"The Menu" stars Anya Taylor-Joy, Nicholas Hoult, John Leguizamo, Aimee Carrero and Hong Chau discuss their new hilarious thriller in this interview with CinemaBlend's Corey Chichizola. Watch as they dive into all the behind-the-scenes details, like balancing the script’s comedy with the theatrical horror elements, and of course, the food.
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00:00 No, I'm saying this movie should be the appetiser.
00:02 People should go and eat after watching this film
00:05 because you will be hungry, regardless of whether you've eaten or not.
00:08 Nick, if I could start with you, I was very taken by the menus,
00:21 a very unique tone.
00:22 It's horror, there's drama, there's stakes,
00:24 but I was also laughing the entire run time.
00:27 You had a lot of moments that really killed me, specifically.
00:30 Can you speak about balancing that unique tone on set?
00:34 I think when it comes to the tone of it,
00:37 obviously reading the script,
00:38 it was clear that it was a balance of all those things
00:41 that you were describing there,
00:42 and that's obviously a tightrope to walk.
00:45 And luckily, Mark Mylard's such a brilliant director
00:48 that that was all in his hands.
00:50 And I think for me anyway, personally, as an actor,
00:52 I was like, you just got to play each moment truthfully and honestly,
00:56 whether you think it might be funny on the page or horrific,
01:00 or whatever it might be,
01:00 you just got to play the honest truth of it.
01:02 And then that's actually because of the extreme characters' natures,
01:07 that's what will make it amusing or bizarre and off-kilter
01:10 and will feel eerie and different.
01:13 So I think it's more about that than trying to play a tone for me.
01:17 Are you crying?
01:19 It's just I find it all very moving.
01:22 Yeah, you know, I was really...
01:24 I wasn't nervous because I knew I was working with the top of the top,
01:27 but I was like, how are they going to pull this off?
01:30 Because the tone is so specific.
01:32 And I don't know how they pulled it off, but they did.
01:34 But I think I have a clue.
01:35 What is it?
01:36 I think when Mark...
01:37 Sometimes we would do three takes at least.
01:40 And it was one just like what's in the script,
01:43 and then it would get bigger or maybe smaller,
01:46 and he would sort of modulate the performance
01:48 so he could have some options in the editing room.
01:51 And he could hit that tone really well.
01:53 And I think he really nailed it.
01:55 And with our editors and our writers and everybody,
01:57 and I think the acting also, it was truly a team effort.
02:01 It felt like, you know...
02:03 So collaborative.
02:04 Like putting on a play.
02:05 Yeah.
02:06 I mean, it's a hard tone to get.
02:07 I mean, it's not...
02:08 This is what makes this work so beautiful by Mark Milod
02:11 and the excellent cast that he got.
02:14 A chef's kiss of a cast.
02:15 Food pun.
02:17 Yeah, yeah, food pun, sorry.
02:18 And I have to owe you 10 bucks.
02:23 To get that tone is so hard.
02:24 I mean, how many directors can get that sweet spot?
02:28 Because it's got to be surgical precision to get humor,
02:32 but not let it get silly and ridiculous.
02:34 Keep the tension and the fear believable,
02:38 and the character's real, but still parroting.
02:42 It's a really tough, tough little task.
02:45 And that's probably what makes him so wonderful.
02:47 You know, it's that secret sauce that you can't really pinpoint.
02:49 I'm just assuming that getting all these different sizes
02:53 and the takes helped,
02:54 but I think you just have to have a vision like nobody else.
02:56 You won't know till the end.
02:59 Tone is a very tricky thing to talk about and try to explain.
03:04 Whenever I read a script,
03:08 I'm always trying to picture it in my mind of how it would look.
03:12 And I had no idea with this one when I read it,
03:15 how it would turn out.
03:16 But there was something really exciting about that, not knowing.
03:21 The thing that I did know was that we were in very good hands with Mark Milod,
03:25 because I think a lot of people know "Succession"
03:28 and how wonderful, what a wonderful job they do on that show
03:33 of turning very unlikable characters into people
03:37 who you do somehow wind up caring about in some way.
