Ep 253: Interview w/Jenna Kanell from “Terrifier”

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
Hello, Welcome to Happy hard Time. My name is Tim.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
Murdoch and my name is Matt Emmert. Today's special guest
so memorably portrayed Terra in The First Terrifier, the character
I think we all thought would end up being the
quote final girl of that film. But in a shocking
twist that occurred halfway through the movie, this strong character
who had become attached to was savagely murdered by artha clown.

(00:34):
Their career in horror didn't stop there, though. They went
on to star in The Bye Bye Man, Faceless, After Dark, Renfield,
and the recently released horror drama The build Out. And
that's not all. They even have a new indie sci
fi film and development that they're writing, directing, and starring in.
Please welcome to the podcast. Jenna Canal.

Speaker 3 (00:56):
Oh my gosh, hi yie.

Speaker 2 (01:00):
Incredible intro I have honored, Oh my god, you Kenny
was easy. You've had like such a career in horror.
We love you, and I just wanted to start with,
like I saw an I and dB that you grew
up originally in Massachusetts. So what was it like growing
up in New England? And more importantly, how did you
first get involved in acting.

Speaker 3 (01:19):
Yeah, so I should. I should really go in and
do some digging on IMDb, because I didn't. I didn't
technically grow up there. I was born there, though, but
I actually grew up in Atlanta. So I was born
in Massachusetts in Boston, and then grew up in Atlanta.
And then I lived in California like you two for
a while, and then work brought me back to Atlanta.
And now I've lived all over because of various filming things,

(01:43):
and which I'm sure we'll get into the different places
those have been. But yeah, and so luckily I got
out early enough that I got rid of the Boston accent,
but I did have it for a couple of years.
It was rough. It's gone now, thank goodness. But and
I didn't get a Southern one, so they managed to
cancel each other out. So in terms of when I

(02:04):
started in the film industry, I started writing as a
child and telling stories even before I could write, and
then started doing feeder in high school. And I remember
being an extra on a big budget film set. I
skipped school one day to go be an extra, which
I do not recommend and I am not endorsing, but
I remember feeling like I was so much happier there

(02:26):
than I'd ever been in school. And so then I
decided to try pursuing it and see what that looks like,
and started acting and training as an actor and training
as a stunt performer and became both of those things,
joined the Union, and then eventually got into production work
and working behind the camera and did first ad work
for a number of years and producing and now writing

(02:50):
and directing as well. And I kind of hop around.

Speaker 2 (02:52):
Wow, I mean that's a talk about a jack of
all trade. I mean like that. So it wasn't just
kind of acting, person was just all of film in general.
It sounds like that you were interested in.

Speaker 3 (03:05):
Yeah, absolutely, the gateway drug was acting, but certainly the
whole machine is so interesting and there's so many different
parts that a lot of people don't know about and
so many different specialties within it.

Speaker 1 (03:16):
Oh, totally. And growing up, were you a fan of
horror films and were any on your radar or had
a major impact on you.

Speaker 3 (03:26):
I have always been a fan of horror, absolutely, so
I used to have to stay home from school every
month for several days. Because it's never been officially diagnosed,
but I quite likely have endometriosis, and so my periods
were an absolute nightmare. So I was experiencing a horror
on a monthly basis. And so what I would do
is I would be incapacitated in so much pain, lying

(03:48):
on the couch, and I would watch the horror movies.
This was before streaming, maging myself a little bit, but
I would watch the horror movies that were just available
on these random channels, you know, the censored versions, in
the middle of the day. And it was this sort
of thing where it felt like I was able to
remove myself from my own pain by going along on
the story with these characters, which I think is a

(04:09):
big part of why a lot of us like horror,
whether it's mental pain, physical pain, the anguish of you know,
living under crumbling late stage capitalism, whatever it is. And
and I remember feeling like, you know, for two hours,
I'm not worried about how much pain I'm in, I'm
not thinking about it. I'm like, are you going to
get out of this house? Are you going to defeat
this monster? You know? And so that was how I
got into it, and I was definitely both my parents

(04:31):
worked full time, so I was watching things I absolutely
should not have been, but here we are. Still haven't
been able to quit the habit and one of the
more formative ones. I mean, there were a bunch that
I remember really fucking me up as a child. And
this was also in the days when you can go
to a Blockbuster really aging myself.

Speaker 1 (04:51):
Now, oh Blockbuster, don't worry, I'll trust.

Speaker 2 (04:54):
Me world or worlder. So you couldn't age yourself past
us any day to prove.

Speaker 3 (05:01):
It, challenge accepted. I am starting to get gray hairs,
but it's harder to tell when it's this short. That's
the secret. But I just guess, Yeah, I think you
look great as a silver fox.

Speaker 2 (05:12):
I think, oh you heard it. Look Tim looks great
as a silver fox.

Speaker 1 (05:17):
Jenna Kanal, Yeah, thank you so much.

Speaker 2 (05:22):
Yeah, are dying to hear what is the What was
like the formative movie or movies specifically one of them?

Speaker 3 (05:28):
I mean there were they were a handful. I would
have to say one of them, which is still one
of my favorite movies to this day, is John Carpenter's
The Thing, because I mean it really really holds up.
It's it's so good. The practical effects are unbelievable. The
all of the thematic elements surrounding it in terms of
the writing and the characters that reflect what we were
going through socio politically at the time. All are like

(05:53):
really fascinating, and the acting is amazing. The light, all
the bisexual lighting is beautiful, Like it's it's just everything
about that movie. There was something about it that stuck
with me, like a a leach for lack of a
better word, and they're a face hugger and it still
continues to to this.

Speaker 1 (06:13):
That's a great film. I love watching it and if
you ever get a chance to see it on the
big screen.

Speaker 2 (06:17):
Go, Yeah. We went to an anniversary screening, was it
a couple of years ago? Because it was the fortieth
annivers draftileson.

Speaker 1 (06:25):
I just I love seeing it on the big screen.
It looks crystal clear.

Speaker 3 (06:29):
Ah, I'm so jealous. I would love to That sounds incredible.

Speaker 2 (06:32):
Yeah, No, it's a great love John Carpenter, big fan.
So moving on to Terrifyer. Now, I heard you mentioned
in the special features of the DVD that you had
originally auditioned for Damian Leone's film The Ninth Circle years earlier.
So now what I wanted to know was this the
short film that he was doing the Ninth Circle or
was he turning it into a feature at the time?

(06:53):
Which one did you audition for?

Speaker 3 (06:56):
You really did your research. I'm so impressed. Yes, so
this was actually he had turned it into a short
film and I was auditioning for the feature version of it.

Speaker 2 (07:06):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (07:07):
So yeah, So what ended up happening was that he
was going to make the feature version of the Ninth Circle,
had already made the short film version, had already made
the short film version of Terrifier, and I auditioned for
the Ninth Circle feature. I, Damian and I have both
tried to figure out how the fuck we met. Neither
of us can. Nobody knows. It's lost to the ether,

(07:27):
no one knows, but we somehow got a touch. I
auditioned for that movie, and he ended up coming back
to me and basically saying, yeah, so it looks like
Ninth Circle. Yeah, so it looks like Ninth Circle isn't happening.
But there's this other movie that I'm making, and it's
called Terrifia, and maybe you'd be interested in reading for
that one instead.

Speaker 2 (07:45):
And so wait, does he really talk like that? Does
he talk like that?

Speaker 3 (07:48):
He's yeah, yeah, yeah, he absolutely does. From I was gonna.

Speaker 1 (07:52):
Say I I had a roommate from Staten Island named Joe,
so I am very familiar.

Speaker 3 (07:57):
Of course his name was John. Of course his name
was They're like fifteen thousand Joes on Stetton Mountain. Now
all of Stutton Island is gonna come firmation. I love
you Stutton Island. But the yes. So actually, so I
didn't even audition for Terrifier. I auditioned for a completely
different movie. And he was like, you'd be perfect for this,
and he sent me the script and and just offered

(08:19):
me the role of Tara, and I remember reading it
and thinking, wow, this is fucked up. What is wrong
with you? I'm in sign me up.

Speaker 2 (08:26):
Yeah. So he picked you for that role. Man, that's awesome.

Speaker 3 (08:29):
Yes, yeah, yeah, so no one read for that role technically.

Speaker 2 (08:33):
That's amazing mine.

Speaker 3 (08:34):
Yeah. No.

Speaker 2 (08:35):
And okay, so I have to geek out a little
bit because I really loved your character and the way
you played Tara in this film. Because okay, so, whereas
Dawn is kind of like a little more oblivious to
everything going on and doesn't kind of take art the
colum seriously, Tara is so much more just aware and
responsible and just really puts up a fight, you know,
all the qualities that you love and someone who usually

(08:57):
survives a horror movie and then you don't. So it
was kind of like devastating. So when you first read
the script, did you think Tara was going to make
it to the end or were you disappointed that she didn't.

Speaker 3 (09:08):
First of all, thank you for your condolences on my death.
And it means a lot that you that you wanted
me to live, because it means you care about the
character and you're invested in and what happens to them.
I I mean, it's wild. We shot that thing all
more coming up on the tenth anniversary, which is bonkers
to think about. Uh So, I don't really remember what

(09:30):
my reaction was, but I'm pretty sure I did think
I was going to live and thought, you know, oh,
that's that's pretty crazy. I didn't think it was going
to be as you know, I didn't think the film
was going to get as big as it has, and
I certainly didn't think, you know, that that my death
was going to become as big of a pivot, you know,
like a divisive point as it has become, especially and

(09:54):
I think part of that is the way that I die,
you know, spoiler alert to anyone who hasn't seen it,
but you had a decade almost so get it together.
The way that I die in the film, you know,
be a gunshot is is I think a big me dying,
you know, the protagonist dying and at the hands of
you know, a firearm from this you know, classic slasher

(10:17):
villain sort of trope.

Speaker 2 (10:19):
Like.

Speaker 3 (10:20):
I think those two things are a big part of
why it continues to hold up. And my original death
was actually completely different in the script. So I remember thinking, oh,
it's kind of crazy that I die, but I think
it's an even stronger decision that I die at the
hands of this like weapon that essentially shows that he's
you know, cheating because he thinks I'm actually going to
beat him. I've like become made it clear that I'm
an actual threat.

