Glass Onion: How Daniel Craig Preps for Knives Out Mystery Monologues (Exclusive)

One of the best parts of Knives Out and its sequel, Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery, are Benoit Blanc’s monologues. It’s become something of the detective’s signature to deliver a long speech in which he reveals the twists, turns, and other shocking details that solves the murder mystery and it’s made all the more enjoyable because of Blanc’s distinctive accent. Now, star Daniel Craig tells ComicBook.com‘s Brandon Davis how he prepares for those moments in the films and Craig reveals he puts a lot of work into making it very natural.

“That’s the job, isn’t it? I mean, at least, I’ve gotta aim there at least. If I get there, then? That’s, that’s good,” Craig said. “I work as hard as I can before we start to sort of get it into myself so it’s in my body, so that when we get to set, it’s sort of like, it’s not a thought…. There’s no thought involved, it’s just, it’s there, ready to come. I rely on Rian a whole heap. I, kind of, present something, I’ll come and say, what about this? And then he goes, ‘Great, let’s try this and let’s try this.’ And it evolves as we shoot it, which is just the, the best way. But I just wanna be as prepped as I possibly can so that I’m not having to think about the accent, think about the lines, think about… It’s just, it’s there. It’s there on call. And then I can also throw it away and do something else.”

Filmmaker Rian Johnson also weighed in about how well-prepared Craig is and how much he enjoys watching it.

“With the first movie and then also with this one, with that last section that you’re talking about, because I love, that’s the thing about murder mysteries I love is the detective holding court and solving it at the end. And with both movies now, Daniel shows up prepped for that sequence as if he’s gonna step onto a Broadway stage and do it. He’s got it down to the point where you’ll watch with the shots… I mean, we work on it together actually figuring out kind of how long we can have each of the shots go so that he can just have the stage and do it. And that, to me, it’s fun time. It’s like a joy that get to just sit there at the monitor and giggle.”

What is Knives Out 2 about?

In Glass Onion, Tech billionaire Miles Bron invites his friends (and Detective Benoit Blanc) for a “murder mystery party” getaway on Glass Onion, his private Greek island. However, when someone turns up dead for real, Blanc must crack the case and discover who the killer is. The film will also star Edward Norton as Miles Bron, Janelle Monáe as Cassandra “Andi” Brand, Kathryn Hahn as Claire Debella, Leslie Odom Jr. as Lionel Toussaint, Jessica Henwick as Peg, Madelyn Cline as Whiskey, Kate Hudson as Birdie Jay, Dave Bautista as Duke Cody, and Ethan Hawke in a currently unknown role. Glass Onion is one of two sequels already greenlit by Netflix.

“The first one, [Johnson] had the idea for years in his head, but he only put pen to paper like late January and by end of October we were filming it, which is a super fast,” producer Ram Bergman recently told ComicBook.com. “This movie, he really did not have an idea. He just stopped thinking and we were… From the moment he started really writing it, like, nine months later, a year later, we were filming. So, the good thing, he is very motivated to go do the next one as quickly as possible. But, you know, we’ll see how fast he is but this is gonna be a challenge. It’s gonna be a bigger challenge. So we’ll see how long it’s gonna take.”

Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery is set to be released on Netflix on December 23rd.