Blumhouse’s latest film Freaky is a rare laugh-out-loud horror film. Vince Vaughn stars as a serial killer called the Blissfield Butcher, who becomes stuck in the body of a teen girl Millie, whereas the high schooler, played by Big Little Lies’ Kathryn Newton, finds herself living in the body of the 6’5 Wedding Crashers actor. It’s the perfect set up for the actors to have fun with, and they took complete advantage of this on set.
While Millie is trapped in the body of the Butcher, she hangs around the high school as a man with her friends Josh and Nyla, played by breakouts Misha Osherovich and Celeste O’Connor. With them, she discovers what it’s like to be in a man’s body – something that Vaughn ran with on set. When CinemaBlend spoke to Misha Osherovich, the actor recalled one funny scene that Vince Vaughn made up on the spot. In their words:
He’s in the stall, learning about the male anatomy for the first time as Millie and all of that was improvised. At a certain point, me and Celeste literally just stopped talking and Vince was like 'Wow, gosh, I guess this is big, I guess it splashes, huh?' And we’re like [drops jaw and laughs]. So that was really fun to listen to an improviser really nail it like that.
Freaky offers a ton of opportunities for Vince Vaughn to play around with the wacky situation his character finds herself in, one being a hilarious moment in the high school bathroom alone with the Blissfield Butcher’s manhood. Newcomers Misha Osherovich and Celeste O’Connor ended up just listening in silence as the master worked. And apparently both Vaughn and Kathryn Newton really married to the body swap bit on set. Osherovich also said this in our interview with these words:
They were both so invested and they both did so much research with each other to learn about movements – Kathryn learned the Butcher walk, Vince learned the hair flip for Millie. Truly, the only times I would really break were in the scenes with Vince. He would really surprise me because he’s such an improviser that like if you’re not ready to volley back with whatever he’s thought of, some imaginative new line and truly there were some weird ones, they’re all amazing. It was actually relatively easy not to laugh or break because you were constantly on your toes with both of them. They were both so committed and I mean that legitimately.
Kathryn Newton steals the show just as much as Vince Vaughn does as a stone cold serial killer left with his murderous tendencies in a high school full of people who bully Millie on the daily. As Misha Osherovich told us, not breaking wasn’t too hard because of how committed the pair were to embodying each other right down to their walks and little ticks.
Freaky is co-writer/director Christopher Landon’s followup to the Happy Death Day movies, another horror comedy franchise we hope to see continue with future films. CinemaBlend also spoke to Vince Vaughn on the ReelBlend podcast about why he hasn’t made many sequels and Swingers 25 years later. Check out the full podcast episode with Vaughn and see Freaky in theaters November 13.