Speaker 2 (10:39):
Wall. What was your original death? This is something and
we did all our research and I've never found this,
So please what was your original death in the script?

Speaker 3 (10:47):
I I don't know if I'm allowed to say what
it was because he might try to reuse it in
another horror movie, but I'll tell you what he doesn't
put it in four. If he doesn't put it in four,
I'll I'll come back and we'll.

Speaker 1 (11:00):
We'll do it all so close to getting that, well, yeah,
because they sometimes, like when they don't get it in
the first movie or whatever, they always sometimes like, I know,
Kevin Williamson's doing that.

Speaker 2 (11:09):
Yeah, Kevin Williamson told us like, like, especially when he
does writes death scenes that they don't get used in
a movie, he puts it into like a certain document
I think he called it the Graveyard, and he brings
it back for other movies, which I'm like, yeah, that
makes sense because if it's it's just a death.

Speaker 1 (11:24):
Your death is such a bummer. It's like it's like
because we're following your journey and all of a sudden,
you're not there. Okay.

Speaker 2 (11:31):
You know in the DVD special features you called Tara
scrappy or do you describe Tara as scrappy? What did
you mean by that specifically? And do you, as Jenna,
share any qualities with the character of Tara.

Speaker 3 (11:45):
That's a great question. I when I say scrappy, I
mean not necessarily trained fighter, but willing to play dirty
is what I mean by by scrappy, which in some
ways also applies to me. I am, in real life
a trained fighter, and I have been training in various
styles of fighting for years and years and years. But

(12:06):
I would also say I'm scrappy because I'm am willing
to play dirty. I think I'd be pretty hard to kidnap.
But please, nobody try to prove me wrong if you
don't mind. And in terms of other ways that I'm
similar to Tara, I mean, honestly, our biggest similarity is,
I mean, I think it's badass that she doesn't let
Dawn drive drunk, very important. But I also the biggest

(12:27):
similarity between the two of us is that I also
have a diabolically small bladder, So I pee all the
fucking time, and I'm constantly hydrating, as you can see.
And so I like me, I just that's something I
would I absolutely would totally have to peep. Except the
difference is the difference is I have less shame, So

(12:47):
I literally would have just popped a squat in the
street and waited for my sister to come. I wouldn't
have gone to a creepy building to Speaking.

Speaker 1 (12:53):
Of that building, you've got a huge chase scene inside
that building. Where is that building.

Speaker 3 (13:00):
That building is in the scenic, scenic city of Trenton,
New Jersey, and I don't know if it's still standing.
I kind of hope it's not. It should be condemned
because none of that was production design. That building looks
like that it was abandoned. It was creepy as fuck.
There was no electricity, there was no running water. We

(13:20):
had to walk through this like all of these rooms
full of crazy shit that had just been abandoned. It
was trash, like the rooms full of cars, like that
room full of tires was just like that, just to
get to the porta potty, like you know, it was
freezing and we were shooting nights seven pm to seven am,
so Catherine and I were huddled around this one tiny
space heater like there were used condoms, there were used

(13:43):
needles like that place. The cops got called on us
one time, Like that place was that place was a
horror movie in and of itself.

Speaker 2 (13:51):
What a fine well, you know what I was gonna ask.
There's like the building, but then all of the indoor scenes.
I swear I thought that was like a sound on
stage because it was so perfectly like set or decorated.
But you're telling me all that Junkyard shit was like
it just looked like that.

Speaker 3 (14:08):
Oh yeah, I don't think. I think it was like
bring your own blood byob and that was probably it.
Like I'm willing to say, almost everything else was already there. Wow.

Speaker 1 (14:21):
I mean that's like a film within a film, because
I'm sure you guys were just scared in general, and
then you add like a terrifier on top of it.

Speaker 3 (14:29):
Oh right, Oh yeah, I mean so people like at conventions,
people will often ask me if if it was scary
to work with David, and I always say no, because
I mean, if you've ever seen an interview with David,
I love him, but the moment he opens his mouth,
he's not scary at all. He's clearly like the squishiest,
softest little nugget, and so it wasn't scary to work
with him at all. But that building, on the other hand,

(14:50):
is nightmare fuel.

Speaker 2 (14:52):
It is hilarious.

Speaker 3 (14:54):
Wow.

Speaker 2 (14:55):
So you know, after you're so close to getting the attention,
the pest control guy our captures you, eyes you to
a chair, and then forces you to watch what has
become one of the most iconic and brutal death scenes
in modern horror. Catherine Corkan getting hack sawed in half
while hanging upside down naked. What I was wondering, were
you really sitting there the whole time watching the entire

(15:15):
scene go down or did they film your reaction shots separately?

Speaker 3 (15:20):
So this is an excellent question because a lot of
people do not know this, and I think this is
a really fun Easter egg. But before I say it,
we have to give props to Catherine because my god,
like what, there just is not a more brutal death
in cinema. I still have trouble watching that scene, even
though I know exactly how it was done. It's like
my whole cervix clenches every single time. It's all and

(15:43):
she went through so much to film that, and it
was so Indie and she you know, it was very
very dangerous and should never be done the way it
was done again, and I'm sure now they would do
it very differently. But like, yeah, always props to her.
She and I are still very very close. Just what
a what? So Okay, so circle back, No, we were

(16:06):
not in the same room at all when we filmed that,
because I know, isn't that crazy? Because Catherine and I
had both just booked our first studio films at the time,
and so she was on a movie I think called
Chuck and I had I was on The Bye Bye Man,
and so literally I filmed Terrifier for two weeks, went

(16:28):
home for twenty four hours, and then flew to Ohio
to work on The Bye Bye Man for a month.
It was literally back to back. So like all of
I'm sure I know we'll get to buy Bye Man,
but like my hair from my shoulders down was all extensions,
because literally it was. It was filmed back to back.
I still have her in a bag somewhere. But because

(16:49):
of that, they were are they were basically the product
Terrifier Production was working around our shoot schedules for these
big studio movies, and so we had Katherine and I
only had a couple days of overlap, and so they
actually filmed the scene of me reacting and the scene
of her dying completely different days, purely because of our schedules.

Speaker 1 (17:09):
Oh gosh, that's great.

Speaker 2 (17:11):
At I'm just gonna say, how did you get yourself
to portray such an intense level of fear? Like was
it difficult? Going for so long? And now that I
know that you weren't even watching anything going on, Like,
how were you able to do that?

Speaker 1 (17:23):
Because David like, okay, so now she's upside down.

Speaker 2 (17:25):
Yeah, David, it's like, okay, we're hacking. We're hacking, We're hacking.

Speaker 3 (17:29):
Hack what hack a? Here were intestines are fallen out.
There were intestines, the blood everywhere.

Speaker 1 (17:35):
What would you reaction?

Speaker 3 (17:36):
That's just flying because we just hit you in the face.

Speaker 2 (17:40):
Because your fear is so intense. How did you do that?

Speaker 3 (17:44):
Thank you? Well? So I did. This is again this
was an indie movie, so this would be done differently.
Now I would do this differently. Now bigger movies would
do this differently. But I did actually request that they
actually tie me up and uh, to the chair, because
I really wanted to feel physically trapped and I wanted

(18:05):
to feel as though like I and so I stayed
tied up between all the takes, which again, like on
on other films, there'd be different ways around this, but uh,
but but I did ask for that because I wanted
I wanted to feel as though there was nowhere to go.

Speaker 1 (18:20):
And but you mentioned you had a small bladder.

Speaker 3 (18:25):
Girl, I was so dehydrated on that day because every
time I know that I'm gonna have to, like I'll
like wear a harness or I'm in like some crazy outfit.
Like I I just don't drink as much water because
I'm like, this will just never it'll never get done,
so which is also not responsible. I'm endorsing all sorts
of horrible shit. But I'm pretty sure I just drank

(18:45):
less water that day and just like powered through. I'm
sure I had to. They probably had done time me
at one point. But I was also so like in
my head. So some of it was the like physical
reaction of like I'm bottling up all this stuff and
there's nowhere for it to go and then no like
sort of phis outlet. So that was part of it.
And then I don't remember exactly what I what exactly

(19:06):
I was picturing, but I know I was having to
conjure up a lot of stuff and like using all
the acting training that I have in terms of like
sense memory and like drawing from just drawing from a
lot of different like techniques for reacting to something that
I wasn't actually seeing. I'm pretty sure Damien was not
didn't tell me anything other than this is where it is.

(19:27):
And then often what I'll do is I have like
a playlist that I'll listen to, like the night before
I have really intense scene, and then the morning of
and then while I'm in it, I just kind of
stay I'll kind of stay to myself. Like normally I'm
really you know, fun and silly and professional of course
on set, but if I have to do something like that,
I'll kind of be quieter and more reserved and I'll

(19:48):
just be kind of in my head. And I also,
like I have a conversation with the team beforehand, so
I'm pretty sure I told Damien, like, hey, I'm going
to kind of be off to myself on this day.
I'm just going to be staying in the zone so
that I'm ready and then you know, so he could
kind of help the environments keep me in that place.

Speaker 2 (20:04):
I've got to know what's on this playlist that you
play it again, and it's like I'm I'm hacking your friend,
I'm hacking Yeah, Like what songs get you hyped up
for that?

Speaker 3 (20:16):
For old Yeller? Yeah, No, it's not, it's not. It's
a it's a it's a bunch of different songs. I mean,
and and this is something that like I think a
lot of actors do. It's it depends. Some of them
are just objectively sad songs. Some of them are really
beautiful songs because it's you know, some of them make
me happy cry, some of them make me sad, cry.

(20:37):
Some of them just kind of remind me of someone
that I've lost, or remind me of a time in
my life when I was going through it, or conjure
images that are really visceral. It's kind of it's a
it's a several hour long playlist. I don't get through
the whole thing, but I kind of just listen to
it and see see what strikes with me at any
given moment, because it's always different.

Speaker 2 (20:56):
This is why horror needs more recognition in the mainstream
award shows, because, like I truly believe, they do not
think about what the actors in horror. I mean, also
everyone making horror, I mean, special effects, everything go through
to portray these emotions. It has always frustrated me because
the emotional depth that a horror star has to you know,

(21:18):
tap into is just unbelievable. I mean, and your.

