Osgood Perkins says he made The Monkey as a comic, playful answer to a story about death—not as a grim, straight-faced horror film. He describes the adaptation as an homage to Stephen King, while drawing a personal distinction from Final Destination: in Perkins’s understanding, the events in The Monkey are impossible.
Why Perkins chose comedy for a story about death
In a Gizmodo/io9 interview with Cheryl Eddy, Perkins explained that he did not want to approach “an evil toy monkey movie with a straight face.” He added, “I didn’t want to bum anybody out.” His aim was not to remove death from the story, but to give the film a tone that could make its outrageous premise entertaining rather than relentlessly bleak.
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Perkins has described the movie as a comedy, and told Vanity Fair that he knew he had made one. He invoked Gremlins as a point of reference for the kind of audience experience he had in mind. That is his account of the film’s intent; it does not erase the horror elements or mean every viewer will classify it the same way.
How he frames the Stephen King adaptation
The Monkey adapts King’s short story of the same name. The story dates to the 1980 period and was collected in Skeleton Crew in 1985, making that collection the most direct reading companion for someone who wants to compare the source with the film.
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Perkins called the movie an homage to King. In the Gizmodo/io9 interview, he placed it alongside Creepshow and Misery as “sort of the fancifully funny ones.” He said he approached the opportunity with “humility and with reverence and with homage.” The phrasing signals admiration, not a claim that the adaptation simply reproduces King’s story or style.
What the Final Destination comparison gets at—and where Perkins differs
When asked about comparisons with Final Destination, Perkins told Filmmaker Magazine, “I’ve seen the first of the Final Destination movies, maybe.” He then offered his own distinction: “What distinguishes The Monkey from the Final Destination movies, as I understand them, is that nothing in The Monkey is possible, right?”
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That qualification matters: Perkins was describing his understanding, not laying down a definitive genre boundary. The comparison is useful at the broad level of stories in which death arrives through a chain of lethal events. But the film’s premise centers on a sinister wind-up monkey and the deaths that follow its activation, while Perkins emphasizes the events’ impossible, fantastical quality. The feature also expands the short story’s premise into a family narrative about twin brothers Bill and Hal, as described in Filmmaker Magazine.
- Mechanism: The Monkey ties its deaths to the toy and its associated events; the comparison with Final Destination concerns a different franchise premise.
- Tone: Perkins stresses comic exaggeration and a playful approach, rather than treating the resemblance as proof that the films share one genre identity.
- Story focus: The twin brothers and their family history give the feature character drama alongside its death-centered premise.
How personal loss informs the film’s humor
Perkins has connected the film’s treatment of death, sibling difference, and comedy to his own experience of bereavement and his relationship with his brother. Speaking to TheWrap, he said, “When you experience something tragic, it’s rough for a long time and then it changes.” He described having “the ability to have a comic distance” and said that felt “holistically healing, in a way.” Those are Perkins’s reflections on his own experience, not a general claim about how grief works for everyone.
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A small but visible change to the toy
The movie’s monkey plays a drum rather than cymbals. TheWrap reported that the change was attributed to a copyright constraint involving the cymbal-playing toy monkey in Toy Story 3. That explanation is the publication’s reporting; it should not be read as an independent legal finding.
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