Longlegs, NEON’s creepy serial killer thriller from horror royalty writer-director Oz Perkins, is the feel-bad talk of the town right now, and most of that discussion is rightfully centered around the performances of Maika Monroe, its Scream Queen lead, and Nicolas Cage as the titular Satanic antagonist. But for my money, the great Blair Underwood is the actor stealthily holding the whole film together. He plays FBI Agent Carter, mentor to Monroe’s ingenue Lee Harker, who handpicks her to be the pair of fresh eyes on the Longlegs case that’s baffled the agency for decades. In a lesser performer’s hands, Carter would be a cliché jaded-older-cop character, but Underwood plays him differently—weary, yes, but also refreshingly wry. In a movie that angles to make viewers feel unsettled at all times, Underwood’s Agent Carter ends up being a welcome respite, and slowly emerges as the film’s soul—to be either saved or corrupted.
With horror aficionados like Guillermo del Toro praising Underwood’s performance, Longlegs is becoming a welcome reminder of the work he's been putting in for decades. Depending on your age, you may remember him as an idealistic attorney on LA Law, or from Dirty Sexy Money and In Treatment about a decade later. Maybe you recall him wooing Jada Pinkett in Set It Off. And we all watched him almost steal Miranda away from Steve as her dashing doctor love interest in the final season of Sex and the City. Underwood turned up most recently in Ava Duvernay’s drama Origin last year; he’s also directed a thriller of his own, which he’s currently putting the finishing touches on. Longlegs marks Underwood’s first horror film; the actor, who turns 60 next month but appears to have barely aged since his ‘80-'90s heartthrob heyday, says he still has much more new ground to cover.
GQ talked to him about bringing levity to Longlegs, what makes a great horror movie, and if he’d ever be up for a Sex and the City encore on And Just Like That.
GQ: The jaded boss/mentor in these kinds of procedural thrillers can be such a thankless and cliché role, but you liven it up almost immediately. How did you approach and flesh this character out?
Blair Underwood: Part of it, I felt like I was given a gift, because that is the trap—that kind of role can be very by-the-numbers. But because of the construct of the script and the story, we had a chance to see him as a family man, where my character takes Maika Monroe's character home and introduces her to his wife and his child. So whenever you can deal with not just the professional accouterments, but when you can pull those layers back and see this person in his home, it just really helps give other colors to it.
Well, you’re also really dryly funny, in a movie that's crying out for some levity wherever you can get it. Was that written into the character, or is that a flavor you brought to the lines?
Oz, our director, is very funny. Contextually, it's a dark film, but he's very funny. So he wrote all those little quips in here and there like when Maika says, "I don't drink” and I say "No, you won't drink, I'll drink, let's go." Oz is smart enough to know a film like this needs some levity.
It's funny, my youngest son, Blake [also pointed that out]—like, "Man, I didn't expect that." It's like morbid levity, really, in the stark world. And I love to do that, because my favorite actors do it and do it well. Meryl Streep always finds irony and sometimes satire or something funny in the darkest of moments. So I was very, very pleased to be able to do that and that it was on the page.
You're doing it up until the bitter end, with that line that’s like, "I'll be back..."
"...You won't be back." [laughs]
So how did you come aboard on this whole thing?
My agent Dar Rollins, set me up with Oz on a Zoom, just like this. And I had read the script, but the funny thing is, he had not finished the film. So the scene you [just referenced], that final scene wasn't even written. He said, "I got some ideas, I got some things I want to do. I want to go in different directions, I'm not sure." Then when he finished it, he sent it to me and he said, "What do you think of the final scene?" And I was like, "Yeah, I'm all in." It gave me some different colors to play.
Are you into horror generally?
I'm a big horror fan. Always have been. That's part of the reason this is so exciting for me because I've never really done horror. I did do a film called Bad Hair, but it was a satire. Loved doing it, but this—a proper dark, sinister and horrific film—I haven't done before, and hope to do more.
What are some of your favorite horror movies?
