rd, and on Netflix, it's gonna be everywhere December 23rd. My thanks to this amazing cast, to Ram, to Rian. Thanks for the time today.