As Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery dominates the 2025 holiday season, one name is being discussed as much as Benoit Blanc himself: Josh O’Connor.
Despite a career-defining year—including the critical success of The Mastermind and the viral sensation of Challengers—director Rian Johnson recently revealed that Josh O’Connor wasn’t originally on his radar for the role of the earnest rookie priest, Jud Duplenticy.
In a deep-dive interview with Chase Hutchinson for RogerEbert.com, Johnson broke down how a recommendation from Daniel Craig and a “timeless mug” turned O’Connor into the unexpected heart of the trilogy’s third chapter.
The Screen Test That Changed Everything
Rian Johnson admitted that while the world was already waking up to O’Connor’s talent, he was late to the party. The director credits his lead actor, Daniel Craig, for the casting breakthrough.
“No, I wasn’t aware of him, actually. It was Daniel during the casting process who brought him to my attention. Daniel knew him through Luca [Guadagnino], and Challengers wasn’t out yet, so they screened Challengers for me. It was my favorite movie of that year, and I just thought this guy burns his way off the screen; he’d be amazing.”
After seeing O’Connor pivot from the high-octane intensity of Challengers to the soulful, grounded performance in La Chimera, Johnson was sold on his range.
“To see him working at the opposite end of the spectrum and be equally as captivating. Then I started digging into some of his other work, met him, and was like, I want to be on a set with this guy.”
The “Jimmy Stewart” of 2025
One of the most striking comparisons to emerge from the set came from Hollywood legend Glenn Close. While O’Connor has built a reputation for playing complex, often brooding characters, Johnson gave him “full rein” to tap into a more classic, leading-man charisma.
“Glenn Close kept saying that he reminded her of Jimmy Stewart in this role. I think that’s a great analogy. He can do Challengers, he can do La Chimera, he can do The Mastermind, he can do History of Sound, and then he can step onto this set and be a leading man in that way.”
This versatility is what allowed O’Connor to anchor the film’s crucial first act—a tall order in a franchise where the audience is conditioned to wait for Daniel Craig’s eccentric detective to take over.
More Than a Comic Foil: The Waffle House Energy
Beyond the leading-man status, O’Connor brought a specific, off-beat humor to the production. The interviewer recalled O’Connor once crashing a press office at Sundance just to “talk about Waffle House,” a brand of playful mischief that Johnson says translated perfectly to his performance as Jud.
“I mean, I knew he was funny, but to give him full rein with this part to dive into that humorous aspect of it, he played it so well… He can grab the audience in a movie where people are showing up expecting Daniel Craig to step forward. The fact that he is the one grabbing people and bringing us through that important first act, and we never blink away from the screen, is extraordinary to me.”
As Wake Up Dead Man continues its record-breaking run, it’s clear that O’Connor isn’t just a suspect in a mystery—he’s the actor who stole the movie from under Benoit Blanc’s nose.
Interview Courtesy: RogerEbert.com
