• Kirk Thatcher worked on The Muppets and Star Trek.
• Thatcher was delighted to see Werewolf by Night because he played
• Before the L.A. debut, Thatcher believed Werewolf by Night was good.

Werewolf by Night from Marvel Studios surprised us all by showing us what a real horror story in the Marvel Cinematic Universe would look like, and we can’t wait to see more of its amazing characters. Werewolf by Night was directed by Michael Giacchino, who went all in on the B-horror style and added a group of very talented stars to make his monster movie stand out. One of these stars is the Hollywood legend Kirk Thatcher, who has worked on big movies like The Muppets and Star Trek. So, when Steve Weintraub of Collider sat down with Thatcher to talk about his legendary career, we took the chance to ask what went on behind the scenes of Marvel Studios’ first Halloween special.

Werewolf by Night is about a group of monster hunters who have to kill a dangerous creature to prove they deserve to use the Bloodstone, a mythical object that can keep monsters away. One of these hunters is Jovan, played by Thatcher, a bloodthirsty Scottish brute who quickly becomes the movie’s real villain. Werewolf by Night has a lot of memorable characters, like Jack Russell (Gael Garca Bernal) and Elsa Bloodstone (Laura Donnelly), but Thatcher’s performance as Jovan made him a fan favorite. However, the star reveals he didn’t know what he was getting into when Giacchino asked him to participate in the project. Thatcher didn’t even realize he was doing more than just a cameo. According to the star:

“When Michael was asking if I wanted to be in the movie and I said, “Yeah,” he said, “Well, work on your Scottish accent and grow your hair and beard out.” I said, “Okay.” So then, as the script was developing, I said, “Do I have any good scenes?” He goes, “You have a really good death.” I didn’t know what that meant. He said, “You’re going to have a really great death scene.” I said, “Well, okay, if I’m going to be killed, as long as it’s good.” He goes, “No, no, it’s really good.” I’m like, “All right.”

For a long time, the only thing Thatcher knew about him was that he was from Scotland. Says Thatcher, “I just knew enough to not ask because I didn’t want to know things that I could accidentally spill.” Marvel Studios is very careful with their secrets, and Thatcher’s experience in Hollywood helped him understand that he wouldn’t find out about details until he was on set. But, over time, Thatcher started to learn more about his personality. He tells us the following:

“So about a year ago, I went in for wardrobe fittings, and I didn’t know anything about my character, so I showed up, and then here’s a black kilt and a black leather jacket covered in belts. There were earrings and nose rings, and rings and gloves. (…) So there I was, and that’s all I knew. I was holding an ax. So I said, “Okay, I’m some sort of Scottish Viking-kind of letter-bound bad guy.” But I didn’t know anything until two days before I got on the plane to fly to Atlanta, and that’s when he sent me the script.”

Even two days before filming, Thatcher didn’t know some of the biggest secrets of the movie because his copy of the script didn’t give him the whole picture. Thatcher didn’t know what was going on in Werewolf by Night. He didn’t even know he was going to be in a competition. Thatcher thought that the mood at Ulysses Bloodstone’s funeral was supposed to be happy, so that was the first scene he filmed. What he says is:

“We knew we were there to honor the death of Ulysses, but I thought that was it. I didn’t know there was a monster hunt, and I didn’t know we’d be killing each other. (…) I thought it was basically a funeral and wake. We’re all going to drink and have a good time, so I’m kind of more jovial. Then, when we’re sitting there, they’re like, “Oh no, you’re all fair game, and you’re going to go hunt this monster, and whoever gets the Bloodstone…” So suddenly, I’m like, “Oh, okay.” “Then I turn into the bad guy.”

Thatcher was kept in the dark until the last possible moment, so he didn’t find out he was playing a bad guy until he got to the set. That could be why Jovan is so charismatic and why so many people like him. But Thatcher’s charisma caused a few production problems, as the crew had trouble keeping up with her. “We did a day of re-shoots, which was mainly my character being more of a monster than he was.” Thatcher says, “Here’s why I made that decision: “I think what they realized is that I’m kind of more cuddly than monstrous, so they had to have me smash Elsa’s head against the stone wall three times, so you’re like, “Oh, okay, we want this guy to die.”

Because Thatcher didn’t follow the script, he had to put in a lot of extra work behind the camera to learn the stunts he had to do during his fight with the other hunters. Because, when Thatcher wasn’t on set, “a lot of my time was stunt rehearsals, learning how to swing the ax so it looks good on camera and how to shove someone’s head into a wall without actually shoving their head into a stone wall.”Even though it was very confusing at first, Thatcher says “it was fun” to work on Werewolf by Night and that he’s really proud of the movie he helped build.

Thatcher was excited to see Werewolf by Night for the first time because he had worked so hard to play the role of Jovan. As the star tells us, the first time he saw the movie was in a theater. “It didn’t even have the ending yet, the ending that it has now, the last shot or the last little scene.” A lot of the post-production work, like some of Giacchino’s amazing original tracks, also wasn’t done. When Thatcher first saw Werewolf by Night, “it didn’t have that beautiful song [at the ending], but you knew it was good, and you knew that the performances were great, but everyone asked you, “Did you know it was great?” “I knew it was good, but it got so much better in post with re-edits.” In fact, the movie wasn’t finished at all, and Thatcher didn’t even know that the final version would be in black and white. He or she says, “I just thought they were showing in black and white, so they weren’t doing color correction or anything.”

Also Read

Scream filmmakers will direct reboot of “Escape From New York”

John Carpenter's 1981 classic Escape From New York will be directed by...

After seeing Werewolf by Night for the first time, Thatcher wouldn’t see it again in its final form until the L.A. premiere. Then Thatcher said, “Wow, this is a lot of fun.” Thatcher thought Werewolf by Night was good before the L.A. premiere, but it showed him he was right. In the words of Thatcher, “the cinematography was so great.” You just knew it was a good movie, but you never know. I’ve worked on projects that I thought were going to be really good, only to have people say, “Eh, it’s fine.”There was no doubt after that night because “we knew all of it was good, but to know that it tickled the audience the way it did was great.” And it’s really great to see it with a live audience.”

During our exclusive interview, Thatcher also talked about Marvel Studios’ success. She said that it’s because producer Kevin Feige and everyone else who works on the MCU love what they do. From what Thatcher said:

“That’s why everyone’s like, ‘Why does Marvel do so well?'” Why does Pixar do so well? Because it’s under the umbrella of a corporation, but it’s run by people who get it and love it. They’re not like, “I’m an MBA, I’m a Harvard MBA, and I ran a software company or a shoe company, and now I’m taking over film because they know how to market and sell.” They know their audience because they are the audience. I think that was a big part of it.