With a long history from conception to production and eventual release, Daniel’s Gotta Die isn’t just tumultuous in its story. This action-comedy-thriller has been through the wringer. Written by Matthew Dressel before the wild success of Knives Out but only seen through post the murder mystery resurgence, Daniel’s Gotta Die’s take on greedy rich white people mixes reality with the absurd.
Filmed on location in the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Jeremy Lalonde, with his cast and crew, flew to the Cayman Islands hauling heaps of equipment and a last hurrah of hope for the future of film with the world around them stopped.
Daniel Powell (Joel David Moore) is the compassionate, loving son of mega-billionaire Edward Powell (Iggy Pop), who makes an interesting gamble on his deathbed with his sizable fortune left in his will. Daniel and his three horrendous siblings (played by Jason Jones, Mary Lynn Rajskub and Carly Chaikin) must spend the weekend together in their family beach house in the Cayman Islands to receive their portion of the Powell Estate with all the activities overseen by Powell’s most trusted advisor, Lawrence (Bob Saget).
It’s all set to go wrong from the beginning because the father knows his children are hopeless heathens who have zero interest in family bonding. Daniel is the only one who hopes to bring his siblings together and have a ‘real’ family, no matter that his fiancé, Emily (Chantel Riley), is ready to start anew with her betrothed.
Daniel’s Gotta Die is a wild ride from top to bottom with an incredible cast of players. I had the privilege of sitting down with director Jeremy Lalonde to talk about his experience making the film.
“It’s funny. Originally, the movie was written to take place in northern Ontario and take advantage of the tax credits. […]And then we just got this rare opportunity where just as Covid was kind of starting to rear its head, I got a call from one of our producers saying, hey, there’s an opportunity for us to make this film in the Caymans. Do you think you and Matthew could rewrite it to take place [there]? Which, for us, made way more [sense] for this movie.”
Even funnier, it wasn’t until the film was set to film in the Caymans that Iggy Pop came on to make his cameo as Edward Powell, being that he was living on the islands at the time.
With some comedy legends on set, it’s hard to imagine there was ever a dull moment. “My rule is always to get what’s in the script. But let’s make sure we have time to play, especially when you have such a great comedic cast. I always want to know what you want to do. What do you want to try? Are there any new ideas you’ve got, especially from the writer too? Because it’s one thing when you’re looking at a scene on a page, but once you’re in the room, you realize, oh, my God, you’re covered in blood.”
Being Bob Saget’s last film, Lalonde and I talk about his character arc in the film and his presence on set.
“[The siblings], they’re already ruined by the time the movie starts. But with Bob, we saw this opportunity for a guy who could have ended up like those other family members but was able to see another path by the end. So, when we cast Bob, he had many questions, comments, and thoughts on that. And so, we made some tweaks just to give another character a little bit of nuance for the end of the film.”
“And, I mean, obviously, we didn’t know at the time that it was going to be Bob’s last. You know, I talked to Bob a couple of days before he passed away because it was such a freak occurrence. And he was in such great spirits. The saddest thing was that he was such a big fan of the film just as we were making it, and he never actually got to see it finished. He wanted to wait until everything was done. And it wasn’t until a week after he passed away that it was finished.”
Be sure to catch Daniel’s Gotta Die in select theatres on March 15th and VOD on April 2nd.
