John Krasinski has explained why he chose Pig director Michael Sarnoski for the prequel movie A Quiet Place: Day One.
Sarnoski shone with his debut feature, Pig. It drew rave reviews for star Nicholas Cage and the attention of A Quiet Place writer, director, and star Krasinski.
In a feature for Empire magazine, Sarnoski revealed why Krasinski selected him as director. Unsurprisingly, it had much to do with Sarnoski’s style in his debut.
A Quiet Place Day One director handpicked by John Krasinski
According to Sarnoski, he was brought on because Krasinski liked Pig’s subtleties and felt that could be a plus for this film.
“When (Krasinski) first brought me onto the project, his directive was, ‘Can you bring some of that Pig touch to the A Quiet Place universe?’,” Sarnoski told Empire. “What he wanted was to see someone else play in the sandbox that he had created. Finding those differences was exciting. It wasn’t something that we leaned away from.”
Sarnoski goes on to point out the big difference between his prequel and the mainline A Quiet Place movies. A Quiet Place: Day One sees Lupita Nyong’o’s Samira and Joseph Quinn’s Eric as strangers thrust together in a chaotic New York City on the day the sound-hunting aliens land on Earth.
“In the first two, family was really important,” Sarnoski said. “And with that comes characters that have an established relationship. I wanted to explore what the end of the world looked like for people that didn’t have an established relationship, or a reason to care about each other.”
The beautifully understated Pig sees Nicholas Cage go on a mission to rescue his stolen truffle pig. The premise sounds like peak Cage daftness, but the result is a truly effective off-kilter examination of grief.
So, to go from that to a tentpole horror blockbuster is quite a jump for Sarnoski’s sophomore effort. He’s well aware of that, but it didn’t quell his hunger to be daring with A Quiet Place: Day One.
A Quiet Place: Day One director is not afraid to be daring
“It’s something I learned on Pig as well: don’t be scared of taking big swings and trying new things,” he says. “I could have gone into this just terrified, but I decided to just be like, ‘I’m just gonna give it a shot, hope for the best, and be daring with stuff.’”
The cast of A Quiet Place: Day One includes Lupita Nyong’o (Us), Joseph Quinn (Stranger Things), Alex Wolff (Hereditary, Pig), Djimon Hounsou (Guardians of the Galaxy), and Eliane Umuhire.
In addition to writing the prequel, John Krasinski is still looking beyond Day One. Soon, he’s tentatively set to develop a third main-series film in the A Quiet Place saga. Evidently, that will likely continue to follow the Abbott family’s lives in a world that went silent. A video game based on (and sharing continuity with) the film series is also in the works.
A Quiet Place: Day One is exclusively in theaters from June 28, 2024.