The Exorcist is my all-time favorite. Then there's The Omen. Poltergeist. It had a lot of special effects. But I really like the ones, like Rosemary's Baby, that don't rely on special effects. It lets the audience off the hook—Ah, that's computer graphics, that's not real. But movies like The Exorcist, movies like Longlegs, man, you're dealing with some very, very dark spiritual metaphysical aspects of life. I believe in God, I believe in the dark side, that they all exist. And so to delve into that and stir it up and explore it is interesting because we all battle with good and bad, good and evil.
Most of those films you named infamously had creepy productions. What were the vibes like filming Longlegs?
Well, not a lot of creepy vibes that I encountered. But you're right—Exorcist, there's a whole lore behind that that people were dying while they were filming it and everything else and a lot of the cast died mysteriously. I don't know if that was just hype or if it really happened, I don't know. But no—I credit Oz, because he is so lighthearted and funny, to really keep the set just light and have that levity the whole time. But come “action,” then you got to go in, play that part and you play it well and do what you got to do. But nothing too crazy jumped off while I was there.
The ending is dark but also kind of ambiguous. What is your take on it?
See, here's the thing. I have a lot of artists in my family. My mother's an artist, my brother's an artist, my brother-in-law's an artist—they'll always tell you when they paint: "It's your interpretation." What does it mean to you? So I think it's a stroke of genius, really, when you can write something [open to interpretation]—because the worst thing you can do is you have a great film and then the ending bombs and the audience walks out confused or feeling unfulfilled. I think he gives enough answers in the end but leaves a lot really to you. And that always gets me off when my brother and others would say that, because you did mean something. But it really is meant to be your interpretation.
But I'll tell you this, one of the things, I think this is what is unnerving to a lot of people, is that part of the message is that evil persists. I'll add an addendum to that: goodness and righteousness exist and persist as well. But in this movie it's that forever battle between good and evil. So at the very end you really realize that evil was not stomped out, but that it’s a part of the world. That battle will continue for time immemorial.
Yea but it’s also like, especially watching it a second time, I'm practically yelling at Lee to stop your character from going into the kitchen. She gets there early enough to maybe prevent everything!
I’m not sure what Maika would say about this, but I just got the sense that she had too much going on. I mean there's her boss, but what trumps all of that is her mother's right there on the couch. Her mind is dealing with her mother, and also this child and whatever [my character’s] going to do, he's going to do it to his wife. You got to make a choice. Do I save this child to my left or my mother in front of me on the couch and what do I do first? And I think that moment really is about her mind racing, trying to figure out. There's that going on here, but there's the girl with the doll and that's your crazy mother sitting on the couch. What are you going to do? What are you going to do?
That's a fair read. I don't know how much you pay attention to the discourse, but the movie is stirring up a debate among horror fans about what makes a film “scary”— jump scares versus dread, an unsettling vibe. The movie isn't heavy on jumps, which I feel like some people maybe were expecting going into it. Where do you land on that schism?
Listen, as a creator and as a fan, I don't think it's either/or. I think it's both/and. There are a handful of jump scares in Longlegs, but you're right, the word you used is what I hear more than anything associated with this film, that sense of dread. I love the fact that Oz did a lot of wide angles so I could be looking at Frazier but also looking over here—so what's happening? What's coming around that corner? It's like constantly wondering what's going to happen next.
But to answer your question, I don't think it's dread or jump scares. I think it's both. Then when you can do it, well put together, it's even better. But I prefer the dread. The jump scares can be fun. Those are the Saws, which I love, Screams, which I love, but it's a different style. The ones I love like The Exorcist and The Omen, really, and Rosemary's Baby, those are the ones that just..it stays. It's in your head more than your heart. Rosemary's Baby, you never saw the baby, by the way. So it's what you don't see, what could be coming, what they might show you, is what scares you.
You're directing your own upcoming thriller. Did you take any cues from your Longlegs experience?
I actually already shot that one before I did this—but I'm always taking notes. I'm always watching directors and storytellers and how they do it, because everybody's got their own flavor, their own rhythm, their own style of doing it. So, yeah—definitely always taking notes. I learned a lot on this film, watching Oz and the DP. This will be my second feature film. It's called Viral and we're in the throes of selling it right now, so we'll see.
