When director Rian Johnson was a child, he bought the last book Agatha Christie published before her death in 1976: “Curtain: Poirot’s Last Case.” The novel sat on a shelf in his grandparents’ large house in Denver. It had a moody black cover that featured an illustration of the mustachioed detective Hercule Poirot. “It was very adult,” Johnson told me recently. “Very scary.” The story takes place in a large country house where guests have the unfortunate habit of dying, or almost dying, in seemingly unrelated circumstances. A hunting accident. Poisoning. A bullet in the head.
The book wasn’t just a dynamite mystery; it also represented a sort of magic trick. Although it was published late in Christie’s life, she wrote the manuscript in the middle of her career, in the forties. Then, in a twist worthy of Poirot, she locked it in a safe for thirty years, ensuring it would remain secret. As her popularity waned, she suddenly produced – voilà! – a book written at the height of his powers. The novel was, Johnson said, “very mysterious and great, and very, very strange.” Soon he was bingeing on Christie novels, two or three at a time. One day he walked into a fire hydrant while reading one.
In Los Angeles earlier this year, Johnson’s usually gentle face came alive as he recounted the plot of “Curtain.” “Do you want it spoiled?” he asked. “Really?” We were sitting in the sunny offices of his production company, T-Street, surrounded by shelves filled with trinkets: a hollow Bible hiding a cigar, an engraved knife. On the wall was a print by 18th-century artist Matthias Buchinger, Born Without Hands and Legs, from the collection of the late magician Ricky Jay. Johnson, who is short, with a salt-and-pepper beard, has a nerdy, understated demeanor. He was dressed casually, in the kind of short-sleeved shirt one might wear to a family barbecue. He believes that pleasing people leads well to achievement. If you didn’t know better, you might mistake him for a particularly nice computer scientist.
In 2019, Johnson tried his hand at a murder mystery with the film “Knives Out.” Compact and stylish, the film begins in a New England Gothic mansion where wealthy patriarch Harlan Thrombey was found with his throat slit. Harlan has a miserly family, each member of which has something to gain from his death. Like Christie’s novels, the film is a study of its times. The Thrombeys argue bitterly over politics, money and immigration. (“Far-right troll,” Harlan’s granddaughter tells her cousin. “Liberal snowflake,” he replies.) Like Christie, Johnson has entrusted his mystery to a detective with a high regard for his own intellect: Southern gentleman Benoit Blanc, played by Daniel Craig. The film was a surprise success with critics and audiences. THE Tutor called it “delightfully entertaining”.
At fifty-one, Johnson is a rarity in Hollywood: a writer-director with a singular vision, capable of turning his strange, idiosyncratic stories – written by hand, in moleskin notebooks – into blockbuster hits. It navigates between genres, creating complex, puzzle-like plots that reward multiple viewings. The success of “Knives Out” cemented Johnson’s status as Agatha Christie in the Netflix era. Natasha Lyonne, who stars in his mystery TV series “Poker Face,” told me, “His plots are there in his mind. » In the writers’ room, he’ll quietly develop inventive murders while others discuss home renovations, then reveal them with gusto. Craig said of Johnson: “He still plays 4D chess. »
