Todd Lieberman on How ‘The Housemaid’ Became a Theatrical Hit and What’s Next for Hidden Pictures

Todd Lieberman was on a retreat when his office called, telling him to drop everything, and to read this book.

The book in question? Freida McFadden’s “The Housemaid.” He read the book cover to cover in four hours, and according to him, “didn’t see a single twist coming.” That was only the beginning. 

The film adaptation of that book opened to number one at the box office in December and became a global smash hit, launching a franchise with a green-lit sequel going into production this year. 

Lieberman is the founder of Hidden Pictures, the production banner behind “The Housemaid,” the Lionsgate thriller starring Sydney Sweeney and Amanda Seyfried that has garnered $385.9 million worldwide against a budget of $35-$60 million.  His credits go back decades, from “Wonder” and the live-action “Beauty and the Beast” to best picture nominee “The Fighter” and “The Proposal,” but “The Housemaid” is the kind of hit that reminds you what a number one theatrical opening actually feels like.

“It was really satisfying,” Lieberman tells TheWrap. “’The Housemaid’ was a homegrown project. It started as a book, and we developed it in-house, we hired the writer, we packaged it, we hired the director, got Lionsgate involved. When you’re involved from the very, very beginning, with a book that no one really even knew about, to be on that ride, it’s really satisfying.”

His office in Studio City looks like proof of what that ride produces and features costumes on mannequins, swords on shelves, a popcorn machine, a pool table and a screening room. “Enough to have fun and enjoy working,” he said.

Each project gets its own wall. At home, a completely different office, all sports memorabilia, game-worn jerseys, helmets, because Lieberman is a big sports fan.

Next up, Lieberman has “War Machine” starring Alan Ritchson premiering on Netflix March 6, and 80s IP “Voltron” in post-production at Amazon coming in 2027.

Lieberman spoke with TheWrap’s Office With a View about how it all came together. The following conversation was lightly edited for clarity and brevity.

What does a number one opening mean for Hidden Pictures specifically, not just the film?

It’s been super fun. The business and distribution has changed considerably in the past several years. COVID changed the game quite a bit. Streaming changed the game quite a bit. We just haven’t had a big theatrical movie in a few years. We’ve been working on them. So having a big theatrical film come out and have a lot of support, a lot of audience, it reminded me of those great feelings. I think “Wonder” was probably 10 years ago. So it’s been a minute.

Take me back to when you first read Freida McFadden’s book.

I was on a retreat, and I got a call from two executives who work with us, Carly Kleinbart Elter and Alex Young. They said, I know you’re on this retreat, but you really have to read this book. And I said, if you love it, let’s just go get it. They really wanted me to read it first. So I took about four hours out of the retreat and just read the book. The math of how one decides what might be great really boils down to no math at all. I didn’t see any of the twists and turns coming. I was surprised, as if I were someone who had never worked in the film business. My litmus test is always, if I’m entertained, I bet other people will be too. We offered our own money to option the book. Freida was represented at the time by an independent agency out of the UK. We then brought Lionsgate in when the price negotiated up a little bit.

When did you know you had something special?

We had hired screenwriter Rebecca Sonnenshine, and she was writing the screenplay. I had a meeting with some of the higher-ups at Lionsgate, and as prep for that meeting, I had my office pull all the stats on “The Housemaid” in terms of sales. When I looked at the data points, I was like, this book is really growing. At the time it had something like 300,000 Goodreads comments or something. I remember sitting in that meeting and saying, “guys, we have something that’s really catching on with the public.” And then Rebecca did such a phenomenal job turning the book into a screenplay. At that point, the book was cresting in sales, the screenplay had come in, and it was excellent. We knew we had something that felt a lot like a movie.

How did the casting of Sydney Sweeney and Amanda Seyfried come together?

Sydney was always someone we had talked about from the very beginning. I’d seen her in “White Lotus” and a bunch of other things, but then I saw this movie “Reality,” and I thought she was excellent in it. Before we got Sydney and Amanda, we had hired a director, and that director had worked with Sydney on something, so we brought Sydney in at that point. Then that director fell out to do another movie. I think it was 14 or 15 or 16 weeks before we were meant to start shooting when Paul Feig came in. Then we started thinking about who the Nina character could be. Who doesn’t love Amanda Seyfried? She’s kind of legendary for certain roles, “Mean Girls,” “Mamma Mia,” among some of them. We felt like, who could best play that role of someone you absolutely hate and then absolutely love? That’s a really hard magic trick to pull off. What we didn’t know, and you never know until you get into it, is what the chemistry would be like between those two. It was extraordinary.

