The Housemaid has been mopping up praise from critics and audiences for being a fun, over-the-top adaptation of Freida McFadden’s bestselling novel, with reviews commending Paul Feig for his adept handling of the suspense genre. The erotic R-rated thriller certainly took people by surprise and, as it turns out, that is exactly what the maximalist filmmaker hoped to achieve when he signed on to helm the feature.
In an exclusive sit-down with MovieWeb, Feig, who is best known for comedies like Bridesmaids and A Simple Favor, explained why he was initially drawn to The Housemaid. He said he could see that the source material provided the perfect “blueprint” for a blockbuster and felt that the story would allow him to use his directing skills, and love of twists, to mess with audiences and dial his cinematic interpretation of the suspense-filled story all the way up “to 11,” which appealed to him, as he admitted to finding joy in twisting expectations:
“Getting to mess with an audience this much? How can you turn that down? Usually, my movies have some kind of twist in them. Some are bigger than others, but I like to fool an audience and entertain them at the same time. And I like how extreme this movie gets. I’m a maximalist; I like things to be playing at 11. It was just all there. The source material is so popular anyway, so you know you’ve got a built-in audience. But more than that, it’s having this amazing blueprint that Freida McFadden wrote. And just getting to cast amazing actors in it, and take it on.”
The Housemaid is a dark, twisty thriller that sees Sydney Sweeney star as Millie, who is hired by wealthy couple Nina and Andrew Winchester, played by Amanda Seyfried and Brandon Sklenar, but it is not long before her dream job starts to unravel into something sinister. The perfect façade of her new employers slips, and she discovers secrets that are far more dangerous than the ones she has buried in her past.
‘The Housemaid’ Is Darker Territory for Paul Feig
The Housemaid led Feig down a road less traveled, which saw him take a sharp detour from his more common, safe space of comedies further into the genre of psychological thrillers after dipping his toe into darker territory with 2018’s A Simple Favor. The filmmaker told MovieWeb that he found the transition relatively smooth, as both comedies and thrillers aim to elicit visceral reactions from an audience – namely, laughter and scares. The two genres rely on building tension and then providing an abrupt release, so he found he could pull on his prior experience to achieve the desired effect with his latest undertaking:
“Comedy and thrillers and horror are so closely linked. Because laughs and scares are the exact same thing. It’s a reaction. And when you scare somebody, you’ll get a laugh after usually. So, it’s doubling the responses I get. And then it’s being true to the genre, so you’re not spoofing the drama. You’re being very serious about it, but then you can find those release points, which is where the comedy and the fun comes from for the audience.”
Audiences have been turning out in their droves to watch The Housemaid, which opened in theaters on Dec. 19, just in time for the Christmas crowds. The film landed an opening weekend box office of over $20 million domestically, putting it behind James Cameron’s sci-fi spectacle Avatar: Fire and Ash and the animated biblical musical adventure David. Its takings are likely to continue to grow over the holiday season due to its positive reception and, contingent on its final success, there could very well be a sequel in the future, as there are two more books (as well as a short story) in McFadden’s series, which are ripe for big-screen adaptations.
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