The following contains major spoilers for Season 1 of The Afterparty.If you have the season finale of Chris Miller and Phil Lord’s fantastic series, The Afterparty, on Apple TV+ and wondered when Ben Schwartz found out he was going to play the killer and how often he lied to everyone he knew, you’re in the right place. That’s because shortly after seeing the awesome finale, I was able to speak with Schwartz to talk all things Afterparty.
During the wide-ranging conversation, Schwartz revealed how he literally told no one he was the killer (which included his agent, manager, parents, and girlfriend), why Miller and Lord wanted him to play the killer, how he filmed multiple versions of the reveal in the finale, what it was like keeping the secret, how Miller gave him specific direction for certain takes to make sure key information was or wasn’t revealed, and how even if you take away the murder storyline, The Afterparty still works as a great comedy. In addition, with Schwartz currently filming Chris McKay’s Renfield, he talked about how excited he is to work with Nicolas Cage and what it’s been like filming scenes with Nicholas Hoult.
Check out what he had to say below.
COLLIDER: Are you prepared for people to be writing headlines, "Sonic the Hedgehog was the killer."
BEN SCHWARTZ: Ah, Steve, you're only the second person, that I've talked to about this. You're the first person to bring that up. Listen, my publicist Jillian is on the phone and is probably horrified right now. I can't imagine that will be the headline. But now that you said it is a very funny headline to be ahead.
Yeah.
SCHWARTZ: And I think that's part of the reason why Chris... Not Sonic, but I remember I was talking to Chris and he said the nature of who I am and the good nature and the kindness of who I am plays into the idea that hopefully you wouldn't really think it's me during it also, he was very kind. We just had a little chat on something and I think that exactly what you're saying, what people know about me helps a little bit to deter you away from, well, he's not going to play a killer, not Dewey Duck, you know what I mean?
I just spoke to Chris and Phil a little while ago. Chris told me that when he offered you the role he said you’re the killer. So, what was it like for you? Because you just touched on it. Most people don't think of you in that light. Were you like, this is the greatest role that I'm ever going to get?
SCHWARTZ: It is. You're absolutely correct. First of all, Lord or Miller emailing me or Chris email me being like, “Hey, we have a show we want you to be in. I wrote this role for you.” All of a sudden, it's like, they're top five directors for me. I was of course, whatever you want. And he said, “It's going to be a genre. Yours is going to be musical. And beyond that, you are the killer.” I literally thought in my head of, oh my God, I get to have that moment where the detective looks at me and says, “It's you.” And in my head, I was already like, I cannot wait for that moment. There's some stuff that they cut just for length, but there's some stuff where I wholeheartedly convince everybody that it's not me.
I really went for it and was like, it's not me stop doing this. I'm really going after people being like, how dare you think this, this is a part of the process. I loved it. I was so excited to do it. I was so excited to have that moment of when I finally have to admit that it's me. It was an emotional moment. There's takes where I cried during it. I would look at Zoe who plays Zoe. And she was looking at me and she would tear up because her character was telling me, oh, it's heartbreaking. You're going to jail for the rest of your life, your life is ruined. I'm watching your life be ruined right there in real time. Everybody else is laughing. So every take I would look at Zoe and that would make me cry, because she's crying at me. It was such a cool little moment.
I really wanted to nail it. I remember just thinking to Chris, I really want to do him proud so much is going into this moment. I want the audience to feel like they got what they wanted.
Have you been paying attention online? Because I don't like learning spoilers, but Chris and Phil were telling me that there was a whole Reddit thread about people breaking down every aspect of the show. Were you going into the weeds and reading what people were saying?
SCHWARTZ: If someone ats me on Twitter, I get to see it. So I didn't get to see the deep weeds thing, but it was so funny. I'm on a chain with Phil Lord and Chris Miller. I'm on a text chain with them and I sent them a picture in this. There's a screenshot in the cartoon episode. And you know, like how The Simpsons in the background it'll be like on a truck in the background, that'll be soft pillows. And that's the thing that you think is going to drop it. Then it goes into a marshmallow factory, which blows up like that type of thing. So they had all these little Easter eggs in the background of the shot in the animated episode. When Dave Franco was talking about, oh yeah, I want my cover to be a baby, but like the chiseled baby and I just took a picture of it and I said, I'm really proud to be in a show that does this.