Speaker 1 (21:22):
Body can't recognize like, oh I'm acting like your body's
like on high alert.

Speaker 3 (21:26):
Just oh yeah, I.

Speaker 2 (21:28):
Mean, no it's a guy. Could imagine just how exhausted
you must have been after that.

Speaker 3 (21:32):
Oh, I was, I was absolutely wiped. It was it was.
It was a mess, especially because it was you know,
we were doing night shoots, which is a lot of
horror movies. A lot of the times you are, you're
filming like er doctor schedules essentially, but with most slightly
much lower stakes. But I mean, I appreciate you saying that.
That's very kind. I mean, I think it's interesting how
both both comedy and horror do often get snubbed from

(21:56):
a critical point of view, and and I think a
lot of that is is that people don't realize that
the even though the circumstances are ridiculous, we do have
to keep in mind that in order for them to
be believable, the people within those circumstances have to believe
that they're real.

Speaker 1 (22:13):
Let me tell you, it makes a difference, because Matt
and I have seen some movies where there's horrific things happening,
and whoever the actor is, if they have no reaction,
We're not gonna have a reaction, Yeah, like, what's right?

Speaker 3 (22:25):
Right?

Speaker 2 (22:25):
Well?

Speaker 3 (22:25):
Because yeah, but one of the reasons that that film
is so much fun is because there I mean, then
there's studies about this where like when we're watching someone
experience something, the mirror neurons in our brain light up
and it makes us our bodies literally feel what they're
feeling very often, and so like it's this sort of
thing where they have to kind of reflect our experience,

(22:46):
but in a way that's safer for us, which is
a part of why art is so fun to consume.
So yeah, no, because I've seen movies too that I'm
I'm like, it's uh, it leaves a lot to be desired,
and I mean even it's funny. Even looking back at Terrifier,
I'm really proud of Terrifyer and of my work in it.
But at the same time, I look back and I'm

(23:07):
just a much better actor now, and there are parts
of my performance that I'm like, oh, oh my.

Speaker 2 (23:14):
Yeah. You know, moving on to your final face off
with Art, Now, I know that you did all your
own stunts in this film, and that, in fact, you're
a stunt performer. So have you always been interested in
that type of performance or how did you get involved
in learning to do and being a stunt performer?

Speaker 3 (23:31):
Thank you? Yes, I love stunts. I mean, action stuff
is some of some of my favorite to work on.
I have always I've been training in martial arts ever
since I was a little kid. I used to do Hoshindo,
I did taekwondo at one point, I tried tai chi.
I did krapmagoth for years and years and years, and
I recently this year started trying to learn a little
bit of moy Thai. And then I've also done a

(23:52):
bunch of stunt specific training to learn about harness work
and water work and stunt driving and things like and
motorcycles which we'll talk about later, but and things like that.
And I originally got started because I was training in
CRAVMGA when I was living out in LA and I
remember someone asked me if I did stunts, and I said, well, no,
because in my mind I always thought stunts is like

(24:14):
I'm on fire and I'm jumping out of a skyscraper.
And they were like, no, No, running is a stunt.
Holding a gun is a stunt, you know, like it's
it's actually you don't have to be you know. And
and once I realized that, I leaned more into it,
and I started getting more specific stunt training and rebranded
myself as an action actor who does my own stunts

(24:35):
and have been ever since.

Speaker 1 (24:37):
And what was the toughest stunt you did in terrifyre Hmm.

Speaker 3 (24:42):
That's a good question. I mean, the my favorite stunt was,
you know, beating the shit out of David with a
two by four. That's that's that's my favorite. But the
toughest one, I think it's probably there is a part
where I'm running away from him and I have to
do like a trip down a small flight of s
and that that was a little tricky because we didn't

(25:03):
really have you know, we didn't have a stunt coordinator,
which is not legal. I don't know if we're different
at the time. I don't know if the rules are
different then, but now on a Union set you are
required to have one, and so I don't think we had.
I can't remember if we had pads or anything, but
that was probably the toughest one. And then obviously, you know,
having a gun pointed at my face. You know, we

(25:26):
saw what the tragedy that happened on Rust Like it's
it's that's a very very dangerous stunt to do. So
it wasn't hard, but it was very dangerous. But I
will say, to his credit, Damien, actually you know he
did he did a demonstration, which is what you're supposed
to do every time you use a firearm, of like
showing everybody that it's empty, doing dry fires away from everyone.
And then to his credit, Damien laid down on the

(25:48):
floor before he asked me to do it, and and
went through all of the motions of the gun firing
at him before even asking me to get on the floor,
which I thought was very commendable.

Speaker 2 (25:56):
Yeah, that is great, And just for listeners, if you
haven't seen Terrified, first off, you I can't believe any
of our listeners haven't seen the original. You're right here,
yeah yeah, But I mean what makes your death so
heartbreaking is like you said, like, you know, you think
Tara's got in the upper hand. She's like, you know,
has the two by fourst is knocking the shit out
of him. Suddenly he pulls a gun on her. But
the thing is is that he shoots in the leg,

(26:17):
then the side, then the face. But what's the worst
is that you're still alive. He goes away, reloads and
then shoots you like a million times in the head.
It's brutal, So I guess what I was wondering. Well,
first off, like how did they film that whole part?
Like did they I'm assuming they made a head cast
for you, or like how did they do all of

(26:38):
the shooting? And when was you versus the head cast?

Speaker 3 (26:42):
Sure, yeah, that's a fun question. The only time I've
ever actually been to Staten Island was to make the
head cast for that movie. It was basically a trust exercise.
Was the first time I ever met Damien was in
a completely different creepy abandoned building and on Staten Island
in which I met him and we did a head cast.
We're basically like, you can only breathe through your mouth.

(27:03):
Your nose is sealed up and your mouth can't open
or close. You can't see anything, and so your mouth
is slowly filling with water and you're essentially waterboarding yourself
with your own spit. It's disgusting, and you're covered in
like plaster. There's a great photo online somewhere that he
took of me when I was in the middle of
the process and I'm just doing this but you can't

(27:23):
see just flicking him off with both fingers, but you
can't see anything about my face. So it was a
cast of me after I was dead. But when I'm
in the process of dying and when I'm like bleeding out,
and even right when I'm like freshly dead and then
my body's still warm, that's all actually me because we

(27:46):
basically what he did, and this is really cool. He
built prosthetics to put on my face and then and
it's also very clever considering there was no money involved
in this movie or very little anyway, he wired tubes
on underneath the prosthetics and then was just Damien's own
ass was just right off camera blowing into the tubes,

(28:07):
making blood pump out of my face, out of the
prosthetics in my face.

Speaker 2 (28:11):
That sounds like like an Ala Savini, like Friday the
Thirteenth type of thing to do, which was like forty
years before.

Speaker 1 (28:18):
That's the magic of the Terrifiers that it's not it's
not it's all practical like magic tricks, right right.

Speaker 3 (28:26):
I think that's a big part of kind of like
what we were, you know, talking about before. I think
that's a big part of why why Terrifier holds up
is because all of the effects are practical and it's
and it and it feels, you know, like a grindhouse
movie and like the sort of homage to these seventies
eighties horror movies that were equally as scrappy.

Speaker 2 (28:44):
Well, then what when your sister Victoria play by Samantha Skeaviti,
finds you and you're dead holding that circus sign? Is
that you? Or is that a dummy?

Speaker 3 (28:55):
That that is a dummy because if you look very
very carefully, my hair is suddenly longer.

Speaker 2 (29:03):
You know, death really gets that growth going on air,
It really does.

Speaker 3 (29:08):
It's an excellent one. Is a serum I highly recommend. Wonderful,
really good career here.

Speaker 2 (29:15):
You know, you mentioned writer director Damian Leone, who's become
quite a name in horror since making the Terrifier films.
What was he like to work with at that time?
I mean you've you've kind of said some things as DIDs.
He sounds very collaborative, but yeah, what was he like
just as a director?

Speaker 3 (29:30):
Yeah? I mean I can't speak to what the second
and third film were like because I wasn't involved in those,
and I know that they were a very different environment
because you know, those those actors, like there was a
huge audition process because and they were walking into something
that they knew was already very well established, which we
did not know. We were just like, we're just down

(29:50):
down to clown for ench hey. So I don't know
what those were like, but on the first one, he
he was very collaborative, and he was very like, very
much wanted us to be to feel as safe as
possible given some crazy circumstances, and was overall really really
grateful because, like I was kind of saying, you know,

(30:14):
everyone involved in two and three knew that they were
walking into an established popular franchise or what was becoming
one and one, a film that already had a following,
because of the first one, we didn't know any of that.
We were just making an indie film because you know,
we were getting paid minimum wage and just wanted to
make something fun and have a good time and make

(30:36):
something cool. And we had already all been making indie
films for years, like Catherine and I had been working
for years already as actors and doing stunts and things
like that, and so Damian, I just remember, on that production,
was really really grateful because he knew that we had
no reason to trust him, and we were trusting him,
and so he trusted us in turn to show up
and do what we do.

Speaker 2 (30:57):
This that's so cool. And you know you had mentioned
David Howard Thornton. We actually have been lucky enough to
have him on the show, not once, but twice, the
second time with Samantha Scaffiti, who played Victoria. So what
was David like on set when the cameras weren't rolling.

Speaker 3 (31:14):
He's I mean, you probably know he's a fucking nut, ridiculous.
I mean, I love him. I'm still I'm still close
with him and Samantha when I get the pleasure of
seeing her, she's so fucking cool. I hope to be
as cool as Samantha one day when I'm grown up.
She's amazing. And I also think that casting is great.
I think we're really believable as siblings, and we both

(31:35):
sound like we've been smoking for fifty years. It's really incredible.
But David, Yeah, David, he's just a hoot. He's so
silly in between takes, and he's also very you know,
he's very outspoken, he's very passionate. I believe he's on
the right side of things as far as being super
progressive and a dirtbag lefty like myself and he's just
a really kind, kind hearted human being.

