Glass Onion Director Reveals Why Bill Hader Got a Special Thanks Credit

Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery was released on Netflix in December and there are plenty of exciting surprises in the film as well as fun cameos and easter eggs. If you stayed through the credits, you may have also noticed that someone unexpected was thanked: Bill Hader. Of course, Hader is best known for his days on Saturday Night Live as well as the Emmy-winning HBO series, Barry. In a recent interview with Empire‘s Spoiler Special podcast (via Collider), director Rian Johnson explained that Hader helped him flesh out Janelle Monáe’s twin characters, Andi and Helen.

“Figuring out how to get that emotional investment from the audience with Helen was difficult,” Johnson explained. “I thank him in the credits, but Bill Hader, who’s a really smart filmmaker, gave me a note on the script to say I’d written her closer to Andi in her character type. Andi was successful in her field, a big hitter like everyone else. Hader said she should be completely out of this world, she should be a school teacher or have kids, and be a fish out of water, and immediately I thought ‘that’s it’. So, having Helen show up and be a very different person and be someone that we as the audience worry about was the key, we wanted the audience to worry she might actually be killed.”

Does Janelle Monáe Sing in a Glass Onion?

Speaking of Monáe’s characters, the Grammy-nominated performer almost got the chance to since in the film. Monáe and Norton recently teased a deleted scene that fans would love to see. During a chat with Rotten Tomatoes, the duo revealed they pitched a flashback scene to Johnson that would allow them to perform a song together. According to the interview, both stars are “mega Bowie fans” and wanted Monáe’s Andi to sing “Moonage Daydream” while Norton’s Miles accompanied her on guitar. 

Sadly, the moment didn’t make it into the movie, and Johnson might not share the deleted scene with the world. “It’s such an incredible memory of this surreal late night, the best concert in the world for like seven people standing around in a basement bar in Belgrade,” Johnson explained. “It’s so romantic, I almost want to burn the footage.” 

Glass Onion is now available to stream on Netflix.