Watch The Weeknd talk Hurry Up Tomorrow, sleep paralysis, and The Idol

After a decade and a half spent revolutionizing pop and R&B, The Weeknd is ready to take on the world of film. The artist born Abel Tesfaye stars in Hurry Up Tomorrow, a new autofictional horror-drama film directed by Trey Edward Shults and co-written by Tesfaye with Reza Fahim, out on May 16. The film, co-starring Barry Keoghan and Jenna Ortega, is partially inspired by a real-life incident where Tesfaye lost his voice in the middle of a concert, and uses those shocking moments to spin an identity crisis that blurs the worlds of dreams and nightmares.

Ahead of the film’s release, we got the opportunity to chat with both Tesfaye and Shults about the film. The conversation covered how Shults’ formative work with the legendary director Terrence Malick inspired his hit film Waves, Tesfaye’s love of Bergman, sleep paralysis, The Idol, and much more. Check out the conversation in full, above.

Hurry Up Tomorrow arrives a few months after the companion album of the same name. Billed as a conclusion to a trilogy that began with After Hours and Dawn FM, Hurry Up Tomorrow has been teased a potentially the final album Tesfaye releases as The Weeknd. If so, he’s gone out with a bang, enlisting features including Playboi Carti, Justice, Anitta, Lana Del Rey, Travis Scott, and announcing a huge 2025 stadium tour.