Published Feb 12, 2026, 6:00 AM EST
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Summary
- Collider's Steve Weintraub talks with Liam Neeson, Joe Keery, and Georgina Campbell for Cold Storage.
- Neeson comments on a return to The Naked Gun sequel.
- The trio also discuss embracing humanity, the blend of horror and humor, standout moments, the true story that inspired Cold Storage, and their favorite Martin Scorsese movies.
Last year, Liam Neeson flexed his comedic chops as Frank Drebin Jr. in Akiva Schaffer's slapstick reboot, The Naked Gun. Now, he's back at it alongside two rising breakout stars, Stranger Things' Joe Keery and Barbarian's Georgina Campbell, in the totally bonkers sci-fi comedy-horror, Cold Storage. As it turns out, Neeson has a very particular set of skills when it comes to comedy, and if the success of The Naked Gun is any indicator, we may be getting more of it.
Cold Storage is written and adapted from his own 2019 novel by David Koepp (Jurassic Park), and drops audiences right into a military mess of epic proportions. While on the night shift, two young storage locker employees, Travis "Teacake" Meacham (Keery) and Naomi Williams (Campbell), encounter a security breach as a highly dangerous fungus escapes from a subterranean secret lab. Meanwhile, former bioterrorism agent, Robert Quinn (Neeson), is called back into action to confront this out-of-control threat before it's too late.
In this interview with Collider's Steve Weintraub, Neeson comments on his return to a Naked Gun sequel, and the trio discuss what about Koepp's script drew them into this wild project. Neeson discusses the true story that inspired Cold Storage and the humanity beneath the horror and hilarity, while Keery and Campbell share the beautiful standout moments and how director Jonny Campbell (Westworld) mastered the pacing of an oddball movie like this one. Check out the whole conversation in the video above, or the transcript below, for all this, plus their favorite Martin Scorsese movies.
Is Liam Neeson Returning for a 'Naked Gun' Sequel?
Image via Paramount PicturesCOLLIDER: I’ve got to start with the most important thing, Liam, and it's an individual for you. I love Naked Gun. You did such a great job with that. Is there any chance that you could be making a sequel to that, too?
LIAM NEESON: I have no idea. I certainly haven't been approached. I think the film did reasonably well financially. I don't know. I honestly don't know.
Well, I'm just going to put it into the world that it needs to happen because it's awesome. I just want to throw that out there. So, before we get into Cold Storage, I love seeing movies in movie theaters, and I've been asking this of everyone. For all three of you, do you have a favorite movie theater?
GEORGINA CAMPBELL: I have an AMC that is like a five-minute walk from where I live, so I'm in that all the time. That's mine.
JOE KEERY: New York has a bunch of amazing theaters. Recently, I've seen a couple at The Village East, and generally, it's based on how good the popcorn is, and they've got pretty good popcorn there.
NEESON: [Laughs] I live in a building where an AMC is in my building.
KEERY: Convenient.
NEESON: And an IMAX screen, too.
KEERY: Very convenient.
Wow, okay. I need to step up my game because you've already mastered it. My other thing that I've been asking everyone is do you have a favorite Martin Scorsese movie?
KEERY: Oh.
CAMPBELL: I love The Departed.
KEERY: I mean, amazing.
CAMPBELL: I love that movie.
NEESON: He's made so many. I did two films with him.
KEERY: I was going to say, you're in Gangs of New York, aren't you? That was maybe the one that I was going to pick…
NEESON: Silence, with Jesuits in Japan.
KEERY: You can say one that you're in.
NEESON: No, no, I was thinking, just to jog my memory. I think the Jake La Motta story, Raging Bull, because I'm a big boxing fan. I love that film. Loved it.
KEERY: I would say Gangs of New York. I think I'll say that one. That was just amazing characters in that one.
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I'm gonna go increase the runtime, increase the runtime.
'Cold Storage' Stars on Mixing Horror, Humor, and "Pucker Factor 10"
Neeson says writer David Koepp always brings it back to humanity, though.
Image via Samuel Goldwyn FilmsJumping into why I get to talk to you guys, I'm sure that for all three of you, you read a bunch of scripts. What was it about this script that said, “Oh, yes, I want to do it?” And Liam, was it because you had the line, “We were at Pucker Factor 10, Abigail?”
