Posted in: Exclusive, Horror, Interview, Movies, Paramount Pictures | Tagged: Miles Koules, oren koules, trust

Trust Producers on Director, Sophie Turner, Celebrity Culture & More

Producers Oren Koules and Miles Koules spoke to Bleeding Cool about their latest survival thriller, Trust, Sophie Turner, celebrities, and more.

Oren Koules has been active in Hollywood for nearly 30 years, producing TV and films, starting with the Sony TriStar rom-com Mrs. Winterbourne and New Line Cinema crime thriller Set It Off in 1996. Some of his biggest signature hits are Lionsgate's Saw franchise and CBS's megahit sitcom Two and a Half Men. Joining him on his producing ventures is his son, Miles Koules, as the two formed Koulest Productions in 2022, and one of their first projects together under the banner is the survival thriller Trust. The film follows a Hollywood starlet (Sophie Turner) who retreats to a remote cabin to escape the backlash of a scandal she finds herself in, but she's not alone. Betrayed by the man she trusted most, she's trapped in a brutal game of survival. She can hide, but she can't run. The Koules spoke to Bleeding Cool about director Carlson Young, Gigi Levangie's script, how Turner's life made her perfect for playing lead Lauren Lane, celebrity culture, and co-stars.

'Trust' Producers on Bringing Survival Thriller to Life, Why Turner Was Perfect for Lauren

What was intriguing about 'Trust?'

Miles: What intrigued me initially about reading it was that there are some great layers to the story. Not only is it scary, but you're also nervous and laughing. You're also coming away with a deeper message and something that is scary and real in today's world.

What did you like about Carlson's vision and Gigi's script?

Oren: Given Gigi's relationship with Hollywood, she had great insights into what happens in the industry. Carlson, before we talked to her, we watched the movie she made Upgraded' (2024), which was a tremendous romantic comedy. I think romantic comedies are the hardest movies to make because if you miss them, you have nothing to fall back on. She crushed 'Upgraded,' and the fact that both she and Sophie were child actors, they understand a little bit about the subtlety of that. They had a great relationship because of that, and we got lucky.

What made Sophie perfect for the role of Lauren?

Miles: Anytime you have someone like Sophie Turner respond to the material you send, it's obviously a blessing, because she's such a talented actress for anything. I felt she fit our film perfectly. You use the term "art imitates life," but she's a mom and gets some criticism sometimes from the internet about being a mom, because she doesn't post about her kids. She is, by far, at my age, the best mom I've ever seen. Everything she did was through production, before and after, her kids always came first. Her being a mom, being someone going…

Oren: I'm going to interrupt you for a second…[I wanted to add] and planning for production, even before she started. All her planning and everything we did was based on her schedule, not in a heavy-handed way, but in a logical way, with kids in between traveling. Everything was…she was great, because it made our lives easy, because she laid it all out for us before we started.

Miles: Anyways, that obviously [she's] going through a very high-profile divorce at the time, and being a child actress, I think she felt a lot of similarities to this character, and I think it was a way for her to express emotions she was feeling in her own life, and have them flourish on the big screen for us.

As far as the commentary on 'Trust' being how audiences look at celebrity culture, the obsession with people's lives, and how it has grown more in the social media age. Can you speak on those themes?

Miles: It's funny, I talked to someone about this the other day, with the scare or the horror in the movie at a surface level is her being trapped in this room and having people coming there to kill her. However, on a deeper level, the real horror is the fact that the world today and the celebrity worship, or whatever you may call it, is so real that she felt the need to escape from everyone in her life and get away in the first place. Since in the real world, where that's not such an apparent issue, you'd be comfortable with the people around her. She wouldn't have a paparazzi hounding her house every time she goes out. She'd be able to trust her agent, assistant, and her co-stars, and these things were her life. The real scary part is that she felt like she couldn't trust anyone, and had to go there in the first place.

Can you talk about some of the stars in the cast, like Billy, Peter, Katey, and you know what they bring to the film?

Oren: It was interesting, we saw the movie a couple of weeks ago in a theater in a screening, and it was amazing. The little bits of humor in the movie, the people caught seeing Peter Mensah. It was about a 400-seater, the Paramount Theater, the big one on the lot, and seeing Peter Mensah do his couple of speeches in there with the sound and the size, he was incredibly intimidating. You can't say enough about Katey Sagal. She brought a little bit of humor. Growing up, all of us watched her between [her scenes]; she was tremendous. Miles, you want to take care of the three boys?

Miles: Katey brought so much levity to the film, while such intense things are happening to Sophie in that room. Rhys Coiro, Forrest Goodlock, and Gianni Paolo were perfect together. It's almost like they've been planning their own separate sitcom for a long time in that room. They were awesome, and Billy Campbell, it's a difficult role to play. You're in a position where you're the bad guy, and you're a gross one at that. I thought he just crushed it, too. I'd love to take some credit for it, but we got lucky with putting together an intricate, cool group of people to support Sophie. It is an ensemble cast, so we worked hard at it, and it worked out.

Talking about the celebrity themes of the film, I was wondering if there was also some subtext as far as the sitcom culture, and the dysfunctional behind-the-scenes nature of that?

Miles: I can take it. It's just basically, "You know what?" When you have someone like Billy Campbell, who's Sophie's dad on their show, when it's a sitcom that's going for a long time, she's obviously been on it since she was 13 years old. It was the best example we could give of a show where there's that kind of relationship, and it would run for that long. It has nothing to do with sitcoms in itself. It has to do with her being groomed by this guy and playing her daughter on the show for such a long time. I think a sitcom illustrates that relationship better than any other show could.

Republic Pictures and Twisted Pictures' Trust, which also stars Renata Vaca, is available in theaters.

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