Of Course Liam McPoyle From ‘It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia’ Wrote A Movie About Stabbing
Fan-favorite It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia guest star Jimmi Simpson is making his scripted feature screenwriting debut with a horror-dramedy called Slay — hopefully it will be as terrifyingly funny as the time when he gave the Gang Stockholm Syndrome.
Beyond his recurring role as one-half of the incestual and sweaty McPoyle brothers on It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Simpson is one of the hardest-working actors in Hollywood, whose lengthy list of IMDb credits is only dwarfed by Danny DeVito when it comes to the central Always Sunny cast. With so much experience in TV and film, the Westworld, Black Mirror and House of Cards star inevitably had to try his hand at some behind-the-camera work, choosing to write his first feature film about a topic he knows well from his Always Sunny days: getting stabbed.
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According to Deadline, Simpson’s project Slay, which just wrapped filming this week, will tell the story of “seven high school seniors whose weekend of backstabbing turns literal.” Hopefully they brought plenty of milk.
“I wrote Slay about that moment in adolescence where you realize your friends know how to hurt you better than anyone else,” Simpson told Deadline of the inspiration behind his milestone movie, hinting that he may have some experience with emotional battery despite being left out of CharDee MacDennis. “Slay lives right there — but with sick music, jokes and stabbings.”
The film’s director, Kyra Elise Gardner, added, “I think horror, at its best, reveals what we can’t say out loud to each other. This movie let me explore that, not with cruelty but with character — through girls trying to be women and boys trying not to be afraid.”
Gardner, who very possibly would accept a nice egg during a trying time, admitted, “It’s always fun for me when fake blood is involved.”
Despite both the screenwriter and director’s fascination with emotional and physical violence, Slay will be a very different beast from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia — neither the McPoyles nor their longtime adversaries have ever thought anything cruel that they couldn’t say out loud at a deafening volume.