03:41 And I knew that Mark was going to be able to take this
03:45 really rogues gallery of despicable characters
03:49 and make us care about what happens to them.
03:53 And Ralph Fiennes, I think, was just, you know,
03:57 he's a living legend.
04:00 He's one of our greatest actors.
04:02 And I could immediately picture him saying the lines
04:07 as I was reading the script.
04:08 But it was one thing to imagine it
04:10 and another thing to actually be there
04:12 and witness that he is just a force and a powerhouse
04:18 and has such a way with language.
04:20 And we all felt like we were sitting in on a master class
04:24 because we got to sit back and watch
04:27 Ralph do these really great monologues to us, his audience.
04:30 I'll leave you to it.
04:33 It was such a gift.
04:35 Listen, Ralph is such a talented actor
04:38 that whatever he wants to transmute on screen, he will do that.
04:42 And so, of course, he is formidable and intimidating
04:45 and all of these other words.
04:47 But being in a scene with him,
04:49 I don't know whether it was our characters
04:52 or the way that we both approach acting,
04:54 I felt so comfortable.
04:56 It was such a warm intimacy between the two of us.
04:59 And we really took care of each other.
05:01 And I think genuinely relished any time
05:04 we got to have those back and forth scenes.
05:07 It felt very, almost like a relief
05:10 because the way that Mark wanted to shoot was 360.
05:14 We were all mic'd all the time.
05:15 We were always improvising.
05:17 And it was incredible, but it was also quite energetic.
05:21 And I feel like any time it was Ralph and I alone,
05:24 everything kind of calmed down a little bit.
05:27 And we got to just be with each other
05:30 in that more intimate space.
05:32 And on that note, food.
05:36 I was wondering what your relationship was
05:39 to the food while you were filming.
05:41 Was it gross?
05:42 Were you hungry?
05:43 I got a burger immediately after seeing my screen.
05:45 Oh my goodness.
05:46 That's not a joke.
05:47 Yeah, no, literally though, that's all I want.
05:49 And I've seen the movie three times.
05:50 I ate a burger that day.
05:53 You did.
05:53 That's right.
05:53 You went out and got it for five guys, right?
05:55 Yeah, yeah, for all of us.
05:56 But for the crew.
05:57 That's right, you got burgers for the crew.
05:58 When they were making that--
05:59 'Cause they were torturing us with that.
06:00 Yeah, they were making that burger on set.
06:03 And you could smell, we were like on this soundstage.
06:04 You could smell everything.
06:05 If someone farted on one end of the stage,
06:07 you could smell it.
06:08 And it was usually Reed.
06:09 So John treated us to burgers.
06:13 But you were, you were saying that you were hungry
06:15 the whole time?
06:15 I was always hungry.
06:16 We just had to sit there for hours.
06:18 The camera was on us, then off of us.
06:20 You're not moving.
06:20 You're not moving.
06:22 You can't get to the food.
06:23 So yeah, and then they're cooking this delicious burger
06:26 just for Anya.
06:27 Yeah, right, right.
06:28 And we're like--
06:28 And she took a bite.
06:30 That's so true.
06:31 Yeah, we ate a lot of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
06:34 But no, the food was the actual food we ate.
06:36 It wasn't necessarily the food we were supposed to be having.
06:39 So like there was a scallop situation.
06:40 We got potatoes instead.
06:42 A raw potato.
06:43 Yeah, and there was a cold.
06:45 It wasn't amazing.
06:46 It looked great.
06:46 We can act--
06:47 You can tell we can act our asses off because we made that--
06:50 those cold props look delicious.
06:53 Yeah, so I was looking forward to, you know, the s'mores.
06:56 But of course--
06:57 No, I'm saying this movie should be the appetizer.
07:03 People should go and eat after watching this film
07:05 because you will be hungry regardless of whether you've
07:08 eaten or not.
