M. Night Shyamalan is no stranger to high-concept thrillers. His latest film, Trap, takes a Silence of the Lambs-inspired approach at an unlikely location: a packed concert by pop star Lady Raven (played by the director’s daughter, Saleka). Cooper (Josh Hartnett) is a seemingly normal suburban dad who takes his daughter to see her favorite artist. While striking up a conversation with a venue vendor, he finds out that the show is actually a trap: the FBI has a plan to catch a serial killer called “The Butcher” after learning he would be in attendance. But, as revealed in the trailer, Cooper is The Butcher and has to find a way to escape.
While the plot may sound outlandish, it’s partially based on a true story. Shyamalan shared that Trap took inspiration from the real-life Operation Flagship. “I heard about it when I was a kid and I thought it was totally absurdist, that this actually happened,” the filmmaker told BBC News. “It was something that was in my head a lot when it happened.”
“[The authorities] used the absurdity against them because they lowered their guard, which I thought was quite brilliant,” he added to the outlet. “So it just stuck with me, and I guess when Saleka and I were thinking about a movie at a concert, I wondered, why would this person not be able to get out, and how can I keep them there?”
The December 1985 sting operation, organized by the United States Marshals and Washington, D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department, tricked more than 100 wanted fugitives into going to the Washington Convention Center, under the guise of having won free tickets to a Washington Redskins (now the Washington Commanders) game against the Cincinnati Bengals, as well as a chance to win tickets to the 1986 Super Bowl. It was said to be part of a special event celebrating the inauguration of a new D.C. sports TV network called Flagship International Sports Television Inc. (it shares the same acronym as the U.S. Marshals Service’s Fugitive Investigative Strike Team). To collect their tickets, the “winners” were told to show up at a brunch a few hours before the game.
Upon arrival, the fugitives were split into small groups and taken into “party rooms” with snacks and posters that read “Let’s party!” Marshals and police officers posed as event staffers, with female officers dressed as cheerleaders hugging the guests to check for weapons. The men were also given balloons, categorizing them by color; violent criminals received red balloons.
Louie McKinney, the chief of enforcement operations for the U.S. Marshals, pretended to be an emcee, giving a speech to the attendees before they received their prize. As soon as McKinney said he had a “big surprise,” Marshals entered the room to arrest the delinquents, repeating the same process with each group. It became one of the most successful mass arrests of fugitives in American history.
“It was hilarious. The cops were literally cheerleaders and mascots,” Shyamalan said to Empire magazine in July. “And [the criminals] were all caught. It was so twisted and funny.”
Instead of using a popular football game (at the time of Operation Flagship, Redskins tickets were a particularly hot commodity), Shyamalan opted to set the trap in a concert with the scope of a Taylor Swift Eras Tour show. “I directed an entire concert,” the filmmaker told Empire. “And it wasn’t just a thing in the background. It’s equally important. There is no pretend concert going on. I love the idea of cinema as windows within windows. One of the reasons to come see the movie at the movie theater is because there’s literally a real concert that you can see nowhere except in that movie.”
Retired federal agent Tobias Roche, who was part of Operation Flagship, fact-checked to British GQ how accurately thought out Shyamalan’s movie was. In Trap, the venue has a SWAT team waiting outside, as well as visible police inside, who question concertgoers. Roche argued that the officers should have been more stealth. He explained that Operation Flagship was planned out to avoid any suspicions and distract the criminals, which is why it was successful. “We were worried that some of [the fugitives] would recognize each other from maybe being incarcerated together or being involved in criminal activities together,” said Roche.
In the movie, a chatty vendor gives away the scheme. Roche told GQ that in this kind of operation, everyone would have to keep mum on the plan for it to work. He recalled that an attorney representing a local company that had the exclusive rights to Redskins games showed up to convention center, stating that the inaugural event for the — unbeknownst to him, fake — broadcasting company Flagship International Sports Television was illegal. The man was taken aside and told what was actually happening; he kept it a secret. “He was really good about it,” said Roche. “He wound up watching the entire sting with us from the control room.” But if the lawyer had blown their cover, the operation would have been shut down.