Speaker 1 (31:58):
And did you get to interact at all with some
because all your interactions are on the phone, Like did
you get to meet her or were you guys ever
on Yeah, while you were filming?

Speaker 3 (32:08):
Yeah, not while we were filming. No, we never filmed together.
We've met, we've now hung out many times at conventions
and like at the premiere and you know, at other
events and things like that. But yeah, we didn't have
any Like you said, all our overlap I was a corpse.

Speaker 2 (32:23):
That's so funny, you know. And yeah, because we were
wondering that because it's like, you guys are sisters. You
have a phone call, but that's it, and then you're
really never in other than the dummy. Yeah, in the
scenes together, you know. Terrifier, we read, had its premiere
at the Telly Ride the Tell You Ride Horror Show
in twenty sixteen, then had a kind of like a
quick theatrical run in twenty eighteen. When do you think

(32:44):
you first realized that this film had developed such a following.

Speaker 3 (32:48):
It was a slow burn for us because, like you
were saying about it premier premier at Telly Ride and
even before that there was a local premiere in New
York at of all places, the Lincoln Center, which normally
hosts like very high falutin ballets and operas and shit,
and here they were playing our movie, which was wild
and a really cool experience. But it was a slow

(33:11):
burn because then it was I think after that, it
was on like you know, Google play, YouTube, like all
of these the sort of normal usual suspects, And then
it wasn't really until it hit Netflix that all of
a sudden, because this is back when Netflix was still
acquiring movies and wasn't just putting out their own their
own material. It hit Netflix and I want to say
twenty seventeen or something like that. I'm sure someone's going

(33:32):
to fact check me, but that's that's when it really
started to gain traction and it became trending, and it
was trending for a long time, and like suddenly I
was hearing about it from people that I didn't even
know and getting tagged in things, and but I think
it was n't until I got asked to do my
first convention a couple of years later. I don't remember
what year that was, and I remember thinking like, oh,

(33:54):
that's fun. That's cute. I'm sure it'll be whatever. And
then the fact that people were actually showing up and
like paying to interact with us was this huge honor
that I wasn't expecting. And I think that's when I realized, like, oh, people,
really something about this movie and about this timing is
really resonating with people. And now we're, you know, all

(34:15):
this time later, and we've seen everything that's happened and
the budgets that the other films have gotten, and like
I'm tattooed on a bunch of strangers' bodies, which is flattering,
I think, And so it's it's it's wild. I never
would have predicted because, like I was saying, like I've
done so many indie movies, and most of them have
not been seen by very many people outside of like

(34:36):
my mom, you know, and some of her.

Speaker 2 (34:40):
Well, then people of them have, but some of.

Speaker 3 (34:43):
Them have not.

Speaker 2 (34:44):
Why then, in your opinion, do you think the Terrifier
franchise has become so successful and appeals so much to
indie horror lovers? Like, what do you think it is
that appeals to people so much?

Speaker 3 (34:55):
That's a great question. I mean, I think some of it,
some of it. There is no telling some of some
of it is just sometimes something grabs hold of people
and it's it just is a flash in the pan
and there's no rhyme or reason to why. So I
definitely think that's that's some of it. It's just that,
you know, and then it becomes controversial for being the
you know, for controversy's sake and all of these sort

(35:18):
of things and kind of snowballs. I think that's part
of it. I do think part of it is that
it harkens back to, like we were saying before, to
this time when horror was much at least more mainstream
horror was was grungy and and really di y, and
they had that sort of texture that the film has
where it feels like it's shot on film even though
it's not, and the lighting is very stylized, and it's

(35:41):
all very like almost almost campy to a degree in
terms of like the acting and the effects and what's happening.
And and I think that there there's there's some like
almost a nostalgia to it that people really enjoyed and
and continue to and and just how brutal it is
in a way that I think a lot of films

(36:02):
weren't weren't doing. And I think Kate Catherine's death is
a huge part of why it hits so hard, because
that shit's insane. I think, you know, me, me dying
a la psycho, you know, killing the main character in
the middle of the movie is a big part of
why it it resonated. I think, you know again, like

(36:22):
him pulling out a gun. Sorry, there's a fly, where
did you come from?

Speaker 1 (36:25):
Sir?

Speaker 3 (36:26):
Me? Him pulling out a gun in the middle, which is,
you know, breaking the rules of killers and uh and
and having a killer that's really different and I kind of,
I think, kind of all of these things together and
then a little sprinkle of who the fuck knows? I
think it's it's all of that.

Speaker 2 (36:41):
I mean, that's a great answer though.

Speaker 1 (36:43):
Yeah, and have you seen parts two and three?

Speaker 3 (36:46):
I have seen two, I have not seen three.

Speaker 2 (36:50):
Yeah, what did you think of where they took the
story in two? But actually a different question and this
is our last Terrifier question, and then we'll move on
to some of your other projects. If Damian today said, like, hey,
I would love for you to come back in a
future Terrifier movie as like a ghost or a flashback
or something. Would you reprise the role of Terra, Yeah, yeah,

(37:12):
I would cool.

Speaker 3 (37:14):
Or even you know, maybe she has a maybe she
has an older sister with a buzz cut.

Speaker 1 (37:20):
Yeah, that's love twin.

Speaker 2 (37:21):
Yeah, I you know, it's it's funny because they use
your picture a bunch in two because they're referring back
to you know, the murders and everything. And then of
course now there's the you know, Sienna and her brother,
and there's their characters, and they've taken a kind of
in a different direction. But I always was like, I
just we love in series when they bring back characters

(37:43):
dead or alive, I guess, and things, and so we're like, oh,
if there can only be some sort of like either
flashback or or maybe like maybe you're haunting Art the
clown or something. And he finally breaks his a come.

Speaker 3 (37:54):
Up and yeah, maybe he gets you know, he gets
his ass down into hell and there we are way
to for him. Who knows.

Speaker 2 (38:01):
Well, yeah, I like that. So moving on to some
of your other horror projects over the years, starting with
twenty seventeen's The Bye Bye Man, where you played Kim,
who has psychic abilities and takes her friends through a
seance to kind of find out more about the entity.
Now I have to say, we found you to be
one of the most interesting characters in that film. Did
you do any preparation for that role, like looking to

(38:24):
people with psychic abilities or anything like that.

Speaker 3 (38:27):
First of all, thank you so much. I actually did.
I early on in production when I got up to Ohio.
I went to like a weird part of town in
Cleveland and I got a psychic reading done because I
wanted to see what that was like and what sort
of techniques they use, because I watched a bunch of

(38:48):
them on YouTube prior to that, but I wanted to
experience one firsthand. So I think it was a I
want to say it was a palm reader or something like.
I wanted to see how she did it and how
she went about it and the way she touched me
and the way she talked and all of that. I
was just very, very curious. So so yeah, absolutely, I
definitely tried to.

Speaker 2 (39:06):
That's so cool. There's so many people we talked to
and we're like, we'll ask like the preparation for the role,
and they're like, did you do any preparations?

Speaker 1 (39:13):
Were like, no, Well, I love I'm from Ohio. So
I it was weird when we were watching Bye Bye
Me and I was like, gosh, this really reminds me
of Ohio. And then I looked at Ohio. I was like,
oh my gosh, how what did you think of Ohio?
Were you like into OSU Buckeyes and all that.

Speaker 2 (39:31):
Tim's a huge Buckeyes fan.

Speaker 3 (39:34):
I am so sorry. Tim. I am not familiar with
sport at all. I really know nothing about the sports ball,
but I respect for the game and for the fans.

Speaker 1 (39:48):
I just grew up with like a heavy dose of it.
Clearly it took, but I was gonna ask. So there
is a scene in the movie where a guy hallucinates
that there are maggots in your hair and none. They
are going back and forth. Were they real or were
they CGI?

Speaker 3 (40:05):
So well, I don't know. I hope you. I hope
you took a bet on this or something? Did you?

Speaker 2 (40:09):
We didn't, But I feel like I'm wrong. I'm gonna
even say before and that I'm probably wrong, but drum roll,
okay real or CGI both?

Speaker 3 (40:22):
Oh wait?

Speaker 1 (40:24):
Wait, so are real?

Speaker 2 (40:27):
What was it like having maggots in your hair? Lovely?

Speaker 3 (40:31):
Oh so so wonderful? Can't recommend it highly enough. They
actually they put several in my hair. I think most
of them were in the part that was extensions, so
it technically wasn't my hair, it was just attached to me.
So that helped soften the blow a little bit. I
did think it was very interesting that there were there
were rules about you know, because that was a bigger

(40:52):
budget film and on there are rules about humane Hollywood,
you know, of like if they're animals involved on set,
like you have to have people there that applies to maggots.
They care about the maggots. I thought that was very
interesting that.

Speaker 2 (41:06):
Wow, so you have to have that the living cree
humane treatment of maggots, Like wait, wait, are you saying
they like scoop them back out of your hair to
like put them somewhere when they were done.

Speaker 3 (41:15):
Oh yeah, in the Little Maggot Cup, there's someone designated
to make sure that those maggots get home safely. I mean,
and listen, I'm not knocking it. I am vegan. I
appreciate it. I also love animals. I had never thought
about maggots being in that category before, so I thought
that was interesting.

Speaker 2 (41:32):
Yeah, I'm just thinking so much to do I know,
I really am learning now, I'm glad. Like at first,
we're like, should we asked this question? No, Sim told
me beforehand. He's like, come on, it was CGI. I'm like,
MEGGI Wasn'tim was going to nix that question, Jetta, But
I'm so glad we asked.

Speaker 3 (41:48):
I'm so glad you asked. I'm so glad you asked.
I didn't put maggots in my hair, not to talk
about it exactly.

Speaker 2 (41:54):
Yeah, well okay, So your death scene in the Bye
Bye Man is another insane one because as k Hallucinate,
seeing a car crash right near a set of train tracks, Uh,
she runs toward them to help, only the turn and
gets smashed by an oncoming train. So I'm wondering how
did they film this scene? Like, how did you really
have to be near any sort of real oncoming train?

(42:16):
What did they do? Did your stunt background come into play?
Tell us everything?

