William Brent Bell Talks “Unique Mythology” Behind “Pretty Twisted” ‘Lord of Misrule’

Lord of Misrule, directed by Orphan: First Kill filmmaker William Brent Bell, is a horror feature that both CinemAddicts co-host Eric Holmes and I recommend. Rebecca Holland (Tuppence Middleton) is a the new priest of a small town. When her daughter Grace (Evie Templeton) goes missing during the harvest festival, Rebecca is determined to find her daughter. Holmes interviewed William Brent Bell, and the filmmaker talked about the interesting mythology behind Lord of Misrule!

Lord of Misrule co-stars Ralph Ineson (The Witch) as Jocelyn, a mysterious man who has a deep influence on the townsfolk. The battle of wills between Rebecca (Tuppence Middleton) and Jocelyn is one of the film’s strongest elements. The third act, when Rebecca gets closer to the origins of Grace’s (Evie Templeton) disappearnce, is downright scary and horrifying.

Below is Eric’s full interview with director William Brent Bell. Let us know your thoughts on Lord of Misrule!

I’m here with William Brent Bell, the director of Lord of Misrule. I don’t know if you’re familiar with the game Blood on the Clock Tower, but I got heavy vibes off of that. I really enjoyed this movie quite a bit. How did this movie come about? 

William Brent Bell: I might know that game if I looked. I think I know what you’re talking about but I’m not like a student of that game. The movie came about James Tomlinson, my producing partner on this movie, sent me the script and (said) “you have to read this quickly, it’s really good.” Wiithin like five pages, it was like, oh yeah, this is great. And just an incredible world that was kind of created. We just developed it with the writer (Tom de Ville) from there. 

Early on in the movie there is a festival or like a Halloween festival. Later on you got people coming over it seems like for like a dinner party and then even kind of towards the latter half you get just a bunch of people hanging out doing things. You ever think of doing like a hangout movie like a Dazed and Confused because I think you’d really nail that. 

William Brent Bell: Oh, that’s interesting. I mean, I like Dazed and Confused. It’s one of my favorites. I love that vibe. I mean, I probably would not just do a straight hangout movie. I would probably somehow either introduce horror or turn it into a horror film in some way, shape or form, you know, just to kind of spice it up anyway. 

I love that vibe. I love working with ensemble casts and and letting them kind of let their personalities come through their characters. Yeah, I love that stuff. 

I also noticed about half your movies you’ve written and directed and half of them you’ve went with other screenplays. What goes into that decision?

William Brent Bell: The difference is sort of like early in my earlier movies, I was writing them with Matthew Peterman and we were creating them from scratch. And that’s what got me into directing the movies. 

At that point, nobody was giving me scripts anyway. It’s hard to find good horror scripts because I feel like if it’s really good, there should be a way that the writer should make it. Because that’s kind of like one thing about the genre, is it gives people a chance to make films. So it’s rare that (a good horror film script) comes across. 

The Boy was the first movie I ever made that I didn’t write. But once you get into the process, I’m just as responsible for everything. I think there were probably other directors that come in and just kind of show up and don’t change the script much, but I’m really involved. Usually I’ll do a rewrite of the script and sometimes I don’t take credit for that. 

Sometimes I’ll just work really closely with the writer because the story’s kind of coming through me. But it depends. And it’s just about time sometimes. I love creating things from scratch, and I love reading something great that hooks me like this did. 

Listen to our review of Lord of Misrule on CinemAddicts. Both Eric Holmes and I recommend the feature:

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When you’re looking at a script, what are some things that you look at where you’re like, oh, I got to do this one. 

William Brent Bell: This one was pretty easy. Immediately in Lord of Misrule, we introduce Grace (Evie Templeton), the daughter, and she’s dressed up for the festival and she pulls a lock of her hair out strangely, and then she grabs the scissors and goes outside and picks up her pet bunny and brings the scissors up to its throat. 

And then we’re intercutting the church and then we’re starting to see the festival. So immediately I was like, wow, this is really painting a world that I want to get to know more about. That’s pretty unique to me. It’s pretty twisted that the first thing that’s happening is this girl almost doing something to this bunny rabbit. That’s a good sign that the script is going to be great because (it’s) already doing really interesting things. 

