Wiccan comedy film King Knight is set to premiere at the Fantasia Film Festival tomorrow, August 8, 2021. The film is directed by Richard Bates, Jr. and stars an ensemble cast that includes Matthew Gray Gubler, Angela Sarafyan, Andy Milonakis, Kate Comer, Johnny Pemberton, Josh Fadem, and more.
RELATED: King Knight Exclusive Key Art From Richard Bates Jr.’s Comedy Movie
“King Knight is an outsider’s outsider comedy starring Matthew Gray Gubler and Angela Sarafyan as Thorn and Willow, husband-and-wife high priest and priestess of a coven of witches in a small California community,” says the official synopsis. “When Willow unearths a secret from Thorn’s past, their lives are thrown into turmoil in this kooky, clever treat, decked with a wild cast that includes Nelson Franklin, Johnny Pemberton, Barbara Crampton, Ray Wise, Andy Milonakis, and the voices of Aubrey Plaza and AnnaLynne McCord.”
ComingSoon Editor-in-Chief Tyler Treese spoke to King Knight star Andy Milonakis about his return to acting, his love of Anthony Bourdain, meeting Kanye West, and much more.
Tyler Treese: King Knight is a really funny film. It’s really interesting and it has a unique setting with the Wiccan culture. Were you familiar with that before filming? Did you get into witchcraft any?
Andy Milonakis: No, not really. I’ve seen some movies about it and stuff, but I didn’t really ever do too much digging or research outside of seeing some movies.
What really attracted you to this film?
I’ve always just liked really absurd stuff. I always loved … I know it’s kind of too general, but I just think a lot of independent movies are kind of more like you could see the character and breathe a little bit and you can kind of get more invested in them than some of the big Hollywood things that are out. I like dark comedies, just like weird shit and it just seemed to fill all those boxes.
With your Twitch being such a big success and your other outside ventures, you don’t really have to act. Can you talk about having that ability to be selective with your roles and just only taking projects that really appeal to you?
I kind of feel like I would do a lot more acting if the whole process, like I know people work hard and it’s their one dream to be an actor. It was never really my dream. I kind of fell into film, fell into that type of stuff by making weird videos of myself. When I was in LA doing the whole auditioning, when I used to go to auditions every other day, I really hated the process. I felt like a lot of times I was reading stuff that I had even no hope of getting because of the characters they were looking for. There’s a lot of cattle calls and stuff like that.
But it’s nice to once in a while people ask you to do something or maybe audition for something that you actually are really into. I didn’t audition for this, but if I did get a role like this, I would definitely feel confident in auditioning for something that I thought I would actually be good in and thought that it would actually fit me. You know what I mean? Wwith Hollywood and you have to like take a million shots to get one role here and there. I feel like you’re, you know, a piece of cattle readings roles that are not right for you and don’t fit you at all. It’s just kind of soul sucking. But I really liked working on this film and then it kind of is inspiring me to want to do more.
Kate Comer plays your significant other in this film and that relationship is so fun and delivers some really funny moments. How was it just working with her and forming that very funny relationship?
Yeah. I thought she was really fun to work with. I really liked how she was kind of gentle, but like very stern. The way she delivered her lines and stuff. She was definitely fun to, to act with. I thought it was a fun pairing too.
King Knight has a surprising amount of heart and it’s funny. The themes are kind of presented in an outlandish way, it’s “everybody has poop in there butt.” It’s just so ridiculous, but were you surprised at just how much heart was in that script?
Yeah. I feel like I’ve found the heart in the movie more by seeing it. When you read something so odd, it’s kind of hard. I mean, you can see it on the page, right? But like the tone of the movie, you just need to see a finished product with the music and the editing and all that. I really like how it all came together, but it was nice because there are polarizing independent movies that feel kind of sluggish and kind of feel like a little stagnant. I feel definitely having the movie have heart and kind of be kind of like just weirdly quirky at times was just nice.
Matthew Gray Gubler is great in the lead role. Can you talk about just working with him and then there’s this whole subplot in the movie with the sword that’s hilarious.
He’s really funny. He killed it and the amount of big monologues he had to master in one shot was like, I just saw him work, man. The guy’s definitely a genius. I know in Criminal Minds he had to do crazy stuff like that, but I’m like such an amateur compared to him. Like I get a couple lines here and there, I’m trying to make sure I deliver them in a serious way without fucking it up. Then I see his stuff and he’s just got like a whole page filled with paragraphs and he has to rehearse and memorize and also deliberate until it’s [done]. He’s something else. I wish I could even consider doing something so difficult.