The big thing people are coming out of Longlegs debating, of course, is Nic Cage and his performance. You don't technically share a scene, but did you interact with him at all on set or get to observe?
No, I met Nic Cage maybe 20 years ago on set, but he wouldn't remember. It was so brief. I didn't meet him on the [Longlegs] set. But there was such a buzz on the set. Oz, he was telling me what he's doing and from a creative actor's perspective, I was just excited. He said, "Man, he doesn't look like himself, doesn't sound like himself, and he's come to play." Also Nic Cage is a producer on the film, so he is very invested in this to make it different and special and I think by far, he did that.
I was excited to see what he was going to do, although I didn't [actually] meet him until the red carpet. He could not have been kinder, nicer and magnanimous and I had so much, I want to say to him, complimenting him. He was a great guy.
There is that scene in the movie where we watch him on a TV monitor. That was the first time I really saw him and saw what he was doing with the character and bringing Longlegs to life, and I was like, "Ooh, he's going to scare some people with this." That's what Longlegs has to be to make it work, right? Films [like this] are only as good as the villain.
Silence of the Lambs is the movie that’s getting cited the most often as a forebear, but were there any other movies you looked to for inspiration, especially with regards to the dynamics between Maika’s and your characters?
Fallen is [one that isn’t] mentioned much.
The Denzel movie?
Yeah. In terms of spirits, the supernatural aspect of the movie. There are threads and shades of that. And that detective in the first Exorcist—I don't remember the actor's name. He had a raspy voice and it was very natural and you just felt like you were watching some documentary, it wasn't an actor acting, he was just trying to piece it together. He was really somebody that I thought about a lot.
Switching gears, I don't know if you realized this, but Sex and the City is having another resurgence. There are a lot of people rewatching it and a lot of people discovering it for the first time. Do you still get recognized for it when you go out?
All the time. All the time. Yeah, I think it's one of the best decisions I ever made, to do that [show], because it stands the test of time. People love that show and love it. Where are you, Frazier? Are you in New York?
I'm in LA.
So my youngest son lives in New York, and for the last year he's living the New York life, and I think part of that drove him to go watch Sex and the City. So he is one of those people you're talking about who discovered it, watched all six seasons of it—fast forwarding through my love scenes. I said, "You don't want to see that." But he loved it.
That's the beauty of what we do. You do stage work in theaters, a friend of mine said it's like watching the shore wipe away handwriting in the sand. The beauty of doing camera work is you do it once, it's committed to film, and it lasts forever.
It’s always interesting when people rediscover things, because characters and plot points get re-litigated. At the time, people wanted to see Miranda and Steve reunite, but a lot of the people watching it now are saying, "Blair got done dirty a little bit."
Got done dirty! That's right. Wasn't the first time.
Would you be open to going on the spinoff if they called you?
Absolutely. Absolutely. That was such a great gig and Cynthia Nixon was just incredible to work with. I mean, when I was cast, I was living in LA at the time, they're shooting scenes in New York and she got my number from production and called saying, "I'm sitting here with all the girls and we just heard you’re coming on the show. I just want to say welcome, can't wait to meet you and shoot next week." That kind of magnanimous stance and generosity is something I respect and appreciate. So yeah, if they called again, I'm sure the storyline would be with Miranda. I wouldn't mind doing that again. But…I got done dirty.
You mentioned this is your first time doing horror after all these years. Certain actors sometimes feel like they get typecast after a while, but do you feel like you're finding new experiences as you move on?
Yeah, no, absolutely. This is a new pocket for me, as you said. And it's the one thing I fought against all my career. There's longevity, after 39 years being in the business, because I didn't stay in one lane or allow myself to be locked into one lane. A lot of that means you got to be willing to say no to a lot of projects. People want to slot you in one type of character, one genre. But no—I just feel like there's so much more to do, man, and much more direct than I want to do. I've never done a romantic comedy.
Wait, what? That's hard to believe.
Yeah, man. I've done a little bit on TV, like New Adventures of Old Christine with Julia Louis Dreyfus. But no, there's still too much to do. There's still so much to do, man.