07:09 So good.
07:10 Glad.
07:11 I ran.
07:13 They're like the stars of the show.
07:15 And that was beautifully framed in terms of the script
07:18 and each course being a different chapter of the story
07:21 and a different reveal of Chef Loic's plan for all these guests
07:24 throughout the evening.
07:25 And all the food porn shots were made by-- what was the name?
07:28 What's the person?
07:28 Chef's Table.
07:29 Yeah, it's the Chef's Table guy, which I'm so sorry.
07:33 It's just the end of the--
07:34 Yeah.
07:34 It was done by the same person who does all those shots for
07:36 Chef's Table.
07:37 Sorry, I can't remember his name right now.
07:38 Massive shout out.
07:39 It's just the end of a press day, so apologies.
07:42 But yeah, so the food was a real star of the show,
07:46 and I got to eat a lot of it.
07:47 Kudos to this man.
07:49 He went for it.
07:50 Every single take, genuinely impressive.
07:53 Thank you.
07:54 Good, strong English stomach.
07:55 Well done.
07:55 This is bergamot I'm getting, Chef.
07:58 Yes, it is.
08:01 John, I love horror.
08:03 I'm a big horror fan.
08:04 I was so excited to see you back in the genre.
08:06 Can you speak to kind of why this project stood out to you
08:11 and why it made you return to the genre in this way?
08:15 Yeah, I mean, I was very fortunate to work with a Latin
08:18 hero, George Romero, who invented the zombie genre.
08:21 Only a Latin person could come up with that,
08:22 because it comes from Santeria.
08:24 For sure.
08:24 And the Caribbean.
08:25 Yeah, like voodoo thing.
08:27 Yeah.
08:27 They're going to come back and hunt you.
08:29 That's how you better behave in this life.
08:32 Yeah.
08:33 I love the genre.
08:35 You know, obviously, it's one of the biggest--
08:37 the biggest demographic for horror movies are Latin people.
08:40 Yeah.
08:41 And with a religious tone.
08:42 Yeah, for sure.
08:43 This doesn't have a religious tone,
08:45 but I think Latin people are going to love it.
08:46 And coming to this horror, it's a really smart movie.
08:50 I love independent films.
08:51 This is my favorite genre of flick.
08:53 And I love doing high art.
08:55 I feel like this is high art.
08:57 And I love being a part of something like that,
08:59 that allows actors to be free, let it be character-driven
09:07 instead of just plot-driven.
09:08 You know, we become like so serviceable to the plot.
09:11 I like that we have a chance to breathe as artists.
09:14 And that's the power of being in a flick like Mark Milo directed.
09:19 Jesus Christ.
09:21 This is just theater.
09:22 It's stagecraft.
09:23 We're leaving now.
09:24 You know, I saw the menu at TIFF, where I also saw the whales.
09:29 It was like very--
09:30 I felt like it was like a big festival for you.
09:32 So I just have to ask if you could speak at all to your collaboration
09:35 with Brendan Fraser, because that film--
09:37 like, I wept for an hour straight.
09:38 I just came from a screening.
09:42 We did a Q&A like an hour and a half ago.
09:47 And I cried on stage.
09:48 I was so embarrassed.
09:49 It's something about the movie.
09:52 It's still with me.
09:54 And just being next to Brendan and talking about his character
09:58 and all of the work he did for it, I don't know.
10:00 It still gets me emotional.
10:01 Yeah, I agree.
10:05 I felt embarrassed at my screening because I was just like weeping.
10:07 And that's how I felt this morning.
10:09 I felt embarrassed that I was crying on stage.
10:11 Well, congratulations again.
10:15 Thank you so much for chatting with me.
10:17 Thank you, Corey.
10:18 This is what you're paying for.
10:21 It's all part of the menu.
10:24 It's OK.
10:26 No, we're going to die tonight.
10:27 Yes, we are.
10:28 Yeah.
10:28 [MUSIC PLAYING]
10:32 [BLANK_AUDIO]