-You know our first guest tonight from his work
on "The Office" and "Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan."
His latest film, "A Quiet Place Part II,"
which he wrote and directed, opens in theaters May 28th.
Let's take a look.
[ Metal creaking ]
[ Fence clatters ]
[ Rope whirs, bottles clanking ]
♪♪
-Run.
♪♪
[ Breathing heavily ]
♪♪
-Please welcome back to the show and to the studio
our very good friend John Krasinski.
[ Applause ]
Yeah! Whoo-hoo! -Yeah!
Wow. -It's a lot.
-How you doing? -It's a lot.
-So good to see you. Oh, physical contact.
-Physical contact. This is a lot.
-Hey, everybody. -This is...
-Look at that guy. -They're all here -- 1, 4...
-So silhouetted. There's so many people.
-This is the definition of unfinished business, my friend.
-I mean, this is full circle. -You're our first guest,
one that I've given a hug to, since, you know, bad times.
First guest we're letting sit -- -On camera.
You're hugging people like crazy on the street.
-Oh, my God, everywhere -- in public,
in streets, in stores.
You are the first guest we're letting sit in this chair
because you were our last -- -It's true.
-You were supposed to be --
You are the last guest that canceled on us before we --
-Well, that's debatable. That's debatable.
-It was March 12th. -I got the, "Get in the car,
get out of the car, get in the car, get out of the car."
-It was the way -- I mean, we were sort of --
I think we knew it was real, because we know you to be
a solid guy who would never shirk your commitments.
And the fact that you said,
"Hey, I don't think I should come,"
we -- Shoemaker and I looked at each other and said,
"Well, I think we got to get out of here, too,
if Krasinski's out." [ Laughter ]
-"Did Jack Ryan just say we gotta get out of here?"
-Yeah! [ Laughter ]
Everybody just starts... -You did. You gave us
one of those Jack Ryan boards with the yarn going over
to different pictures. -Exactly! Exactly.
Yeah. That's what I was doing.
-The other trippy thing is, not only did you cancel
March 12th of last year -- and, again,
I want to keep saying you canceled.
-Yeah, it's really subliminal, but it's really working.
I'm feeling worse... -And I don't want to put this
on you, but you canceled, and then everything went south.
-[ Laughing ]
-I don't know if you're the first --
-I think the next day, the NBA went.
They heard I canceled, and they were like,
"Oh, my God. We're out."
-The crazy thing is, you're here promoting the same movie.
-[ Laughing ] Yes. I mean, that's really
the trippiest part. -It's Part 2.2.
-It's Part 2.2. So, this is a full 14 months
since you were supposed to release it.
-Yeah, it's the most bizarre thing to make a movie
and then not put it out, but, clearly, the world
was going through something more bizarre
than not putting out a movie, so there was very little emotion
in making the decision to not come to this show.
Now, making the decision to hold the movie was a bigger deal,
but not coming to this was easy. -Yeah.
I was like, "Yeah. Easy." [ Laughter ]
-But the other thing that must have been nice is,
if it had been the first "Quiet Place" --
I was thinking about this -- I feel as though,
'cause you had this idea that was very novel,
and no one had seen a horror movie like that,
and I think any time you have material
that you have to hold, in the back of your head,
you're thinking, "What if someone else
comes up with this idea while I have it done?"
-Yes. -So at least it was a sequel.
You'd already sort of planted the flag.
-That's true, yeah. -Yeah.
The weird part was, because people knew the movie,
I started getting texts, one of which from Maya Rudolph.
It was about three months into the quarantine,
and she goes, "All right, I get it.
We have had enough. When are the creatures coming?"
I was like, "No, no, this isn't the movie!"
She's like, "This is the movie. This is it," so...
-Were any friends asking, in this desperate year,
where people were running out of things to watch,
were they saying, "I know it's done.
Give me the movie"? -Paul.
Maya's man, Paul Thomas Anderson,
who is also my filmmaking hero, literally said exactly that.
He was like, "No, I totally get it.
It's a tough decision. Do you have a print of it?
Can you just send it over?" [ Laughter ]
And I did. -You did?
Well, that's good. There are certain people
you can't hold the line on. -Yeah, no, totally.
-And I think -- -He's also one of those people
when you call the studio, and you're like, "Can he --"
they're like, "Yep! Yes! Yes!"
And you're like, "I haven't even told you
what he wants yet," and they're like,
"We already sent it. We sent him churros,
we sent him popcorn." Like, "No, he wants the movie.
He wants the movie." [ Laughter ]
-You're actually -- You know, this is obviously
a different time, as well.
I think, had you had the premiere of "Quiet Place II"?
-We did, two days before I think I canceled --
Oh, my God. You did it -- you incepted me.
[ Laughter ] -You canceled.
-You incepted me! -Yeah. [ Laughs ]
You spun us out. -Yeah.
-It wasn't until like May that we could like say --
-Had I not canceled, you would've been doing the show
all summer long. -Absolutely.
-I would have insisted on audiences.
But you are now, because you're not doing a premiere --
you already did it... -Yep.
-...you're going theater to theater,
which is a pretty cool thing. -Well, this is my thing is,
we're so excited to be one of the first movies back.
