‘The Monkey’ trailer: ‘Longlegs’ director Osgood Perkins takes on a Stephen King classic [Watch]
Hot off the success of “Longlegs,” writer-director Osgood Perkins is already back with another supernatural horror flick. On Tuesday, Neon released the kooky and disturbing trailer for “The Monkey,” which hits theaters early next year. The trailer has a darkly funny tone, but it also contains the image of a baby carriage on fire.
“The Monkey” is based on a 1980 short story by Stephen King that was included in his classic collection “Skeleton Crew.” The story follows twin brothers Hal and Bill, who find a creepy old monkey toy in their attic. When mysterious and gruesome deaths start happening, they get rid of the toy. They grow apart over the years, but they’re brought back together when the monkey comes back. The brothers are played as a child by Christian Convery (“Sweet Tooth”) and as an adult by Emmy nominee Theo James (“The White Lotus,” “The Gentlemen”). The cast also includes Emmy winner Tatiana Maslany (“She-Hulk,” “Orphan Black”), Elijah Wood (“The Lord of The Rings”), Laura Mennell (“Batwoman”), Sarah Levy (“Schitt’s Creek”), Rohan Campbell (“The Hardy Boys”), Colin O’Brien (“Dear Edward”) and Corin Clark (“Upload”).
The film is produced by horror maestro James Wan (“The Conjuring”), along with Michael Clear, Dave Caplan, Brian Kavanaugh-Jones, and Chris Ferguson. It’s the second collaboration between Perkins and Neon, following “Longlegs,” the Satanic panic horror movie that’s become Neon’s highest-grossing film of all time and the highest-grossing independent film of 2024, earning over $100 million at the box office against a budget of less than $10 million. “The Monkey” is coming out approximately six months after “Longlegs,” which premiered in July.
If “The Monkey” is a hit, it will be the greatest horror back-to-back since Ari Aster’s “Hereditary” and “Midsommar” came out a year apart in 2018 and 2019.
“The Monkey” opens in theaters on Feb. 21, 2025.