Speaker 3 (42:20):
Yeah? Yeah, yeah, no, this is this is so fascinating
because I had obviously never done a train hit before
as a stunt and haven't since. I would be happy
to now that I know how it works. But yes
I did. I did do all my own stunts for
for a by By Man as well. And what we
did was we were shooting on an active set of
train tracks, which is very dangerous, and so I do

(42:41):
I will say like there were there was a stunt
coordinator there there. You know, the first ad was very
on top of like they had been communicating with with
you know, with uh, I don't even know what to
call them, the people who run the people who make
trains run on time, because this was extra dangerous because
I don't know if you heard. I know we talked
about Rust earlier, but Midnight Writer, the film in which

(43:05):
several crew members were injured and died because the film
was shooting on an active, active train tracks. I want
to say that that had recently happened when we shot that,
and so everyone was very very sensitive about it, which
is the right way to do it. You know, safety
is free. Like I can't say enough, It does not
matter how much money you have on a film. There

(43:27):
is always a way to do things safely and it's
always worth prioritizing. So anyway, I'll step off of my
soapbox now to answer the question. What we did was
it's we did a version where there was an actual
train that went by and I ran up to the
tracks and stopped before them. We did a version where

(43:47):
there was no train and there was a sort of
mini green screen that they set up on the tracks
and a pad and I was doing pratfalls as though
I was being hit by a train onto the pad.
And then the most fun version, because so we did
it all these different ways. The best one, my favorite
was they had a dummy that was dressed up in
my same outfit, had the same extensions. They stuck this

(44:10):
poor bitch on the tracks and they actually hit her
with a train.

Speaker 1 (44:12):
That I remember that shot and I was like, it's
I mean, obviously it wasn't you, but it's a good one.

Speaker 2 (44:20):
Do you think could they have used the terrifier dummy
with the circus, I mean they had it already.

Speaker 1 (44:26):
Shit, Yeah, that.

Speaker 3 (44:27):
Would have been incredible. Her resume is stacked, she's coming
from my job.

Speaker 2 (44:32):
Wow. Okay, So again we love asking these questions, especially
about death scene, because you never know how something is filmed.
But I mean, like that, so there were a lot
of takes involved in this. This was a very intricate
death scene, but it also looked like it must have
been really fucking cool, just because like, you know, who
gets to say they who else gets to say they
got smashed by a train and made a half maybe

(44:52):
a handful of actors, you know what I mean?

Speaker 3 (44:55):
And yeah, it was very very cool.

Speaker 1 (44:58):
One thing I love is that they Dunaways in this movie.
I'm a huge Mommy Dares fan and Carrie On Moss.
Did you get to meet them or talk to them
or what was your What was it like if you
got to talk to them or anything?

Speaker 3 (45:10):
Yeah? No, I mean I unfortunately I don't think I
got to meet Faye Dunaway or No. I think I
met her briefly in passing, but I didn't have any
actual scenes with either of them. I had more of
a conversation with Carrie Ann Moss, who I was like,
she was one of those people who I was shitting
myself when I met her, because I obviously we all

(45:30):
love her. She's amazing. She's so fucking cool and she's
just as cool in person. And so when I met her,
I was we met in passing, like she was like
leaving the hair trailer and I was walking in or something,
and it was this, you know, we shook hands and
I will never forget for the rest of my life.
But it was amazing. It was, I mean, the whole
team was really really lovely on that That was That
one was directed by Stacey Tidel, who a handful of

(45:51):
years ago died of als. But she was amazing. She
was like, she was so lovely to work with and
was very like she really wanted me because I had
just direct to my first short film at that point,
I've now directed seventeen short films. But she took me
behind the camera and into video village and was showing
me what she was doing and explaining why she was
doing different things, and like sent me her shot list

(46:12):
and was just very like really really wanted to foster
an environment which she like encouraged my filmmaking career as well.

Speaker 2 (46:18):
That is so cool, Like especially i mean, like to
take the typicause I'm sure as a director you could
just be like, I want to get this project done,
but to take the time to mentor other people that
may have that interest, that is really cool.

Speaker 3 (46:30):
Yeah, And then it really was. And she and she
also like my birthday happened on set, and so she
got a cake for me during lunch one day. And
there's this photo that I absolutely love of the two
of us where I'm blowing out the candles and she's
holding back my extensions and.

Speaker 2 (46:45):
She's like, surprise, there's maggots in the cake.

Speaker 3 (46:47):
Okay, surprise there in your hair?

Speaker 2 (46:50):
Just what? Oh my god. So skipping forward to twenty
twenty three, you were in a horror anthology call Night
of the Missing. Now you're in a segment called Miniature
where your character is literally a figure that's trying to escape,
like a Tim Burton style world where everyone else is

(47:10):
coming after her for being Dare I say different? Now?
Maybe it was just me, but I found a lot
of symbolism in this story, kind of relating to wanting
to break free from social norms and such. Did you
feel the same, Like, what kind of themes did you
feel like we're explored in that segment?

Speaker 3 (47:27):
That's really that's a really good observation. I would agree
with that. I think there is something early Tim Burtney
about it. You're absolutely right, that's very you know, everyone's
kind of uniform, and everyone has this sort of glassy
sheen to them, as though they're not real, and there's
this like pressure to conform. I do think it has
to do with maybe assimilation and conformity, and I don't

(47:50):
know if the director had any of those intentions, but
I read the same thing from it personally as you do.
And it is also funny to look at that and
terrify her back to back and look at just me
trying to save my blonde friend running and screaming and whatnot.

Speaker 1 (48:04):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (48:05):
No, it just seemed like because obviously it could have
just been you know, it's a weird figure world and
almost like a Stepford Wives type of thing, and your
character is trying to escape.

Speaker 3 (48:16):
Yeah, but it's very what's it called pleasant? Pleasant?

Speaker 2 (48:19):
Pleasantville? Yes?

Speaker 3 (48:20):
Yes, is a pleasantville? Is that what I'm thinking of?

Speaker 2 (48:24):
Yes?

Speaker 3 (48:25):
But that's right, thank you.

Speaker 2 (48:27):
But it felt like there was something more to it,
So I was just I didn't know if maybe that
was explicitly told to you, or maybe it's just my
observation or that kind of thing.

Speaker 3 (48:38):
Yeah, no, I would agree with that. It may have
been explicitly told to me. And I just don't remember
it because it was we shot that. I know they
put the feature anthology aspect of it together much later
and I haven't seen it. But the that snippet we
shot as a standalone short film. We shot it in
January of twenty twenty, and as you may recall, some

(49:00):
crazy shit happened very shortly afterwards. So it's a little
glory wow.

Speaker 1 (49:06):
Yeah, And did you get to keep your actual figure?

Speaker 2 (49:10):
Uh?

Speaker 3 (49:10):
No, I never got to like meet her. I like
they like took photos. They had me send photos because
they made the figure after we shot the film. I'm
pretty sure. Oh I never got to hold my little knee.

Speaker 2 (49:21):
Yeah, because it's like a cool figure and it looks
like you in that film, and I was like, Oh,
that would have been cool if you got to keep it.
But now it's somewhere on eBay. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (49:30):
Yeah, I don't I don't want to know what's happened
to that figure. That's that's not my business. What I
did get to see was the place where they shot
the that scene with them with the janitor and all
the all the miniature figures. I got to go there
and and it's somewhere where they have done a lot
of filming of other projects that utilized miniatures. And it
was really really cool because they had there was that

(49:51):
one that we were in, but there were all these
different worlds there and they all like move and they
have like little animatronics in them. It was really cool.
Somewhere in it was in we shot in southern CA, California.
I can't remember where that was.

Speaker 2 (50:01):
Oh wow, you know I'm also in twenty twenty three,
you played Carol in the horror comedy Renfield, which starred
Nicholas Cage as Draculine. Now, poor Carol is always getting
interrupted by Renfield during the codependency group meetings. But one
of your lines that I found very telling was when
you say life is like a never ending hallway of

(50:22):
funhouse mirrors, but all the clowns are me. Now, I
have to ask was this line given to you specifically
because of your role in Terrify or was that just
a coincidence.

Speaker 3 (50:32):
I actually I made up that line myself and they
ended up using it.

Speaker 2 (50:37):
That's amazing. I love it because it was such a
like how do you not think of that? It's a callback?
You know.

Speaker 1 (50:44):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (50:45):
Well, so Chris McKay, who directed that film, who was
an absolute joy to work with. He had he was
very encouraging of improv and both in the audition process
and then on set. He was so game and so
once I realized how open he was, I would literally
come up with a bunch of alt lines, and I
would bring them to him and even to the writer
Ryan Ridley, who was also very encouraging of that sort

(51:06):
of thing, and and would present them to him and
he would like have me try different ones, and so
that was one that he said, Yeah, go for it.
That's funny, and and it ended up in the movie,
which is so cool. And I found out later because
I think we may have talked about it on set
a little bit, but I saw an interview with him
later in which he talked about how, if it were
up to him, he would have stacked the cast with

(51:26):
exclusively people from horror movies because and he talked about
how much he like, you know, because Caroline is in
it and uh William who plays the priest at the beginning,
whose name I'm blanking on, like he's he's a horror
icon and he and he mentioned like me being in
Terrifier and so he Chris McKay is like a huge fan.
So I almost I can't help but feel like that's

(51:48):
probably was intentional.

Speaker 1 (51:51):
That's exciting.

Speaker 2 (51:53):
Yeah, No, that's so cool. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (51:55):
I was like, oh, the girl from Texas Chainsaw Maascar
part too.

Speaker 2 (51:58):
Yeah, Oh yeah, we didn't, Okay, right, yeah, and there's this.
So in Renfield, there's a big massacre scene toward the
end where Dracula comes to the codependency group and basically
just takes everyone out. But when it comes to Carol,
your character, we see you running toward Dracula and then
it kind of cuts away. So we were wondering, did
you film like an actual death scene that we just

(52:18):
didn't get the scene or how did they see or
how did that all go down?