And I feel almost a responsibility --
I had an emotional connection to it because I was
one of the last movies to almost make it to the starting line.
Then I thought I'd bookend it.
Not that anybody else cares, but I think it's kind of special.
-[ Laughs ] Right. -But if you're a fan
of the movie, I wanted to bookend the pandemic for you.
And I think the other thing for me is, it's not about our movie.
Sure, we hope you come see our movie,
but at this point in time, it's about movies in general.
It's just about getting back to the theater,
getting back to being together,
which we're going to be doing here soon, I'm sure.
And I think at the end of the day, it's something --
So we're going to all these theaters.
I've been to Cleveland, New York, Miami.
We're going to other secret locations.
And it's been awesome. I mean, just to get there
and see all these people who working at the theaters,
who have been hurting a bit, and we're --
you know, it's really nice to celebrate them
and bring them back. -This is a family affair.
Your wife, Emily, is in the film.
You appear in a flashback.
-I do. Spoiler alert. Great.
-You die in the first one.
-What the hell, man? [ Laughter ]
-Look, I'm gonna say -- Here's why I said that.
If people went a whole pandemic and didn't watch the first one
when they literally were watching everything...
-You're right, yeah. -...if you didn't watch
"A Quiet Place" this year, you're never gonna watch it.
-That's true. -But maybe if there's people
who desperately don't like you and want to see you die,
and now they know. -Wow.
-Well, then I'm saying -- -Guys, this turned negative.
This got da-- It was, like, funny dark and then really dark.
-You canceled on us! -I'm actually scared.
-You canceled on us. -Mike, come on, man.
[ Laughter ]
How is it -- I mean, we've talked about it before,
but, you know, it's obviously a very intense scene.
This is now -- I'm getting dangerously close.
I don't want to give anything away.
But how do you direct -- Because this is a very --
This is one of those shots that's very complicated,
and it seems very involved.
I'm assuming it's something you have to rehearse
for a fair amount of time. Like, how do you direct --
-Are you talking about Emily's car scene?
-Yeah. -So, the car scene that
I think is in the trailer, that was definitely
the hardest thing to shoot
but probably my proudest moment as a director.
It's one of those things where every single crew member
put their stamp and their fingerprints on it,
but we planned it for six weeks.
We rehearsed it with stunts for three weeks,
and then, on the day, I said to Emily,
"Do you want to rehearse one?" She said, "No. You know what?
I just want to experience it organically,"
and I said, "Oh, great."
So everything in that shot is actually happening to her.
She's hitting human beings -- that are stunt people --
there's a lot of cars almost hitting her -- by stunt people.
And there's a bus actually coming at her
at 45 miles an hour.
And I don't think she knew that part.
[ Laughter ] So as I close the door,
she's like, "I just want to experience it organically,"
and I went, "Okay, great." And I shut it,
and I went to the -- I saw the camera crew go,
"I don't -- I don't --" And I was like, "Let's do it!"
And they're like, "Are you sure?"
And I was like, "Did I just put my marriage on the line?"
And then the car took off. And I was like, "Wait!"
and we were rolling. -I mean, she must be happy
with the way it turned out, though, right?
-Very. -I mean, it seems like
her instincts were very good to react to in real time.
-Yeah. It was terrifying.
-Yeah. -It was very, very scary.
But the cool thing is, it's a car we build
a pod on top, so the guy on top is actually a stunt driver.
And I remember Emily said she turned to the guy,
and he said, "You okay?" and she said,
"Well, actually, my life is technically in your hands,"
and he went, "Don't worry, Ms. Emily -- I'm the best."
And she went, "Okay. That actually made me feel great.
That makes me feel really good."
-I would say that's every stuntman I've ever met.
[ Laughter ]
There's no stuntman rolls in, he's like, "I'm the 'C' choice."
[ Laughter ]
-"I'll be honest with you, Ms. Emily, I am mediocre."
[ Laughter ] "Wait. What?"
-"A few guys fell out for me to get this job."
[ Laughter ]
"I blew it. I had my meeting with John.
Blew it pretty hard. -"I'll be honest.
I just arrived on that there bus, so..."
[ Laughter ]
-But it really is -- I think it is a lovely bookend,
and I want to congratulate you for staying the course.
-Thank you. This is a lovely bookend.
It's so nice to see you. -It is.
-Congrats, by the way, since the time I was supposed
to see you, that you canceled, and then now,
congrats again on doing "SNL." -Thank very much.
That is a life goal of all life goals.
-Yeah. -And it was amazing
to actually see it happen. Everybody was like,
"We're sorry that you had to do it during COVID."
I was like, "This is amazing!" There was actually something
really special about doing it during that whole time.
-It was amazing to watch the show
and how they adapted this year,
and it was really nice to see you do it.
And, buddy, thank you so much for being here.
-Absolutely. So good to see you.
-We're gonna touch again! Human hands!
-Yes! Anybody have Purell?
[ Laughter ] -"The Quiet Place Part II"
opens in theaters Friday, or another pandemic will happen.
We'll be right back. [ Laughter ]
Well, I'm just saying.