In some of your early work, there was a lot of shock value in you looking so young and saying outrageous things In King Knight, the character work just kind of speaks for itself. You’re not typecasted here as a certain type of character because of how you look. Was that a more interesting role for you just because you were allowed to just be the character rather than being forced into any molds like that?
Yeah. Especially because of like some of the stuff that I’ve done in the past. I rap, I’m into hip hop, and stuff like that. So the reason I got cast in Waiting… was because they saw my rapping on the internet. So they cast me as that white rap kid. Then further stuff that I’ve done in entertainment kind of led me down that line where I got typecasted, that type of stuff. So definitely cool to that not be a part of it and just kind of get to be this quirky, weird guy with a wife. That was nice. I want to do more stuff, but obviously not exactly the same, but something similar. Just like in the weird quirky movies where I’m just like, oh, he’s that guy. Not just have to be the young guys.
Kanye West has an album coming out. I saw that you had a funny Kanye story when you were working at Jimmy Kimmel. His security wouldn’t let you on the stage. Can you talk about that?
Yeah. To be fair, Kanye was about to perform. So the security was just blocking the stage and he’s like, yeah, Yeezy’s about to go on. I didn’t even see that Kanye was right behind him. Kanye saw me and pushed the security guard aside and was like, “Nah, let him up,” and he let me up. He just complimented me on my shirt. He just liked the shirt that I was wearing and I just told him I’m a fan and then he went on stage, but it was just a quick little interaction, but it was kind of cool that I got to quickly meet him and that he vouched for me to let me on the stage.
Yeah. That’s the only vouch you kind of need in life is from Kanye.
It’s cool. You don’t know if he’s seen your shit before or if he’s just being nice, but it’s kind of cool either way, you know?
I’ve seen on your Twitter that you’ve been traveling so much. I know Anthony Bourdain really inspired your love of travel and you have this wonderful tattoo. Can you just speak to why his show was so moving to you?
Because there are a lot of travel hosts and people travel the world and they do it in these TV shows and in such an overly saccharin, like a Disney way. He’s the opposite of that. And not only is he the wise ass and kind of the opposite of those Hollywood, Disney types that are doing travel shows, being real corny. He’s not only the cool guy that you wanted to travel with, but also, I mean, all the narration, the way they sum up each place they go, it’s poetry, man. He really nailed all that stuff. It was just really cool getting to see him travel and live vicariously through him going to all these places. It definitely really sparked my interest to do it.
You had this great role in Adventure Time playing N.E.P.T.R. Do you want to do more voice acting and how was your time on the show doing that role?
I love voice acting. I definitely want to do more and some of my favorite stuff to do is to go in the booth and deliver lines and see it animated. I think a lot of people probably have that dream. I’m a huge, huge fan of a lot of the people on that show. The fact that I get to be in the same room with Tom Kenny delivering lines with him and just reading lines with Spongebob. Like, what the fuck? You know what I mean? The guys are voiceover legends. John DiMaggio, like dude, these are people that are just like in some of the best cartoons ever. Obviously that’s just my fanboy perspective, but even if I wasn’t acting with people that I was a big fan of, I just really like doing voice acting and seeing the finished product and the cartoon. It’s dream come true type shit.
Congratulations to the Astronauts that left Earth today. Good choice
— Andy Milonakis (@andymilonakis) May 30, 2020
You have the fifth-most liked tweet ever with that astronauts tweet. It was very funny, but I’m sure you didn’t expect to get a million likes, let alone three million. How do you deal with like a notification tab like that? How can you even look at Twitter then?
Well, I don’t even know how that happened, but all I know is I was about to make that tweet much longer. Then I thought, you know what? Shorter is always better with tweets, as far as performance, as far as just like how people like to see like one liners. I edited out a little bit. I remember waking up, looking at the news, seeing the astronaut thing, and then thinking about the riots and thinking about the coronavirus. I’m like, man, they escaped this rock that that’s really going to shit right now. So I just thought of that as a one-liner: good choice you got out of here. It just resonated with so many people and I never expected to even get a tweet with 10,000 likes or 20,000, like the fact that it went like that, it was nuts.
Josh Peck once called you the Andy Kaufman of this generation. Andy Kaufman was very famous for also doing a lot of pro wrestling stuff. He wrestled women, had some very famous angles. Are we ever going to see you get inside the ring, Andy?
Never. I got a fucked up leg with a metal implant in it from when I broke it in two places, but I would like to do some more weird humor and performance art because I am a fan of Kaufman. I don’t remember Josh saying that. Maybe it was when I did his podcast, but I’m a big Kaufman fan. Just not a big fan of getting hurt and being inside of a ring.