Speaker 3 (52:22):
I am so glad you asked this is it's there
is a deleted scene. Yes, it is on the DVD
and the and the Blu ray, and I think there's
a actually no, there's a steel book of Renfield plug
plug time. There's a steel book coming out a four
K release in April, I want to say, of Renfield,
and I'm sure it will be on that too in

(52:43):
the special features. And I also at one point someone
had put the deleted scenes on online, so you could
potentially find them there somewhere, because we filmed an epic
death for me and it didn't end up in the
final cut, but it's really cool. So the death that
we filmed is Dracula sat at my leg and I
do a crazy stunt, which is called for reasons I

(53:05):
don't understand and I did not make up. It's called
a double gooch. I don't have to tell you.

Speaker 2 (53:12):
Wow, okay, a double gooch. Yes, the things that you're learning, Yeah,
tell us about a double gooch.

Speaker 3 (53:22):
I would love to tell you about a double gooch.
I would love nothing more. Basically, I'm in a harness.
It's like a full like a one piece bathing suit
sort of shaped harness, and and there's a wire attached
to my back and it go Because I've done harness
work before, and normally there's there are wires on your sides.
In this case, there's a wire on my back. It
wires up to the ceiling. It goes across the room,

(53:43):
it comes down on the other side of the room.
And there are two unnecessarily large beefy dudes who just
yank on that rope. And the rope is it goes
from I forgot an important step. It doesn't go straight
to the ceiling. It goes under my leg and up
to the ceiling. So when they pull, I basically do
this and I like somersault like a rag doll through

(54:04):
the air and then splat on my face. On my
stomach onto a mat on the ground, and we did
that a lot of times. I can darely walk afterwards.

Speaker 2 (54:14):
And then they cut it, and they cut it.

Speaker 1 (54:16):
Yeah a bummer.

Speaker 2 (54:19):
Oh, we're gonna have to get this because again, like
Tim and I were watching us and we're like, okay,
we see draculas killing certain people and then we kind
of see you run up and then you're just dead.

Speaker 1 (54:30):
Yeah, it's like, wait, is second.

Speaker 3 (54:33):
I appreciate that. I'm glad that you that you missed
me and that you wanted to me be there. Carol
couldn't even get justice in her death. She's just that's
just her lot in life.

Speaker 2 (54:40):
But Mart Carrol, she gets interrupted, her death gets interrupted.
Nobody gets to see the double Gooch. I just love that.
So another film in twenty twenty three that you not
only starred in but also co wrote was Faceless After Dark,
which feels like it has some aspects that may have
been drawn from your real life. You play a horror

(55:01):
star known for a killer clown film who, after being
attacked by a crazy fan, kind of snaps and goes
on a murder spree, taking out people who have left
some of the worst comments on social media. Now, obviously
you're not a killer, but did you pull from any
specific personal experiences after Terrifier when writing this?

Speaker 3 (55:20):
I do appreciate you giving you the benefit of the
doubt of saying I'm not a killer. It's not been
proven anyway, I'm just kidding. I am not a killer.
I did just say I was a vegan, So that
would be kind of wild serial killer. Someone should make
a movie about that. Yeah. True. So the short answer
is right. The short answer is that there were aspects
that I was pulling from certain experiences that I had had,

(55:42):
certain experiences that Catherine has had, because you know, Katheryne
Corkran has a cameo in the movie as well, and
my favorite sort of I mean, we definitely wanted it
to be more of a thriller and more of a
dark comedy. And what we were essentially trying to go
for is, like my pitch for the movie was if

(56:03):
Taxi Driver, if the main character and taxi driver Travis
Bickel were the lead in promising young Woman, It's supposed
to be that sort of arc like we were going for,
like an American psycho, you know, like the sort of
movie where you're watching a descent into madness, and we
wanted to make it in a way that would be
fun for people who were genre fans, because there are

(56:25):
a bunch of different sort of nods in it, like,
for example, the spoiler alert the disembodied dick that you
see is actually the same prosthetic penis that they use
in Terrifier Too, which Damien lent to me. Damien literally
shipped me a penis for this movie.

Speaker 2 (56:39):
Oh my god, you heard it here on Happy Horror Time. Yeah,
it was there like a note in it like happy penis.

Speaker 3 (56:51):
Sorry usps, I promise I can explain that in the
box meaning to what's in the box? Yeah, And actually
a fun fact in terms of things that draw from
real life. One of my favorite Easter eggs about this
is that you see in a lot of the flashing
sequences of comments that you read online, most of those

(57:11):
were actually real comments and real dms that I received.
In a lot of those sequences, you'll see dick pics
flash by. Every single dick pic you see in Faceless
after Dark is one that I have unsolicited received in
real life.

Speaker 2 (57:25):
Oh my god. And by the way, oh, we had
a lag for a little bit on the picture but
now it's getting back to better on your end. But wow,
so those are all real. I guess I just don't
understand the objective when people are like, hey, hey, I'm
so proud of that this person never asked for this,
but I'm just gonna send them a picture of my dick.

Speaker 1 (57:46):
I mean, you know.

Speaker 3 (57:47):
What they want, Yeah, you know what they want that
they did not you know what this complete stranger wants
but didn't ask for my erect penis. Wow. And so
there was a serious well the audio didn't cut out right,
I know, no, no.

Speaker 2 (58:02):
No, audio has been great. Yeah, audio has been great. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (58:04):
Very important that the story about the dicks makes it
in on stage. It's very very important. Yes. And so
there wasn't, you know, talk about Damien shipping me a penis.
There was a period of time where I was out
of nowhere. Every time I got a Dick pic, I
would just send it without context to Raymond Wood, the director,
so that he could collect them to use for the edit.

Speaker 2 (58:23):
That's amazing. You're like, here's another one, here's another one.
What do you think of this one? How many total
Dick pics do you think you sent him?

Speaker 3 (58:31):
That is a great question. I have no idea. I
even sent him one when he was like really far
along in editing, and he was like, please stop, I
have enough.

Speaker 2 (58:41):
We're talking twenty plus fifty plus one hundred plus.

Speaker 3 (58:45):
Oh no, certainly not that, probably more in the house
of twenty probably.

Speaker 1 (58:51):
I mean just getting one would be alarming.

Speaker 2 (58:54):
I was just thinking how Timmy would be blushing like that.

Speaker 1 (58:56):
I'd be like I would to be an actor.

Speaker 2 (58:58):
Right now, as Tim contacts you after this, Jennikator, send
me those dick picts you film.

Speaker 1 (59:06):
I need to know.

Speaker 3 (59:07):
I will happily next time I get one. Next time
I get one, right to the Happy Horror Time Instagram.

Speaker 2 (59:13):
No, no, no, Tim's personal one. Well, so also in
phases after Derek, you play a queer character in this film,
and I heard you mentioned in an interview that it
was made by a lot of queer people. I think
you said it was one of the gayest sets you
have ever been on, which I love. Why do you
think here's a big, big, deep question, why do you
think horror in particular is so appealing as a genre

(59:37):
to the queer community.

Speaker 3 (59:39):
I love that question. That's a fantastic one, I think
because this is something that I've noticed. When I started
doing conventions, I remember having a lot of preconceived notions
about what they would be like, about who would show
up to them. And I remember realizing after the first
one that almost everyone who comes to horror conventions is
in some way marginalized, right, so like, almost everyone comes

(59:59):
up to my table is either queer or you know,
global majority, or physically disabled or neurodivergent, or any number
of other things. And I remember there was a girl
who at the first convention I ever did, was crying
on the last day, and she had like dressed up
every day and like made matching outforts for her dog,
was really into it. She was crying and I asked

(01:00:20):
her what's wrong, and she said, it's the last day.
It's over, and this is the only place I belong.
And I remember feeling like it hit me, so I know,
I get like chills just talking about it because it
hit me so hard because I was like, well, shit,
that's like that's been true for me too. That's also
why I've loved horror. I think there's something about horror

(01:00:41):
that historically, horror has always been one of the if
not the most inclusive genres in regards to sexuality and
race and gender. I mean all three of these things.
Horror was knocking down walls long before any of our
or whatever metaphor you want to use, long before any

(01:01:02):
of the other genres. I mean, like think back to
even something like the original Fright Night. It's clearly a
movie about gay people. Like when you look back at it,
they're like, we don't like that these two men are
living together because they're vampires. It's because they're vampires to
be that's the only problem that we have, you know, Like,
It's always been a genre that like explores otherness and

(01:01:23):
what it means to be othered in, like in a
society that was, you know, built on genocide and patriarchy
and white supremacy and all these things. And and I
think that's a big part of why it feels so
welcoming and why why it's like, you know why, and
it explores things that other genres take a longer time
to explore. It tends to, for the most part, cast

(01:01:46):
more inclusively. You know, it tends to be that queer
characters are played by queer people, and like in a
lot of other genres, which we're getting better about, but
we're still you know, there's still a lot of progress
to be made. So I mean I'm only one person
I can speak for myself. But that's that's that's what
I think.

Speaker 2 (01:02:03):
No, that's a wonderful answer I'm thinking because like we've
been asked that question. I'm like, Okay, I'm stealing Jenna's.

Speaker 1 (01:02:10):
Well, just feel like, here's my fun. Here's here's Jenna
pus playing. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:02:13):
No, I mean we know. I mean, like I have
said a similar type of things where you feel, but
I mean, like me specifically, it's tough. I hate trying
to speak for a full community, even when I'm part
of it, because I just know my own personal experiences
and I know for me as a kid, and I'm
sure it has to do with knowing in some respect

(01:02:34):
that I was gay, like always really looking up just
strong resourceful women and women characters standing up to people
who you know, could take them down. In a way,
I felt like maybe that was seeing myself in people,
you know, standing up to people who maybe putting me down.
And I was seeing these people who were maybe seen
as being weaker as not being and showing them all up.

(01:02:56):
And so in a way I felt like I could
identify with a lot of these quote final girl care,
but also, like you said, like it also has explored
so many topics they're not afraid to kind of go
there and uh and and I think we've just always
I've always specifically like just seeing that the final chase
and like the person standing up to them. I think

(01:03:17):
that's why I love to Terra so much, you know,
because I love the people who aren't just the oblivious
party goers, the people that are really like what's going
on here, like trying to use their brains and like
think about it and stuff. But it's such a tough
question because I can only speak personally to.

Speaker 1 (01:03:32):
The partygoer that doesn't know what's going on.

Speaker 2 (01:03:34):
They might get to know the party girl. Oh yeah,
so what.

