In Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die, it's a dark night in a crowded diner when a man with a detonator bursts in, proclaiming to be from the future. This is the 117th time he’s returned with the same imperative.
Before time runs out, he must recruit a group of distinctly unqualified diner patrons (Haley Lu Richardson, Michael Peña, Zazie Beetz, Asim Chaudhry, and Juno Temple) to stop the impending AI apocalypse and save humanity from the perils of social media. The problem? Everything is stacked against them--from sceptical strangers and brain-rotted teenagers, to algorithmic monstrosities beyond their control.
But if this unlikely group can pull it off, the world might just turn out okay. Or not!
Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die is now playing in theaters, and we sat down with Juno Temple this week to discuss her role in the movie as Julie. She's been through an unbelievable tragedy and is dealing with the aftermath of that while on this bonkers quest to stop the end of the world.
During our conversation, Juno talks about how the movie's absurd style of comedy differs from her work in the hit Apple TV series Ted Lasso, working with filmmaker Gore Verbinski, and the joy of working on a VFX-heavy project after her role in 2024's Venom: Let There Be Carnage.
You can check out our full interview with Juno in the playe
Ted Lasso's Keeley is one of your most iconic roles, but this film explores comedy in a far more absurd way. What excited you to come on board and explore that?
I think first and foremost, the people that were involved with it was something that was very exciting for me. I'm a big Gore Verbinski fan. And I also think Matthew Robinson, the writer, is a genius and then the cast. I mean, Sam Rockwell has been a hero of mine, I think, for as long as I really remember. And then you know Zazie [Beetz] and Haley [Lu Richardson] and Michael [Peña] and Asim [Chaudhry]...this incredible group of really eclectic, brilliant actors. So that in itself was exciting.
Also, the fact that we got to go and film in South Africa was very exciting. But then the subject matter itself, this kind of absurd take on really important topics and exploring it through a lens that felt a little bit like going back to a sort of 80s version of the future, but whilst really talking about things that are incredibly present now and in our actual future. But doing it in a way where the absurd humor of it all kind of feels like it opens the doors for conversations about really heavy topics in a way that don't necessarily feel as kind of—it feels like the conversation is fluid about these topics of kind of like you're not focusing on one thing alone and focusing on the gravitas of that it's focusing on a combination of things in our past, present, and future that we need to keep communicating about because that's the only way we're going to heal and move forward from things and also keep learning about things.
It felt like it really did a beautiful kind of fluidity between many different topics, which I thought was really profound, especially wrapped up in this kind of mad, bonkers, wild, dark comedy that felt like a really brilliant kind of Hollywood rollercoaster of an experience. It was really kind of—I don't know if I'd really read a script that sort of felt like it was its own genre like that in a weird way.
It explores the tragedy that Susan has faced, but then in the second half of the movie, you're wearing that Viking helmet, walking around with the hockey stick, and dealing with the silliness of that. The two contrasts must have been so interesting to explore, with the darkness and lightness.
Totally. And also the kind of idea of it all stemming from a place that it felt like the movie to me was ultimately also saying, but there is still hope. You know, I think like the way it ends and the fact that it isn't fixed this time, but they don't give up. It's like there's the idea that these people might keep trying to do that, definitely, you know, the man from the future is going to, and I think there was something kind of that gave me a real positive outlook on it towards the end for that as well. And yeah, and I think also the fact that all the characters kind of interacted in this tragedy without realizing it together in a way, you know, with the same high school and the kind of how these characters sort of explore the lack of human communication still and how the movie itself is saying we need to talk about this stuff. We really do, and we need to keep talking about stuff because we don't have the answers if we don't keep asking questions, you know.
There are some big VFX moments and characters, and I know you got maybe a taste of that on the Venom movie, but to come into a film like this where you need to use your imagination on set in that way...how much fun is that for you as an actor to just play in those kinds of surroundings?
It taps into the child and youth to be like, "Wow, here is the imagination that used to drive everyone crazy when I was four years old because I was always creating people that I was inhabiting and stuff." And this is where you get to really tap into that stuff. It would be quite interesting, actually, to get the cast together and, when you're doing VFX moments like that, to ask them to each draw their version of the monster that you're all looking at and see what that version is. I think that would be a really interesting thing. And also because this cast was just so amazing all around, from like these kind hearts, brilliant brains and just openness.
It was a really joyous experience to work as a kind of ensemble cast together, you know, led by the extraordinary Sam Rockwell, who has been a hero of mine for so long and just exceeded all my expectations with wanting to be so involved with everybody and so invested in every moment. It was a really magical experience from that standpoint, too. But yeah, it was also we actually did quite a lot of stuff practically, which is where I think it kind of feeds into that sort of 80s version of making a futuristic movie, which also is nostalgic whilst you're dealing with things that are big questions for the future. It felt like a good combination of those two kinds of hybrids together, too.