A sequel has been greenlit. How much can you say about where that stands?

I’m wildly superstitious about talking about a sequel before the first one even comes out. We knew when we got involved that there were three books. We had read all of them. We optioned all three. But I try to ignore that stuff when you’re making the first movie, because the first movie can only be the first of many if it’s excellent. At some point during post, Paul and his producing partner were talking to me and saying, we know you’re superstitious, but do you think it’s worth getting prepared for the possibility of a second one? Reluctantly, I agreed. So we started writing the sequel before the first one even came out. I can’t really talk about where we are now, but I will say this: the script is excellent, and there’s a lot of excitement around it.

“War Machine” comes out on Netflix next month. How does that film feel different from “The Housemaid”?

Both process-wise and genre-wise, completely different. “War Machine” was a script that Lionsgate had, that Patrick Hughes had written. It’s an Army Ranger training film that turns into essentially an alien invasion movie, with an incredible amount of soul. I had been tracking Alan Ritchson for a while, certainly from “Reacher.” This guy who is both handsome and imposing and funny, with a massive sense of emotional, empathetic understanding. I called Patrick and said, I just feel like Alan Ritchson would be amazing for this role. Patrick studied up on him, agreed, we went out to Alan, and he signed up immediately. He said, I’ve been looking for this role my whole life. We had a few interested buyers and bidders and ended up going with Netflix. Alan is the definition of all in. He gives everything of himself for the film, and so many of the stunts were done by him.

That relationship with Ritchson continues into “Thornton.”

This “Thornton” film is a true story about Navy Seal Mike Thornton and Tommy Norris during the Vietnam War, with Patrick Hughes directing and Alan starring. We’re filming it right now with Amazon. That’s the beauty of what we do. In the “Housemaid” scenario, we get to make another one. In the “War Machine” scenario, we essentially get to make another one, just a different movie, but with the same group.

You’ve also got “Voltron,” “Robin Hood,” the Def Leppard documentary. How do you manage a slate that wide?

I have an incredible team. Alex Young is the president. Carly Kleinbart Elter is our VP. We have Nicole Bryant, who’s our Director of Development, and Aydan Cohen, who’s our Creative Executive. And my wife, Heather, who works at the company, who’s a longtime producer and amazing creative. She does a lot of the logistics but also serves as another creative eye. I just trust every single person on the team. “Robin Hood” is a perfect example. John Glenn is an old friend of mine. He called me up one day and said, I wrote a spec on the true history of Robin Hood. I read it and thought it was incredible. I was like, this is like “Batman Begins” for Robin Hood. We decided rather than taking it down the traditional path, let’s figure out another way to make this show. We ended up budgeting it in Serbia, came up with the entire plan, took it to Lionsgate, and ended up doing a deal with MGM+. A 10-episode series that went straight to series.

You had a massive streaming hit with “Shotgun Wedding, and now a massive theatrical hit with “The Housemaid.” Do you think about those differently as a producer?

Not really. We try to tell the best story possible. If I feel like I’m falling in love with something, I feel like other people will too. The best distribution mechanism for a story might be different. “Shotgun Wedding” becomes the number one movie of the year for Amazon. “The Housemaid” becomes, I’m going to assume, one of the number one movies for Lionsgate worldwide. Both very different, both equally finding an audience. Getting people off their couch to the movie theater takes a little more energy and effort than it used to. The Lionsgate marketing, publicity, and distribution teams did an extraordinary job of creating an event out of that movie, and we had the goods to make it an event.

What was the founding idea behind Hidden Pictures?

The business was shifting quite a bit, and the days of having a conventional studio deal where making a movie was a given just wasn’t happening anymore. It became clear to me that there were opportunities to figure out other ways to get things made. Documentaries were part of it. Doing television in a different way was part of it. Expanding genres on the feature side was part of it. Hidden Pictures is kind of a reference to the idea that each story, you uncover something. Through the course of telling these stories, you unveil the hidden truths, the discoveries of the people, the places, the ideas. That might be a little corny, but it’s the truth. The bar is that we have to be in love with it. Getting something made is very hard, so you have to love it. If we love it, we know it’ll get made. Whether that’s a documentary, a streaming movie, a theatrical film, a podcast, a series, a limited, all of those things are possible, as long as we love the story.

“War Machine” premieres on Netflix on March 6.

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