Speaker 3 (01:03:39):
But there's gotta be one of each.

Speaker 2 (01:03:42):
Hey there does right?

Speaker 1 (01:03:43):
Smart, resourceful. I'd be done in two seconds.

Speaker 2 (01:03:45):
No, that's not true. Well, one of the final scenes
in Faceless after Dark is very intense because your character
is filming themselves looking into a camera crying for like
three minutes straight while strobe lights are going off like
it actually reminded me of the end credit scene of
Pearl when Mia Goth is like keeping that humongous smile
up for so long, Like it's what was it like

(01:04:07):
filming this scene? Was it tough to keep those emotions
going for so long? I almost feel like it wasn't
because you were able to do that fear in terrifier,
But how did you go about filming that scene in particular?

Speaker 3 (01:04:17):
What's funny because I've heard that comparison to Pearl before
we actually filmed that before Pearl had come out.

Speaker 2 (01:04:24):
That's awesome.

Speaker 3 (01:04:24):
Obviously we didn't come out. The movie didn't come out
before Pearl, so no one will ever believe that. And
that's okay. I know, hats off to them because they
it's it's been done before. We weren't the first ones
to do it, and it's and it was done in
a different way by by everyone who does it. But
we actually so the way that we shot that we
had we were wrapping out of the house that we
were filming in, so we we had to be out

(01:04:46):
of that house, you know, the joys of indie film.
And Raymond Wood, the director, he stuck me in the
basement in that room, set up the lights so they
would keep going automatically, set up the camera and press
record and just left me in there and said like,
I'm just gonna let you do whatever it is you
need to do, and he went upstairs and then was
helping the rest of the crew wrap out of the

(01:05:07):
house because we had we were on a deadline, and
so I basically figured, okay, I'm you know, we talked
about all the different ways I had to kind of
get into that place, and I just sat there and
I just went through every possible thing and just like
kind of put myself through essentially a panic attack that
turns into this sort of Joker esque euphoria. And I figured,

(01:05:29):
you know, I'll just give him everything I have. I'll
pour myself out, I'll empty myself and then he can
pick and choose what he wants. Joke's on me. He
used the entire thing. But that's the only take that
we got. It's literally just that, and he used every
every moment of it.

Speaker 2 (01:05:44):
Wow. I just can't even again, like the exhaustion about
having to put I mean, I felt exhausted for you
watching that scene because it goes on for so long.
So the idea I just can't imagine.

Speaker 1 (01:05:58):
We didn't have film on the cameras, didn't do it
again on Oh no.

Speaker 2 (01:06:05):
I Yeah, it is very commendable, amazing job because it
is so intense emotionally, and it's also it's just a
great scene because you're what it's so like uncomfortable but
also like beautiful in a weird way, if that makes sense.

Speaker 3 (01:06:18):
Thank you, thank you, I appreciate that. Yeah, you know what,
we wanted to sort of like a like a joker
King of comedy thing, but with someone who presented as
as female, even if they weren't didn't identify that way.

Speaker 2 (01:06:31):
Yeah. So, and then you were just in a horror
drama that was released just last month on VOD called
The build Out. You play Cameron, who escorts their friend
into the desert where she's going to live in like
a cult like settlement. Now, the setting in this film
was absolutely beautiful, and you and your co star are
on motorcycles throughout most of the movies. So where was

(01:06:53):
this all filmed? And had did you already know how
to ride a motorcycle before this production?

Speaker 3 (01:06:59):
We've owned in the Onza Barrego Desert in California, so
it's it's it's a couple hours I don't remember what direction,
but in the vague area near where Palm Springs is
like the middle of nowhere. It's absolutely gorgeous. One of
the scenes that we shot is where they got those
scenes of the two rocks talking and everything everywhere all

(01:07:19):
at once. That location was. It's stunning. It's so beautiful.
It's also terrifying because the desert is not meant to
house human life. And I remember the one time I
got I got out of the shower at the end
of the night and there was a fucking scorpion in
my room that I had to figure out how to
escort out. That was fun. But no, I did not
know how to ride a motorcycle prior. The director, Zishan

(01:07:41):
Yunis actually put myself and Hannah Alin, the other star
in it. He put us through training. So I actually
got my motorcycle license for that movie.

Speaker 2 (01:07:52):
Wow. Wait, so you've got press though, Okay, so that
means so then can you do like so then on
future movies you could do motorcycle riding and be safe
and prepared.

Speaker 3 (01:08:02):
Yeah. Yeah, I would certainly want to brush up and
rehearse beforehand because I don't practice a lot here because
I live in Atlanta, and I think if I took
a motorcycle out on the streets here. My parents would
bury me, and I don't want to put them through that.
But but but yeah, I absolutely, I mean I did
a lot of my training. I did my first training
on like rocky muddy terrain, got my license on asphalt,

(01:08:24):
and then we did all the filming in you know,
sugary desert sand, so it was a bunch of different
types of terrain. But I did all of my own
writing in the movie.

Speaker 2 (01:08:32):
That's amazing.

Speaker 1 (01:08:33):
And this is a slight spoiler alert, but we were
a little unsure what happened to your character at the
end or is it open to interpretation or what do
you think happened to your character?

Speaker 3 (01:08:44):
That the buildout is definitely more on the artsy poetic
side of things, more Terrence Malachy sort of vibes. So
it is definitely meant to be a little up to
interpretation what happens to me at the end.

Speaker 2 (01:08:57):
Because we I mean, it's like we have theories. I
mean I didn't. Yeah, it's like I kind of want to.
I mean, do you have a theory or do you
want to? And I totally respect if you want to
keep it to yourself, because so people can experience this
and come to their own conclusion. But do you have
a theory as to what happened to Cameron or you.

Speaker 3 (01:09:15):
Yeah, into that big motorcyclist sky, you know, would like
to you know, yeah, exactly, it comes comes back. I'm
in full leather for some reason, I have a blowout.
I would like to think, you know, there's I think
there are two different versions of it. I think there's
the version and there are three differ three versions. There's

(01:09:37):
the version in which I somehow survived. There's the version
in which I, I, you know, just die a really
horrific slow death, you know, of dehydration and starvation in
the desert. And then there's the version in which the
spoiler alert the cults that I that we I'm there
to drop her off with, finds me and you know,

(01:10:01):
whether I join them, whether they kill me and sacrifice
me to whoever they worship, Who's to.

Speaker 2 (01:10:07):
Say that's I mean, I think that was along the
lines of what we thought. Because it's so she joined
the well because camera and here's this loud sound out
of the car and then goes to explore and then
just is never heard from again. And I'm thinking, unless
that's either that's an animal and then you're dead either way,
or that's the cult. And so I was thinking it
probably didn't end up so well for Cameron, but you know,

(01:10:28):
maybe maybe she did ride off into the scene.

Speaker 1 (01:10:30):
That's what I'm gonna tell myself.

Speaker 3 (01:10:34):
I think that's good. I think whatever helps you sleep
at night is what you should believe well.

Speaker 2 (01:10:38):
And and then, like I mentioned in the intro, you
are currently in development for a new indie sci fi
feature that you're writing, directing, and starring in called Denovo.
What can you tell our listeners about this film? Like,
what's it about, how did it all get started, when
can we expect to see it? Tell us everything.

Speaker 3 (01:10:55):
So we are still in the very early stages of
development on this film, so I cannot say much, but
I can say that it's it's a sci fi and
the main character is a mycologist, which is somebody who
studies fungus, So there's going to be kind of an
existential horror element to it, but it skews more on
the on the sci fi side, and and I'm really

(01:11:17):
really excited. People can find out more about it by
going to Hoka Studio dot com slash Denovo. So that's
h O c A studio dot com, slash d E,
and o VO And at the bottom of that pit
you can find out more about the cast that we've
attached so far, and about the story, and about some
of the images, because we've already started shooting parts of

(01:11:38):
it and it's going to be really gorgeous and I'm
really excited. At the bottom of that page, you can
also sign up for our email list to keep posted
on when things progress and when you'll be able to
see it down the line.

Speaker 2 (01:11:50):
And it's a beautiful site, by the way, listeners, because
I've visited and look through it and it's just beautiful
and it's very it looks like, yeah, it's very intriguing.
I can't wait to see how it turns out. Are
you thinking maybe, and again, I know it's so early,
but maybe like a twenty twenty six release or is
that what you'd be shooting for.

Speaker 3 (01:12:10):
We're shooting for twenty twenty seven release. Oh, I mean
twenty twenty six would be great. Either twenty six or
twenty seven. It depends. It depends on a couple factors.
But I've either end of twenty twenty six or sometime
in twenty twenty seven, we'll see I hope to be
able to share it soon. And yeah, and if you
look at the site, you can see some of the
other projects that I'm involved in, Like there's another there's
a short film called Spray Bottle, which is an action

(01:12:32):
comedy that I also wrote, directed in starring, and that
one actually comes out in festivals this year. It comes
out premieres in April actually at our first festival, and
it'll be playing all over the country this year, which
I'm really excited about.

Speaker 2 (01:12:45):
That's so cool. Lots of things, and I love that
you have taken on like I mean, it's like, like
you said, acting was kind of like the gateway, but
now like being so involved in writing and directing and
stunts and everything. I mean, you're just like a one
person production. Als.

Speaker 3 (01:13:00):
Thank you. It takes. It does still take a village,
but it helps when you are several members of the village.

Speaker 1 (01:13:07):
Yeah, and we noticed that you make time to do conventions.
What's the number one question people ask you?

Speaker 3 (01:13:14):
A lot of people, I mean, I really appreciate this,
this is a huge compliment. But a lot of people
ask if I'm coming back to Terify here. A lot
of people want me to come back, and I would
if they I would if they ask, I promise.

Speaker 2 (01:13:27):
I mean to be honest, we like we said, would
love you too. Also is because just again because when
you I think, when you like a movie and you
like franchises, you like seeing the characters.

Speaker 1 (01:13:37):
Like like whenever there's someone from a past film is back,
you're like, what, like people love it?

Speaker 3 (01:13:42):
Oh, I mean talk look at just That's what Avengers
has built their entire franchise on, is people leaving and
coming back.