It’s a highly unique mythology, but it’s also kind of steeped in history. So it felt complex and unique to me, but it also felt like kind of easy to understand and thought that was just great writing. And for me, it just was very clear. Very quickly I felt like I knew how I wanted to make the movie, which is always kind of the main thing, you know, if I feel like, oh, yeah, I’m speaking this guy’s language as well. 

What is the mythology behind Lord of Misrule?

William Brent Bell: Lord of Misrule has been around forever, I think in Roman times and Lord of Misrule was a guy who was kind of the town idiot who would get to be king for a week and just have a great party for the Feast of Fools. And then he would be executed. 

That legend carried on to different countries for hundreds of years. And we did a change on it to where now the Lord of Misrule is kind of the hero of the town, who chases the demon out, and the demon is something that Tom (de Ville) created. 

I thought when I first read about it, I thought it was pulled from something else, some other legend. But it’s not. It’s even a hard word to find even, but generally like the story of a spirit God that lives in the forest that takes your children. They’re themes we’ve played around with before, with stories, certainly scary stories. 

This one was pretty unique. And there’s so much more to mythology in this one. That’s the the basics, I think. 

You’ve also assembled a hell of a cast. How did you cast your ensemble? 

William Brent Bell: Part of it is auditions, part of it’s just meeting with certain actors I’m a fan of, perhaps. And then sometimes it’s  like a left turn. And so, you know, with Tuppence Middleton, she was somebody I was a fan of. She was like the top of my list of actresses. And we were in the UK that I wanted to meet. 

She responded to the script and we had a great meeting. And then, you know, we had another meeting about notes and changing the script. And so she became, you know, Rebecca pretty quickly. 

Ralph Ineson was somebody I knew I wanted to be in the movie, and I’ve worked with him before, and we’re good friends. Like you said, he’s great in everything he’s in and he just, brings something kind of unique to his character no matter what. In this case, the script, we were even the script that Tuppence signed on to, Jocelyn was a 70-year-old woman. 

I went to meet with him about playing a smaller part in the movie, which seemed kind of like a waste as we got to talking. Basically I asked him if he would be interested in playing Jocelyn and who of course was a woman in the script, and he thought that was really cool.

Before I fully made it official was I call it Tuppence. And I was like, listen, are you cool? If Ralph Ineson plays Jocelyn and we make it a man and she (said) “if he wants to do that, that’s amazing.” 

And then the first thing we did, we were going to change the name from Jocelyn. And then we both decided, you know, let’s just let’s keep the way she is and not change a thing about her. Pretty much. It was a pretty different kind of way to cast somebody in a role.

What are the films you are directing down the road?

William Brent Bell: We have two movies we’re going to shoot in 2024. Both of them are going to be shot in the UK with the same crew, some of the same cast I hope. One’s more science fiction and horror. And one is pretty much horror, I guess you’d say. Or like thriller drama. 

We’re developing another movie in The Boy franchise, and it lends itself more to what you’re describing (with the Dazed and Confused reference).

One of the questions we asked everyone is we have a What’s in the Box segment. And in this box we have people put movies that are like, really personal to them. Or maybe they’re just an underseen movie, like this movie is really. Are good and no one ever talks about it. What’s the movie you would like to put in the box, or a movie I would put in the box? 

William Brent Bell: It would be The Other. It’s not The Others, which is a cool movie with Nicole Kidman. It’s a movie from 1972 called The Other, and it’s about two twin brothers growing up in this, like remote kind of farm area. One’s good and one’s bad. People start winding up dead in different ways. It’s a great movie. It’s weird. 

It was based on a novel in the same era that, like The Exorcist and The Omen came out originally. It’s just a weird, creepy movie with a huge twist. So many things about it are great. Well, weird and creepy. 

You’re speaking to my heart. I love weird and creepy. William, thanks for joining me and Lord of Misrule will be available in theaters and on demand December 8th. Congratulations and hope a lot of people see this one. I think they’ll be rightfully creeped out by it. 

William Brent Bell: All right. Thanks, man.

Lord of Misrule is available in theaters and On Demand on Friday, December 8th.