Then Chris responded, this is literally one of the puzzles. You took a screenshot of one of the puzzles. I said, what? And he said, yeah. And then Phil and I looked at it and texted him that we had no idea how to solve it. That's so funny that you picked that frame. That frame is literally one of the puzzles to unpack and neither Phil nor I had any idea.
That's crazy. How many people were texting you while this was airing and being like, wow, because of the episode three and also trying to be like, so did you do it?
SCHWARTZ: Even when you and I talked, it has been so hard to lie to people or to bend the truth a bit. My dad doesn't know yet. My dad tomorrow will find out that I'm the killer. My mom and my dad, my dad is certain, it is Maggie. Certain it is the kid thinks it Brett and Zoe's kid. My mom thinks it's Walt and my agent and manager doesn't know. They don't know because Chris told me in the beginning, don't tell anybody. So literally nobody knows. And the funniest thing is my manager. I have two managers, Rachel and Jesse and Jesse Hara. The reason why he thinks it's not me is because there's no way I could have not told…he would've had to be aware through shooting and whatever.
My girlfriend didn't know, I would memorize my lines in a different room. So nobody knew. When it happened, I really want the reveal to be like what? My dad is going to be so shocked. I think my mom and dad are going to be so shocked, but it's hard. I had to wait to see how other people answered. When they go, when did you find out who the killer was? I'd watch Sam Richardson answer the question and copy his answer. Cause I had no idea how anybody else found out. All I know is that I found out before anybody, I was the only one that knew at the beginning.
First of all, amazing. But now you know what it must be like for the Marvel actors or the DC actors, these superhero movies to basically...like Andrew Garfield and Spider-Man to have to do all these things.
SCHWARTZ: I was literally thinking of that. I remember watching him in an interview once with my friend Josh Horowitz, I'm sure you guys are friends, but Josh interviewed him for something. And he's like, “So are you?” And he is like, “No.” I was like, if he is, this is terrible. And if he's not, this is even worse. Cause now you're saying, he's not a part of, one of the coolest movies, you know what I mean? I love that he was in it and all of them were in it. That made my day. I really like that.
Talk a little bit about when you're filming some of the scenes. Were there specific moments where Chris gave you real specific direction in terms of, you got to pull it back here or I want you to reveal a little bit more here.
SCHWARTZ: This is a great question. That's exactly correct. There's some stuff that I did myself and I would run by Chris. I said, “Hey, this feels like a good moment to do this”. And he'd be like, “great.” The one that came to mind was when I find out there's a camera in the private eyes' poster. If you rewind that episode now, which I think is the beginning of three or the end of two, I say, "Oh my God." I give myself two reactions. One is, oh my God, I'm dead. There's footage of me killing somebody. I'm so screwed. And then it's me trying to hide that and tell Sam, wait a second, I know this because then in my head it's like, okay, I'm going to find a way to erase this. If you watch that moment, you'll literally see me, give it away and be like, oh my God.
Because I realize I'm on camera. I'm killing somebody. And then I try to make it that it's around him. The other ones were Chris had a great thing. When I sing that song in the bathroom, I'm using Xavier's phone. And then I quickly changed to, Xavier's phone was always in my left pocket and Jasper's phone was always in my right pocket. So like there's two times that I use Xavier's phone. One is to sing in the shower. So I was trying and record his here. There's only five frames where you could see it, you would have to pause it and look at the five frames. The other one was when I erased the footage, I'm on Xavier's phone. So if you look, Chris was amazing and he is like cover more of the phone, so it's not obvious.
I was holding it like this, so you can kind of see the top and the black part of the top. So we kind of did hide a bunch of stuff. And there's a lot of reactions to Danner starting to accuse. You could see sometimes I get really scared. And then other times I try to like overcompensate by acting whatever. I think the more stupid we try to make him look when he didn't understand things, the more you wouldn't expect that he is literally masterminding in real time, how to deal with all this.
It's interesting because if you were to re-watch the series now, I'm sure there's so many little things that you'd pick up on. I would pick up on that I didn't notice.
SCHWARTZ: Absolutely.
What's crazy about this series, and I said this to Chris and Phil, is that even if you take away the murder aspect, the who did it, if you will, the series is still incredible because of the filmmaking and the characters. The levels of this show are really awesome. And so hard to do. Can you sort of talk about that aspect of it?
