Project Hail Mary, Chris Miller and Phil Lord - Directors and Producers - Interview

Chris Miller: "I know, it's pretty awesome."

Phil Lord: "It, yes, that wasn't part of the plan when we, you know, we took our bindle sticks to Los Angeles in the late 1900s, but somehow here we are."

Chris Miller: "I just feel amazing all these people so excited about the movie and we're about to see a crazy hologram thing, so who knows."

Phil Lord: "A hologram? Excuse me, we're going to be about to be visited by an extraterrestrial being. There we go, I'm excited for that. Hologram."

Chris Miller: "Are you the effects?"

Phil Lord: "Oh, what a sweetheart. Um, it takes five puppeteers, 75 animators, a bunch of lighting artists, a bunch of clay sculptors, an entire creature design team led by the incredible legendary Neal Scanlan and one James Ortiz to perform him and lead his performance and have the incredible chemistry with Ryan Gosling, who is an international treasure."

Chris Miller: "The great news was that he had the rights to the manuscript before anything, and so he was the first one on board, so we were so lucky that we didn't even have to think about who it could be because I don't know that anyone else could have done it the way that he did. He makes you laugh, he makes you cry, he makes you excited, he makes you scared. He's one of the great actors of our time and he has so much range and was so thoughtful and a great partner making this movie together."

Phil Lord: "Gosh, I mean, it was really a lot of preparation to get them there and then once they were there, they took over. You know, the spontaneity of their interaction, the genuine delight that Ryan has when he watches Rocky being performed, you know, that stuff was actually came really easily."

Chris Miller: "Right, the bond that you see between them was real because it was a real bond that was happening between Ryan and James on set."

Phil Lord: "We are attracted to stories about friendships and people who work together to solve difficult problems, because that's what we do."

Chris Miller: "It's like an animated genre-defying movie. There's comedy in it, there's animation in it, it's a drama, it's funny, oh my, it's emotional, it's super, there are twists and turns, surprise endings."

Phil Lord: "You get a full meal with this one. Yes, you get a little bit of everything. But we're not trying to like be in a genre box, you know, we're trying to tell a story inspired by this incredible book that hopefully feels like something you've never seen before. And the thing that's really satisfying about watching it with a big old audience like we're going to do tonight is to hear people laugh in the same places, cry in the same places, and to really hear big laughs in a movie and also to have scenes where you can hear a pin drop. That's like, we're really proud of that."

Phil Lord: "I would bring Chris for sure, mostly for warmth."

Chris Miller: "And I would bring Phil because I'd be very scared without him."

Chris Miller e Phil Lord hanno costruito insieme una filmografia caratterizzata da un approccio sovversivo ai generi consolidati. Oltre al loro ultimo lavoro, Project Hail Mary (2026), il duo ha diretto insieme Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (2009), che ha segnato il loro debutto nel cinema d’animazione. Hanno poi portato sul grande schermo 21 Jump Street (2012) e il sequel 22 Jump Street (2014), oltre a The Lego Movie (2014). Con Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018), hanno conquistato l'Oscar come Miglior Film d’Animazione.