The Monkey hits theaters Feb. 21 and it’s going to be a bloody good time.
In the adaptation of the 1980 Stephen King short story of the same name, Theo James takes on double duty starring as twin brothers Hal and Bill, who are forced to confront a murderous cursed toy from their childhood, a wind-up monkey.
Despite experiencing the same traumatic events, James describes the brothers as complete opposites, sharing, “[Hal] had dealt with death around himself a lot, and he’d come to terms with it in a way. And then juxtaposing that with Bill, who is trying to escape death … he’s just a scared child that has never evolved beyond childhood and is desperately afraid. And as a result, he’s looking for love and immortality in the wrong places. The wrong place happens to be a maniacal monkey.”
Director Osgood Perkins, who also directed the 2024 horror film Longlegs, shared that he had no hesitation when it came to sharing his adaptation of the story with the King of Horror, King.
“I was pretty confident that … the handle I had on it was … pretty true, was pretty authentic,” he says. “I felt like I was an authority on sort of the insanity of life and death. It’s like sort of been something I’ve dealt with in my life. So, I felt like I knew what I was talking about, and I was approaching it with sort of humor.”
King gave his stamp of approval, and Perkins says, “Ultimately, he loves the movie. So all things worked out.”
And Perkins does not hold back on the insanity of death with plenty of creative and humorous killings — if you have the guts to watch.
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