We spoke to Dylan O’Brien leading up to the release of Caddo Lake, his new M. Night Shyamalan-produced thriller now streaming on Max. It’s a twisty, dense affair with juicy plot beats we won’t spoil here, but O’Brien reliably nails the lead role of Paris, a down-and-out lake worker who gets entangled in mysterious terrain once a young girl goes missing in the wet woodland community. Its release on Max practically coincides with another O’Brien movie, Saturday Night, the star-studded dramatization of the 90 minutes leading up to the first episode of SNL 50 years ago. There he plays the one and only Dan Aykroyd, and O’Brien opened up to us about how he went about nailing the iconic performer on the big screen.
“The approach for Dan… was just sort of trying to tap into, like, enough foundational qualities of his, but not too many to be impressionistic, but like enough to really embody him,” O’Brien told MovieWeb. “Those things for me were sort of his hyper-intelligence and how precise he is.” O’Brien continued about Aykroyd:
“He’s so articulate, and he’s so verbose, and he’s so precise in his improv. He never fumbles, he never misses.
He’s so inherently kind of factual. And interested — he’s like such a curious cat, you know?
He’s kind of just floating with this effortless confidence. I sort of viewed him as possessing no insecurities. And yeah, those were kind of the elements that I myself sort of inferred from his presence and watching his interviews and things like that. And then, I kind of just went with those and rolled the dice.”
8:12
Related
Dylan O’Brien Discusses Caddo Lake & Playing Dan Aykroyd for Saturday Night
The charismatic actor stars in both the Max mystery thriller Caddo Lake and also plays an SNL legend in the new movie Saturday Night.
Working With ‘Hyper-Enthusiastic’ Directors & Wrangling Gators
When an eight-year-old girl goes missing at Caddo Lake, past deaths and disappearances resurface, reshaping a fractured family’s history.
And then there’s the wildly different character of Paris, which O’Brien also nails in his latest movie, Caddo Lake. The mystery thriller was written and directed by filmmaking duo Celine Held and Logan George. There’s no humor to be explored with Paris, but that doesn’t mean O’Brien doesn’t bring the same sort of intensity to the role. “I definitely want to give Celine and Logan their props in how they crafted the script,” he told us. “I had such a clear picture of [Paris], you know, from the first time that I opened the script, so kudos to Celine and Logan on crafting such a beautifully grounded and honest character in their writing, you know, across the board with the whole cast.”
8:47
Related
Caddo Lake Filmmakers Explain the Thrilling Mystery Movie on Max with Dylan O’Brien
Celine Held & Logan George discuss their new film on Max, a tense and atmospheric mystery thriller produced by M. Night Shyamalan.
O’Brien continued, in reflecting on his Caddo Lake directors and how he learned the skills that Paris possesses in the story, set against a lake backdrop:
“They’re so passionate, and they’re hyper-enthusiastic. And you know, they were constantly meeting people every day in pre-production. They were texting me, being like,
‘You gotta go wrangle gators with this guy!’
and, ‘[Paris] is an amazing character!’ and, ‘You gotta go meet [these locals]… They’re kind of crazy in the best way!’ But from that, I met a guy by the name of Chaz Warren, who initially took me out on the lake and kind of taught me to drive the boat.”
That experience resulted in some of the most tense and even spooky moments of the new thriller Caddo Lake,now streaming on Max (you can watch it here). Meanwhile, Saturday Night is now in theaters.