Wake Up Dead Man cast reveal their favourite detectives and whether they’d make good murderers

This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine.

“I am hoping to get out of Narnia in time for Christmas,” says Daniel Craig. We’re supposed to be talking about the former James Bond star’s performance as Benoit Blanc, the mannered, sometimes manic, private detective from the Deep South of the US in Rian Johnson’s Netflix Knives Out mysteries.

The new film, Wake Up Dead Man, is set in and around a neo-Gothic church in upstate New York where Benoit enlists the help of Josh O’Connor’s Catholic priest Father Jud Duplenticy to solve “a classic impossible crime”.

But Craig’s mind is already a movie ahead of me. He’s presently filming The Magician’s Nephew, Greta Gerwig’s take on CS Lewis’s Narnia novel, in which he plays the eponymous magician, Uncle Andrew. It’s a role as un-Bond-like, in its way, as the unhinged gay author he played in Luca Guadagnino’s Queer last year (based on William Burroughs). Or, for that matter, Blanc, the driving intellectual and dramatic force of Johnson’s three Knives Out films.

“I suppose I started freeing myself up from any convention,” says the 57-year-old Craig. “I’m not saying no to things that I might have been a little bit wary about before. When the Bond thing was going on in my life, the juxtaposition between that and another role would sometimes feel self-conscious. I’m working harder than I ever have, but I’m also just enjoying it more than I ever have. I get to do really interesting, different stuff.”

No Time to Die was in 2021. That’s four years away from Bond now; has it made him happy? “I love my job but does it make me happy? Not always,” he muses. “It’s very complicated. It’s an incredibly tough job. It’s kept me away from my family over the years, and that has its downsides.”

Craig is married to the actor Rachel Weisz. They have a daughter, Grace, born in 2018 (Craig has another daughter, 33-year-old actor Ella Loudon, from his previous marriage to actor Fiona Loudon) and homes in north London and New York.

Craig likes nothing better, he says, than “watching Strictly with the kids – it’s a joy” and, if he is out of Narnia in time, will be celebrating Christmas with them. “Not in a religious way,” he says, “but celebrating the fact that it’s a family get-together. Much in a way like the Americans have Thanksgiving, Christmas is an English kind of thanksgiving. And saying thanks for having family is really what it’s about.”

Ironically, after escaping a character that defined him in the public eye over five films and 15 years, starting with Casino Royale in 2006, Craig is now the centre of another franchise, Knives Out, playing a character who walks the narrow line between convincing characterisation and camp. “But that’s the fun bit, isn’t it?’ he says. “Walking the line.”

Three films in, Benoit Blanc feels like he has a lot of mileage left… perhaps more than the five films Craig made as Bond? “As soon as we’re on the red carpet, Rian and I get asked, ‘Are you going to make another one?’ And we both go, ‘Hang on a second! Let’s get this one out first.’ But, of course, I would love to continue working with him. As long as Rian keeps inventing it the way he does, then I’m in.”

Not that playing Benoit Blanc is easy. “I still have to work hard at this,” he says. “He’s not uncomplicated to play. I don’t turn up on day one and go, ‘I know how to do this.’ That would be just terrible. I work on it and work on it.”

With that level of commitment, does Craig feel he’s now getting the hang of investigating? For example, if I were to be clubbed to death or poisoned, could he work out whodunnit? “No! It’s like asking me, ‘Do you think playing James Bond made you better at being a spy?’ ” Craig exclaims. “It’s not going to happen; I wouldn’t be very good in that situation. You need a brain.

“I suppose what I like about Benoit is that he’s not aggressive, his way of doing things is to try and disarm people. He often pays compliments, and I think that’s an interesting way of getting what you want in life. You know, he’s a charmer.”

His co-star O’Connor told RT that, because he’d been brought up thinking of Craig as Bond, he was surprised to encounter an actor whose “sweetness, insecurity, and funniness were such a pleasure to work with”. Does Craig recognise himself in that description? “Well, all actors are insecure,” he says. “We may appear to be confident, but we’re just ducks; looking good on top but the legs are going crazy underneath. I’m making it up as I go along.”

• Read our guide to the best Christmas TV for 2025

Andrew Scott plays Lee Ross

Could you get away with the perfect murder?

ANDREW: I don’t think I would be very good at murder – I suppose I’m the type, but I just don’t like blood. I have many faults, but I think I’m going to get away in this life with not murdering anybody. That’s the way it’s looking, anyway.

Do you have a favourite detective… Sherlock Holmes, perhaps?

ANDREW: Actually, it’s Hercule Poirot. One of the films that had a real influence on me was Evil under the Sun with Peter Ustinov as Poirot, made in the 1980s. I remember watching him, Diana Rigg and Maggie Smith and thinking, “Wow!” I’d never seen a film like that.

Glenn Close plays Martha Delacroix

Do you have a favourite detective?

GLENN: I loved Agatha Christie’s books and I was in Christie’s Crooked House in 2017. It had never been filmed because it has a very strange, disturbing ending. I also loved Prime Suspect. Helen Mirren was so good in that.

Do you believe in good and evil?

GLENN: Oh, very much so, although I think we’re a complicated species. It’s a pretty deep question. I think there are very few people who are born evil, but there are some. It’s usually a malfunction in our very complex brains, and I think a lot of it is how you’re brought up.

Josh O’Connor plays Father Jud Duplenticy

Could you imagine yourself planning the perfect murder?

JOSH: No. Absolutely not. I’m too anxious. Most of the time, even if I make a plan to go and meet someone for dinner, I have second thoughts. I don’t think I’d ever make it out of the door.

What about solving a murder, Josh?

JOSH: Again, I’d be useless. Crime-solving requires an incredible level of organisation. You’d have to be very directed in your thoughts. And I’m so doubtful of everything and anything and everyone. My answer to most things is, “I don’t know!” As a detective, you’d have to have a little more conviction.

You don’t seem very confident in your abilities…

JOSH: I have low self-esteem and a big ego. You put those together and it’s chaotic. But it is perfect for an actor – most of us have low self-esteem. That’s why we need to be told that we’re good. But we also have a big ego and we want to be seen. It’s a strange one.

Who was your favourite detective growing up?

JOSH: I used to love turning on ITV and watching Midsomer Murders on a Sunday afternoon with my family. We’d all sit there and predict who the murderer was. We loved it.

Mila Kunis plays police chief Geraldine Scott

Did you grow up watching murder mysteries?

MILA: I grew up in Russia, and Sherlock Holmes was definitely around when I was seven or eight. Then, when I moved to the States, I loved murder mysteries. Clue is one of my favourite movies of all time.

Would you make a good murderer?

MILA: I couldn’t do it. I’m not a very aggressive person and I don’t think I’m very calculated. I’d also need to be so much more organised… Actually, hold on, that’s not true. If my life or my family’s lives were at stake, I’d have no problem doing something extreme – and a woman who’s juggling a job and a family and kids can do a lot of things.

Of course, you’re on the other side of the fence in the movie — would you make a good investigator in real life?

MILA: I’d make a great investigator. I have no problems asking questions and I’m also pretty observant. However, I’m not good at identifying people – in a line-up I’m not your gal.

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Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery is coming to Netflix on 12th December. Sign up for Netflix from £5.99 a month. Netflix is also available on Sky Glass and Virgin Media Stream.

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