# Wake Up Dead Man

Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery, or simply Wake Up Dead Man, is an upcoming American mystery film written and directed by Rian Johnson. It is a standalone sequel to Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery (2022) and the third installment overall in the Knives Out film series. It stars Daniel Craig, who reprises his role as master detective Benoit Blanc. The ensemble cast also includes Josh O'Connor, Glenn Close, Josh Brolin, Mila Kunis, Jeremy Renner, Kerry Washington, Andrew Scott, Cailee Spaeny, Daryl McCormack, and Thomas Haden Church.
Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery is scheduled to be released by Netflix in the second half of 2025.

## Cast

* Daniel Craig as Benoit Blanc, a private detective/investigator
* Josh O'Connor as a priest
* Glenn Close
* Josh Brolin as Father Frank, a priest
* Mila Kunis as G. Scott, a police chief
* Jeremy Renner
* Kerry Washington
* Andrew Scott
* Cailee Spaeny
* Daryl McCormack
* Thomas Haden Church

## Production
### Development

Before the release of Knives Out (2019), Rian Johnson said he would like to create sequels with Benoit Blanc investigating further mysteries, and already had an idea for a new film. On March 31, 2021, it was reported that Netflix bought the rights to two Knives Out sequels for over $400 million.

### Writing

In June 2022, Johnson revealed that Knives Out 3 was a working title with his intent being that each film has a distinct title, citing the works of Agatha Christie as his inspiration for the films and the individual titles. In November 2022, Johnson said that he was preparing to work on writing the third film. By January 2023, Johnson confirmed that he had started writing the script for the third film, stating that it will be tonally and thematically different from the previous installments. Johnson later stated that though he had approved the subtitle of A Knives Out Mystery for the previous installment, he would like to rename the series and add A Benoit Blanc Mystery as subtitles to future installments.
In October 2023, following the resolution of the 2023 Writers Guild of America strike, Johnson announced that he had started working on the script for the third movie. The filmmaker stated that he had the premise planned, and could begin writing again.

### Casting

Daniel Craig was expected to reprise his role early in development; he acknowledged interest in returning early on during the project's development. Craig was paid $100 million for his involvement in the two Knives Out sequels. In May 2024, Josh O'Connor, Cailee Spaeny, Andrew Scott, Kerry Washington, Glenn Close, Jeremy Renner, Mila Kunis, and Daryl McCormack joined the main cast; Renner's likeness had previously been used in Glass Onion, although he had not been featured otherwise. The following month, Josh Brolin and Thomas Haden Church joined the cast.

### Filming

As with the previous two films, Steve Yedlin and Nathan Johnson returned as cinematographer and composer, respectively. Principal photography began on June 10, 2024, in London. On June 19, 2024, Close revealed that she was "really hit hard" with both COVID-19 and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), which was also revealed to have resulted in her being able to only participate in two days of filming by that point in time. Filming wrapped on August 17.

## Release

Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery is scheduled to be released by Netflix in the second half of 2025.

## Future

In September 2022, Johnson confirmed his intention to make more films in the series. Later that month, Craig and Johnson separately said that they would continue making further films, as long as they were both involved.