We had the wonderful opportunity to speak with horror icon Barbara Crampton, known for her iconic roles in horror classics like Re-Animator, From Beyond, Chopping Mall, and You’re Next.
She touches on the practical effects of past films, her experience doing voice work for Turtle Rock’s Back 4 Blood, and her newest film, Alone with You.
Horror Geek Life: Throughout your career, you’ve been in many gory, goopy, effects-heavy horror films like Re-Animator and From Beyond. You’ve recently taken on roles in more psychological horror sub-genres, like Superhost and Alone with You. Do you prefer one over the other?
Barbara Crampton: I mean, I like it all; I just think there are trends in the marketplace. In the 1980s, goopyness was in, blood was in, and I feel like now we’re in a stage where movies sell internationally and a lot kind of shifts in the paradigm because we have a wider audience for American horror, especially. I think supernatural things and psychological stuff are more in fashion and something I think a wider audience can enjoy. I kind of think that’s why we’re now in this period of more psychological, internal, and mind-bending type of horror. But I’ve enjoyed it all.
In From Beyond, I had slime on me for a great part of the movie, because when you go into the Beyond, it sort of appears. We were working with this substance called methylcellulose which at the time, I don’t know if they use it anymore, was the food thickener for McDonald’s milkshakes, so it was this Vaseline-y, cold, gelatinous gel that was all over me. I’d say that was a little distracting to act with that kind of stuff, so it might be a little easier, in a way, to just use your own mind, voice, and body. I also think we’re in a time where we’re just exploring the inner worlds of people’s psyche. We’re really interested in that as a people. Just watching all these television shows about dissecting human nature is really at the forefront of what’s in fashion, so that’s why I think we’re in this period where it’s just about people and what motivates people. It’s actually a very exciting time for performers because we really get to stretch ourselves.
HGL: In Alone with You, your character was portrayed through this Skype-style video chat. Was that part initially written like that, or did Covid influence the filming? Is that something you expect to see more in the stylistic changes in horror?
Barbara Crampton: Emily Bennett and Justin Brooks were the writers and directors, and Emily was the star of the movie. They had been planning to shoot a different movie, and then Covid hit, and they wrote this film kind of quickly to produce during Covid. It was shot at the height of Covid, toward the beginning. It was at the time when we were still going to the grocery stores and coming back and wiping off our salad boxes. Nobody was hanging out, and nobody was spending time with anyone outside of your family where you lived. I think the movie was born out of necessity in that way. I don’t really think we’re going to see all these new pandemic movies. We did get Host out of England, which Jed Shepherd produced, which was amazing. I think that was the preeminent pandemic movie.
There’s a slice of time when we’re going to see some of these films coming out, and there’s probably a few more coming out that were shot during Covid, but right now, things are opening up, and people are filming. We have Covid compliance officers on set, and I’ve shot a bunch of things in the past year. I think people will get tired of seeing a surge of pandemic movies going forward, and I don’t really think Alone with You, in particular, is not going to have a shelf-life beyond the pandemic because there’s so much about this movie that you learn while you’re watching it. Initially, you think what’s happening to her could all be in her mind, or it could be a dream, or could be hallucinating all of this, and then when you find out what’s really true and it’s revealed, it’s like “Oh, now I get it, it makes perfect sense!” and it was a shift that I didn’t see coming when I was first reading the script. I think in this particular case, with what is really going on with the character of Charlie, you could have shot this in the same way, whether there was a pandemic or not. It doesn’t really matter, but it does work for that time.
HGL: Traditionally, you’ve taken on more protagonist roles than anything else, but recently, you’ve been stretching into a villain, or at least anti-hero territory with Creepshow, Jakob’s Wife, and Superhost. Do you have more fun playing the hero or the villain?
Barbara Crampton: Yes, I definitely have! I would say I was definitely the villain in Creepshow, Superhost, and Alone with You. I don’t think in Jakob’s Wife I was really the villain. I think that one was more about a relationship and trying to understand the dynamics of a marriage. Even though my character does turn into a vampire and kills a couple of people, haha, it’s understandable! I think that movie is not so much about a vampire, although it was always my desire to play a classic character, I think it’s really more about marriage dynamics. I hope people come away thinking fondly of that character and not like I’m some sort of demon or something.
To answer your question, it’s enjoyable for an actor to play all kinds of roles, and as I’ve gotten older, I think some of the roles that I’ve played have become much more interesting than maybe what I was given when I was a younger actress fleeing for my life, like in Chopping Mall or Re-Animator. Although Re-Animator is a great movie, I didn’t necessarily have the best role in that, I think that was really Jeffrey Combs’ iconic character and that really sells the movie. I think as I’ve gotten older, I’ve been able to play more complicated characters. In Beyond the Gates, another movie I produced, I played an evil on-screen game villain, and so it’s fun to explore all aspects of who you are as a person, so I’m enjoying it all. I like playing nice characters. I like showcasing empathy and love, but also understanding what makes an evil character tick and being able to justify why they do the things they do, or at least justifying it in their mind.
HGL: Speaking of games, you recently branched into video game horror and did voice work as “Mom” in Turtle Rock’s Back 4 Blood, a spiritual follow-up to Left 4 Dead. What was that experience like?
Barbara Crampton: It was amazing! I didn’t know anything about doing a voiceover for a video game before I stepped into the recording booth. There was quite a steep learning curve and a lot of vernaculars that they used in recording me and giving me different cues about what I was supposed to do. They’d say things like, “Well, why don’t you give that some pre-life before you speak?” and I said, “What? What is pre-life? What does that mean?” and they said, “You know, like give a yell, or exclamation, or add a couple of words to kind of get you into the mood, and we’ll either use that or cut it out,” and that made sense to me right away, so I was able to do that. It’s very fast working on a video game. You get your dialogue in advance, but it’s hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of lines, so it’s really hard to study for it.
We had a director for a certain amount of time, then the original writer, Simon Mackenzie, was really active and talked to me in the recording booth about the story and what was happening at that moment, and my relationships with all the other characters, because these characters just spit out dialogue here and there, sometimes it’s just one line. Occasionally, it’s a small paragraph and by that, I mean two or three lines. It’s very brief and fast, so we would have to record one line for me, and they’d tell me to “say it three different ways, and give us a little break between each line, and we’ll take our favorite,” and if they wanted to give me any more direction, they may have me do it three more times. It was really fun and exhilarating and something I’d love to do again. I do think they’re planning on doing some downloadable content for it, so I’m supposed to go back in and do some more voice work for Back 4 Blood. I’m looking forward to that and hoping to do more work on some more video games if people would like me to.
HGL: Do you have anything coming out that you want people to keep their eyes open for?
Barbara Crampton: I have a couple of Lovecraftian films that are going to be making their way out soon. There’s one that I executive produced that I won’t be in, and another one that’s in development that we almost have all the money for. It’s based on a story by Lovecraft and written by Dennis Paoli, who did Re-Animator and From Beyond.
We’re still developing that and hoping to shoot that in late Spring, but still putting the pieces together for that one. I can’t say the name of it yet, or who the players might be, but that’s a really exciting one for me.
