Rian Johnson has revealed that part of Wake Up Dead Man was filmed on the same set as Rick Astley’s ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’ video.
The third instalment in the Knives Out film series was released onto Netflix earlier this month and saw Daniel Craig’s Benoit Blanc attempt to solve the mysterious killing of Josh Brolin’s controversial priest in upstate New York.
Among the sets used in the film was one with a distinctively floral window design that one eagle-eyed viewer on BlueSky this week identified as the exact same that appears in Astley’s meme-tastic 1987 video for ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’.
“I saw the window tracery and immediately made my friends pause the film so I could tell them,” the social media poster explained on Monday (December 29).
Johnson, who has directed all three Knives Out films, personally responded to the post, confirming the connection. “This is true and I was the only one on set excited about it (and playing the song on my phone to blank stares)”, he wrote.
This is true and I was the only one on set excited about it (and playing the song on my phone to blank stares)
— Rian Johnson (@rianjohnson.bsky.social) 2025-12-30T04:21:06.329Z
The star-studded movie saw Josh O’Connor, Glenn Close, Jeremy Renner, Kerry Washington, Andrew Scott, Cailee Spaeny, Daryl McCormack and Thomas Haden Church all presented as possible suspects in the murder – and you can see a breakdown of the film’s denouement here.
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In a four-star review of Wake Up Dead Man, NME wrote: “While it’s a little over-elaborate – at 140 minutes, you might well call it ‘The Long Good Friday’ – it’s impossible not to be amused by Craig doing a Scooby Doo impression (no, really) or Scott’s author beset by fans who all look like John Goodman in The Big Lebowski. With Josh O’Connor also absolutely terrific as the punch-drunk priest, Johnson’s mystery movie will be a perfect fireside companion when it hits Netflix in early December. Guaranteed, you won’t find a more fiendish film this winter.”
It also landed at Number 16 in NME’s list of the 50 best films of 2025 – check out the list here.
Wake Up Dead Man followed on from the 2019 original Knives Out and the 2022 follow up Glass Onion, and Johnson has expressed his desire to return to the universe once again in the future.