SCHWARTZ: Absolutely. Steven, I love chatting with you. I think one of the things that makes it so unique is we had this incredible DP Carl Herse and every episode has his own lighting. It has his own light. Everything is different. Romantic comedy is lit like romantic comedy. Mine is these big, bright, beautiful colors. Tracy in wardrobe would take my regular jacket and line it with different cool lining. I would have different sneakers on, cause in my episode, I think it's all about me and all that stuff. You could also see one of the little hints, even in my explanation of talking to Dave Franco about blessing my track. You can see me get a little manic a little bit when I'm asking him. You could even see me be a tiny, I just want to make it a tiny bit unhinged in that moment.
And you'll see it a little bit, but it's amazing because it works as a comedy. If there wasn't a who done it, it's still one of the funniest shows on television and it has one of the funniest casts ever constructed for television. So I think you're exactly right. The murder stuff, it's been so unique for me because I've been getting texts from friends more on this than anything I've ever done being like, “Okay, I think it's because this, I think it's because of this” and it was so fun to be a part of a show that, like I'm watching Succession every week or White Lotus every week. And before that week comes out, me and my girlfriend are theorizing and thinking, and then we're talking and we're talking to all our friends and I'm talking to my...so to be a part of a show that people were talking about that much was so fun and a huge feat.
Just to give you a little tiny piece, the musical episodes we were shooting, you would probably allot a day and a half, two days for each of those. And Chris shot almost all of them in a half a day per song. It was insane how he has an incredible crew and everybody respects them so much. And they're so kind, he has a great line. Chris has a great thing where Chris and Phil, everybody's collaborating. There's no ego to them at all. If the prop person has a great idea, they're listening to that. If one of the actors has a great idea, they're listening to that. If the wardrobe person has a way to make this scene a little bit better through their different…they hire people that are the best at what they do.
And they listen and then they are the captains of the ship to say yes or no to things, but they make you feel like you're part of something so special and you want to do well for them. You want to do well for the project because they're just good. They're just good people. And they write such good words. I was very cognizant on it the whole time. I was like, man, I want to do well, because the words are so good and he's nailing this. If we pulled this off, it could be really special.
When we spoke last time, you mentioned how ridiculously excited you were to work with Nicolas Cage because you're a super fan. I just have to ask you what the hell has it been like working him?
SCHWARTZ: He starts next week. Steve. Am I excited Steve? Yeah, of course. I'm excited. Am I very excited? Yeah, of course. He's playing Dracula in a movie where... I can't talk about my character yet, but I have tattoos. So that's exciting. I will say this, I've done a lot of scenes with Nicholas Holt and I'd seen Holt in Mad Max and was blown away cause I didn't know it was him. And then of course saw About a Boy when I started filming this. So many of my friends said, you got to see The Great. I was like, really? And so I turned it on. I am blown away by how good Nicholas Holt is. He's a movie star. He's so good in The Great, and in this, he's doing so much, it's his movie and he's incredible.
And then Aquafina is unbelievable and really funny. Then I get to play with both of them a lot and it's been so fun. Aquafina, I have been watching her career since she started and I've been in awe how quickly and how amazing, how funny she is. Nick has been around for so long. And so you kind of take it for granted how good he is, but he is so good. He's a true movie star. I think people see him in this and then he'll continue to be in anything he wants to be in.
Completely. By the way, Space Force Season 2 is real good.
SCHWARTZ: Now we're going to get to talk for Sonic? Sonic 2 is going to come out. Then you and I will sit down for longer for that.
Also, you know that Tim Miller told me how good the sequel is, which is great to hear, but yeah. Space Force season two, I talked to Greg and the season is so much better than the first one. Ken did such a great job directing.
SCHWARTZ: I was very close with Garry Shandling. I'm one of the biggest Larry Sanders show fans in the world. Kwapis is one of the huge forces that directed Larry Sanders season one. He was amazing. He has a book on directing, that's how good he is at directing.
Yep.
SCHWARTZ: He literally has a book on directing and he's so calm. It was the first time ever a director came up to me and wouldn't give me direction. He'd be like, in this moment for Tony. I mean he's in the back of this picture. Right? And I go, yeah, he goes, do you think that makes him feel? I'm not sure yet, but I mean, what do you think while he is looking at everybody else there and he is in the back, what do you think he's making him feel?
I don't know. And then he walks away and it's brilliant, because then it makes like, oh my God, he would feel terrible that he's not in the front. He would feel bad that Steve Carell is not there. All of a sudden he brings so much emotion to a scene just by asking... He's like a guru, he'd ask little questions. And he wouldn't push you either way. He'd just ask a question and then he'd leave. Suddenly, your performance is different and it's a better performance. He's a very special man.