Ghosts star Rose McIver has teamed up with her former iZombie co-star Rahul Kohli in a new horror-comedy, Next Exit. The first teaser for the film is out now and, while it doesn’t reveal McIver’s role, fans do get to see Kohli as a desperate man teaming up with a fellow weary traveler (Katie Parker). The mismatched pair are driving across the United States to a medical facility, of sorts, run by a scientist (Karen Gillen) with a compelling and controversial new procedure.
The film’s official synopsis explains: “When a research scientist (Gillen) makes national news proving she can track people into the afterlife, Rose (Parker) sees a way out and Teddy (Kohli) sees his chance to finally make it. These two strangers, both harboring dark secrets, race to join the doctor’s contentious study and leave this life behind. While Rose is haunted by a ghostly presence that she can’t outrun, Teddy is forced to confront his past. As these two misfits humorously quarrel their way across the country, they meet people along the way who force them to reckon with what is really driving them.” The film also stars fellow former iZombie actor Tongayi Chirisa, as well as Diva Zappa, an actress and artist who is the daughter of late rock legend Frank Zappa.
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Next Exit is the directorial feature film debut of Mali Elfman. The filmmaker also wrote and produced the movie, and is a “very good friend” of McIver’s, which the actress shared during a previous exclusive interview with PopCulture.com. Elfman even produced a short film that McIver wrote and directed in 2020, titled Nice Ride.
“We’ve been kind of creative chatters about anything we are working on or coming up with. We’ve kind of held each other quite accountable and encouraged each other and so I was fortunate to be with her when she wrote that script,” McIver told us. “She came with me to a convention in Hawaii one weekend, and I said, ‘You’re coming with me and you are finishing writing that.’ She’d been talking about it for a long time, and I’m so inspired by her.”
McIver also shared that Elfman finished her draft of the script the weekend after they spent time together, and explained that the filmmaker was in a unique position to be able to “put the whole thing together,” amid the global COVID-19 pandemic. This is something that McIver says was very inspiring to witness.
“She put the whole thing together, directed, and we had a lot of our friends involved. It was Katie Parker — the female leader in that film, is a very good friend of mine and Karen Gillan’s a dear old friend, so it was a passion project.” she said. McIver then added that Parker, along with Kohli and Chirisa, are “absolutely phenomenal.” in their roles.
She also gushed that the whole movie is “really stunning” when you see the finished product. “That’s kind of the dream to me, is working with people who you’ve come up alongside and you’ve watched learn and grow,” McIver said. “I’m so proud of her, so I’ll come down to Tribeca. I think she made a beautiful film.” Next Exit premieres June 10 at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York City.
