I can imagine that a significant number of young actors in Hollywood right now are feeling a smidge of envy directed at Glen Powell. After all, the guy is definitely having a moment right now, playing leads on screens big and small following his breakout turn a few years ago in Top Gun: Maverick. But just because Powell is soaring high right now doesn’t stop him from being wowed by the work of his colleagues – an example being Topher Grace’s performance as an enthusiastic megachurch pastor in their new A24 movie How To Make A Killing.
I sat down with Powell, Grace and Jessica Henwick earlier this month during the Los Angeles press day for the 2026 movie, and in the spirit of Kind Hearts And Coronets (which the new film is a remake of) and the multiple roles played by Alec Guinness, I opened the interview asking the trio what part they would have loved to play in How To Make A Killing in addition to their own. Powell gave a lot of credit to the actor sitting to his right, saying,
That's a good question. I mean, I will say that Topher's role, he did make it seem very, very fun. I didn't really read it on the page as what it was gonna be, but he was having the greatest time of his life. And I'm just like in a chair watching Topher just like chew the scenery in every way. I was like, okay, 'He's taking a thing and he's like throwing it to its fullest.'
In the new film, Powell stars as Becket Redfellow, a descendant of one of the richest families in America who has been cut off from the family tree but is still lined up to inherit a sizable trust. The only thing standing in between him and the money are various relatives ahead of him in the succession order, and so he sets about quietly knocking them off. One of these cousins is Grace’s Pastor Steven J. Redfellow, who we meet in the story while he is in the middle of a work day.
Powell had the chance to simply observe his co-star doing his thing up on a stage preaching to a packed audience, and he was taken aback by the energy he was putting out:
I came a little later 'cause you introduce his character on stage at this sort of megachurch. So I came into that theater as you were just getting going. And I was like, 'Oh, Topher is in his zone.' There is a part of you that wanted to be a megachurch guy or a self-help guru or whatever.
Topher Grace recalled the day in question, looking out on a large and engaged crowd, and he freely admitted that he got a real kick out of the whole experience:
They blew this smoke out and then I ran out and I'm high fiving like a hundred people. I mean, there must have been 2000 people in that church. And then I'm running on stage and playing guitar and then John wanted me to give a full sermon and they're gonna take parts of it. And, and yeah, you know what, yeah, (laughs) I always thought it would be fun. And, you know, it was fun.
He got the chance to really live in the shoes of his character, which must have been a super cool thing to do when filmmaking can often be a stilted process… but there apparently were some side effects to all of the actor’s exhibited passion.
According to Grace, what he was saying on stage weirdly got through to some people, and he had to do a bit of awkward de-escalation:
The funniest thing was, 'cause no one in that crowd knew that my character was gonna try to kill his character three minutes later. A lot of the background, who were great and were so nice, every single take cheering me on, after about three or four takes, they're like, 'Hey man, like, I'm really feeling what you're saying.' And I was like, 'Oooh, ahhh… I have no idea what I'm saying.’
Care to see if you too might be ensnared by Topher Grace’s gospel? How To Make A Killing – featuring Margaret Qualley, Bill Camp, Zach Woods, and Ed Harris in addition to the aforementioned Glen Powell, Topher Grace, and Jessica Henwick – is playing in theaters everywhere now.
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