NEESON: [Laughs] Oh, that was the line. That's what pucker means. Look, it’s the script. Always the script. That's the foundation stone for me. It was a lovely mixture of different genres, but it always came back to the humor, which is what I loved, the relationship between these two beautiful people. My bad back. Lesley Manville, who is a dear friend. I got the chance to work with her. And David [Koepp]'s superb at that. His mind, his imagination can go, you know? Spider-Man, you name it, Indiana Jones, Jurassic Park. With this, it always comes back to the human quality. But I really admire David.
KEERY: I definitely agree. It feels like the characters start on the page in such a specific place already. For an actor, you're looking for that sort of specificity, and to have that sort of dialogue, too, along with that, it just feels like such a gift to start with. There's already so much there that you kind of can't help but want to dive into it.
CAMPBELL: I really would just be saying the same thing, which is that the script was amazing, and I really enjoyed it, and it just seemed fun and something that would be enjoyable to be a part of.
I actually have an individual for you, Georgina and Joe. I'm just curious, what does it actually cost to be in a movie with Liam Neeson? Because I would imagine you have to pay to work with him.
KEERY: Mhmm. Well, depending on the country that you're working in, I think there's a different rate. We were working in Italy, so I don't know what a transfer to a couple hundred thousand dollars is.
All kidding aside, I’d pay at least a little bit.
Image via Samuel Goldwyn Films.Actually, something that I really wanted to touch on was that a lot of times people want to play the strongest person in the room, and one of the things that I commend you on is you're always willing to get punched, or in this movie, you have a bad back. A lot of times, actors want to be portrayed in the best light. Can you talk about why it's important to you to play characters that aren't the strongest person in the room?
NEESON: Because that's life, isn't it? These characters, again, back to David's creation of these people, they all have little frailties. My thing, yeah, of course, the physicality, there's a bad back from an accident many years ago, but it's more fun to play. There are so many superhero movies out there, which are extraordinary Hollywood bells and whistles, but it's nice to be human.
Completely.
Liam Neeson Reveals the True Story Behind 'Cold Storage'
No, there was no mutated fungus — that we know of.
Image via Samuel Goldwyn FilmsOne of the things that I thought your director, Jonny Campbell, did was... you guys didn't make this on some sort of Marvel or Stranger Things budget. This is a limited-budget thing, but he managed to bring out a lot with creative use of camera angles and the VFX. Can all three of you talk about your reaction to the finished film? Because I really thought he did a great job with his visuals and amping up the tension and the grossness, which I really enjoyed.
CAMPBELL: Yeah, it's really exciting. Especially, I feel like the sequence with the cockroach really stands out in kind of creating that moment that spells out exactly how everything happened before we get there. I thought that was really beautifully done.
KEERY: I think that a movie like this, that is one evening, and it's unfolding in quote-unquote real time or whatever, can be very difficult to have the pacing of the movie work well because it's kind of a race to the finish. It's sort of a romp that unfolds, and so I feel like that’s very difficult to tell while you're doing it how that's going to feel. Watching the final movie, it felt like he had some real mastery of shaping the rhythm of the film in a way, and that's a hard thing to do, and I feel like the unsung hero of the movie in a way. That can really make or break it. It’s almost like if it goes well, you don't even notice it. That's kind of how that works.
I feel like Hollywood makes all these movies that basically demonstrate why we shouldn't fuck with nature or science or whatever it is, and yet, in the real world, nobody ever learns. One of the things about this is that I feel like the government would actually do this, have a burial, put a fucking door in front of it, and say whatever. I went off on a tangent, but can you talk about how the real world never learns from Hollywood? Do you think they ever will learn from these movies, like Jurassic Park, Terminator, or Cold Storage?
CAMPBELL: I don't know if the world needs to learn from Hollywood. [Laughs]
NEESON: That’s true. But mind you, David, the writer, was inspired by, I think it was 1979, when a NASA craft disintegrated and fell in the Australian desert, and the Aboriginals took these little pieces and sold them to tourists. I think that's what inspired David. Interesting story.
Completely. Also, at the beginning of the movie, I love the quote. It says, “This shit is real.” Right at the beginning, it sort of tells you the tone.
NEESON: It does. And it's funny, too. Do you know what I mean? You see “this shit is real,” and it’s like, “Oh, okay.” [Laughs] There’s going to be humor.
Cold Storage is in theaters starting February 13.
Release Date February 13, 2026
Runtime 99 minutes
Director Jonny Campbell
Writers David Koepp
Cast
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Georgina Campbell
Naomi Williams
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English (US) ·