Drivers cruising down Hollywood’s famous Sunset Boulevard are being greeted by a truly bizarre sight — a man apparently trapped inside a house 30 feet in the air.
No, he doesn’t need rescuing.
It’s all part of an eye-popping Netflix publicity stunt designed to promote the streamer’s new thriller, The Last House.
An unidentified performer climbed into the elaborate billboard installation on Thursday, Aug. 6, and is expected to remain there until Saturday, Aug. 8 — spending three days living inside what looks like the front room of a house suspended high above one of Los Angeles’ busiest streets.
The display sits near Selma Avenue and Sunset Boulevard, where commuters and pedestrians can look up and watch the man go about his strange new life in the sky.
According to Netflix, the performer will try to maintain some sense of normalcy while confined inside the elevated enclosure.
“He’ll attempt to maintain a sense of normalcy over extended periods of time while ‘stuck’ in his elevated, enclosed set 30 feet above the ground,” Netflix explained.
The actor can even communicate with people on the street below using a whiteboard — an eerie connection to the plot of the movie he’s promoting.
Footage from the installation shows the man sitting inside the billboard eating cereal, staring outside and generally looking like someone who has seriously begun questioning his life choices.
And for anyone assuming Netflix is secretly rotating several performers through the stunt, apparently not.
It is reportedly the same actor staying inside throughout the entire three-day spectacle.
The unusual promotion mirrors the claustrophobic premise of The Last House, which stars Greta Lee and Wagner Moura and was directed by Fast X filmmaker Louis Leterrier.
The thriller follows a family of four who suddenly discover they have been completely sealed inside their home with no apparent way to escape.
With supplies running low and a mysterious threat keeping them trapped, the family members are forced to rely on one another — even as the pressure begins tearing their relationships apart.
Netflix could certainly use the attention surrounding the billboard.
As of the stunt, The Last House was sitting at just 36 percent positive on Rotten Tomatoes, although that number was based on only 22 critics’ reviews and could still shift as more reactions come in.
The Hollywood Reporter offered a more enthusiastic assessment, describing the movie as a psychological chamber drama and survival thriller in addition to its science-fiction and horror elements.
The review praised the film’s focus on four people desperately using their intelligence and dwindling supplies to stay alive while their once-close family bonds begin to unravel.
Whether the giant human billboard will convince viewers to give the movie a chance remains to be seen.
But Netflix has already accomplished one thing.
For three days, thousands of people passing through Hollywood can look up and see a miserable-looking man eating breakfast inside a fake house floating 30 feet above Sunset Boulevard.
The Last House begins streaming on Netflix Friday, Aug. 7.
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