Speaker 2 (01:13:50):
Yeah, exactly, And so earlier I asked why you think
the queer community in general gravitates toward horror, But I
also wanted to ask you individually, since you've obviously embraced
the horror genre throughout your career, what do you enjoy
most about making horror films?

Speaker 3 (01:14:06):
Ooh oh, that's interesting because we did. We did talk
earlier about about why I enjoy consuming horror, but making horror.
I think I love making. I mean, like I said,
like I love you know, I love a lot of
genres and including action like we were talking about. And
I mean, I don't know if you have any bad
boys fans that listen to this, to this show, but

(01:14:28):
if you do, go watch the most recent Bad Boys
not a horror movie unless I don't know anyway, unless
you hate loud noises, in which case it is a
horror scar But but I love making horror because there's
so much freedom in the genre because, like we were
talking about of how historically it's it's just been such

(01:14:49):
a such a playground for expression and for collaboration and
for different voices in front of and behind the camera,
and like, like we were talking about, like some of
the whole sets I've been on have been some of
the gayest and and some of the most racially inclusive
and some of the most interesting in terms of like
gender bending and things like that. And I just feel

(01:15:10):
like it's there's so much fun to make because you
can see even if you're doing if you're doing special effects,
if you're doing carpentry, if you're doing puppetry, Like there
are all these different ways to get into it. Just
watching like you know, or stunts or seeing like how
the sausage is made, it doesn't make it any less
fun to watch. Like even when you watch something I mean, well,

(01:15:33):
you know, obviously for actual sausage, it makes it a
lot less less fun. But for horror sausage it's you know,
when you can see something like it's it's really cool
to watch the process of like this thing that I
love so much. It's it's cool to see, like what
is it like before sound design? Like what is what
does what does mouth blood taste like? Versus what does

(01:15:54):
body blood feel like? And what does you know a
bone breaking look like? Versus How much more vis it
is when when they add this the sound of a
carrot snapping, you know, and post and foley and sound
mixing and things like that, and to see how different
something is when when the music changes, and you know,
like it's it's just really cool to watch how it
all comes together. And one of the reasons I love

(01:16:16):
film in general is because it's so collaborative, like it
really is a team sport and and it's so cool
to be a part of us watching like a small
army who have a common goal, all working towards the
same thing. Like I remember on Renfield, one of my
favorite memories of all time was we're in that gym
with all the support group scenes. We're in the middle
of New Orleans. It's the middle of the night, and

(01:16:39):
I look around. There are hundreds of people. There's a
techno crane that the camera is on that's like moving,
you know, moving it all over the place. Nicholas Cage
is floating in the air next to me, and I
just remember thinking like this is so this isn't real
and this is not like I can't believe I get
to do this. I'm so so lucky, and I'm so grateful,

(01:17:02):
and I'm so grateful that people watch horror movies and
that they bring anyone any comfort at all. Like I
do believe that the film in general is meant to,
like Caesar Cruz says, like it's meant to disturb the
comfortable and comfort the disturbed, and and it means a
lot that we get to do it and that people
enjoy it and and it brings anyone any comfort or

(01:17:25):
or disturbs anybody.

Speaker 2 (01:17:26):
Oh wow, well said, great answers. You're so well spoken.
I'm so impressed. Like and it just like your answers
are incredible because again, like we we do these interviews
a lot, and some of the questions we ask we
recycle in a way.

Speaker 1 (01:17:42):
And we don't always keep it fresh.

Speaker 2 (01:17:44):
I mean, yeah, yeah, but I mean this is so
like it's been so amazing talking with you, Jenna. We
have one final question for you that we ask every
single person that we interview, and it puts you on
the spot a little bit, uh, but you know that's
what we What is one thing that you can tell
us about your experience I was going to say working

(01:18:05):
on Terrifier, but really any of the films that we
discussed today that you've never told any other interviewer, publication, convention,
Q and A, or podcaster. Just one thing about your
experience either working on Terrifier or one of the other
horror films that you've never told in any interview. You've
told us a lot of stuff, and you've told us
a lot and I know we're not going to get
that original death from Terrifier because we got to wait

(01:18:27):
on that, so I know we can't get that. But anything,
and it doesn't have to be like some big, juicy
gossip thing, just anything about your experience working on any
of these films. I mean, and you've told us some
things already that kind of count in this, I feel like,
but uh, okay.

Speaker 3 (01:18:43):
I don't. I think I've maybe I maybe posted about
this years and years and years ago, but I don't
even know if the post is still up and I
definitely have never spoken about it, so maybe we can
count this.

Speaker 2 (01:18:56):
Oh sure?

Speaker 3 (01:18:58):
On Renfield, I was living in New Orleans on and
off for three months, and which is such a magical place.
It's where and you know, you understand why Nicholas Cage
has a his future grave already purchased there. He totally
makes sense. And I was walking around on one of
my off days because I always love to explore any
cities that I'm working in that are new, and this

(01:19:22):
man came up to me and he lifted up his
shirt and he told me he had just been released
from the hospital and he had all of these like
freshly hatched up stab wounds on his stomach that were
like like still had the iodine on them, like gospads,
like all the iodine you could see was around. And

(01:19:43):
I was like, you do it, okay, buddy, and he
was like, well, I much better now. And he walked
away and I never saw him again, and I think
about him all the fucking time, and I hope he's okay.

Speaker 1 (01:19:55):
Did he escape ye?

Speaker 2 (01:19:57):
Wait? Wait, like yo, no, was he just attacked by
someone just like hees?

Speaker 1 (01:20:04):
Hey, I just got some stitches.

Speaker 3 (01:20:08):
I have this these questions are I like, this ship
keeps me up at night. I have so many questions, like,
who was he? What happened? Was it actually the hospital?
Was it a jail that he escaped from? Who stamped him?
Where are they? Well?

Speaker 2 (01:20:21):
Well, surprised, Jenna. We have a special guest with us today.

Speaker 1 (01:20:25):
This guy.

Speaker 3 (01:20:30):
Under your chair right now.

Speaker 2 (01:20:34):
Surprise Jenna, he's right outside your window. Oh my god,
that's killed. That is terrifying. Slash. That is a great start. See,
we love those random kind of stories, the stories that
you We asked this question because it's the stories that
you wouldn't normally bring up in interviews. Well, we want
to hear all that shit. So like that is here.

Speaker 3 (01:20:52):
You can see why. You can see why I wouldn't
casually bring this up, like you Knowloria or whatever.

Speaker 2 (01:20:59):
But that's so random that he also happens to go
to someone who was in the midst of filming a
because obviously I'm taking it he didn't know you were
filming or an actor or anything like that, right.

Speaker 3 (01:21:09):
I don't think he knew who I was. Usually when
people recognize me, there is like they tell me that usually,
so uh, everything about it felt very organic, uncomfortably.

Speaker 2 (01:21:23):
So you know, I feel a horror short possibly coming
along with that situation.

Speaker 3 (01:21:28):
Jenna, I get if anyone wants to.

Speaker 2 (01:21:32):
Oh, I want you to write it and directed.

Speaker 3 (01:21:34):
Oh okay, fine, five have fun. I'll work on it.

Speaker 2 (01:21:37):
Tim will be the Tim will be the weirdo with
all this.

Speaker 1 (01:21:40):
Tim and where your your hair? Axtension with maggot please?

Speaker 3 (01:21:45):
Yes? But Keith, yes, oh my god.

Speaker 1 (01:21:48):
By all means well, I'm from Ohio. Bye Bye, bye
bye man was filmed?

Speaker 3 (01:21:53):
No, yeah, it's per I have I also have when
I do like photo ops as terra I have a
Tarah Hayswig from Terrifier as well, so we can we
can do a deep dive.

Speaker 1 (01:22:05):
How come there was just never a bye bye a
man too?

Speaker 2 (01:22:09):
I thought said they said bye bye?

Speaker 3 (01:22:14):
That is a good question. I think I think there
were talks about it. I mean because it made a
bunch of money, so I'm not really sure. I think
there were conversations, but I have no idea.

Speaker 1 (01:22:25):
Kim Kim, that was your name in the mid Yeah.
I like from the train tracks, from the trade that
we've had so much.

Speaker 3 (01:22:36):
I know the train conductor come full circle.

Speaker 2 (01:22:40):
The by train condrector. Jenna you've been an absolute delight,
Like seriously, and I don't know why I used the
word delight. It sounds like it's like my grandma, but like, Okay,
you've been an absolute delight, but seriously, like we've had
so much fun talking with you. You can just tell
yourself an amazing person. We're so grateful.

Speaker 1 (01:23:02):
Cool.

Speaker 2 (01:23:02):
Yeah, we're so grateful to have had the chance to
talk with you, big fans. And the coolest part is that,
I mean, yes, we love terrifier, but you you can
tell you have such a bright career ahead of you,
whether you're writing, directing, acting. We hope you continue to
do horror. I feel like you will in addition to
other genres. But like you can tell, there's gonna be

(01:23:23):
so much to watch from you, and we're really excited
to be a part of that.

Speaker 3 (01:23:27):
Thank you so much, Thank you for having me. This
was a delight.

Speaker 2 (01:23:32):
Awesome. Well, enjoy the rest of your day. Thank you
so much.

Speaker 3 (01:23:36):
Thank you.

Speaker 2 (01:23:37):
Okay, take care, We'll talk with you soon. Bye bye.

Speaker 1 (01:23:48):
Thanks for listening to another episode of Happy Horror Time.

Speaker 2 (01:23:51):
If you'd like to support the podcast, please sign up
to be a patron at www dot patreon dot com.
Slash Happy Horror Time. As a you get access to
all our bonus content, which now includes two new bonus
episodes every month, a monthly after show mini episode, access
to our Discord community so you can chat with us directly,

(01:24:12):
and the chance to review a film with us in
one of our bonus episodes.

Speaker 1 (01:24:17):
Patrons also get all our regular episodes, ad free and
a day early our monthly newsletter, the chance to vote
in polls, and autographed Happy Horror Time stickers.

Speaker 2 (01:24:27):
I'm Matt Emmerts and I'm Tim Murdoch, and we hope
you have a Happy Horror Time.

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Ep 253: Interview w/Jenna Kanell from “Terrifier”

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