Refusing Leonardo DiCaprio's charm, putting a devout Catholic in agony, and finding the sexy in creatures from Hell. Replacing an actor can sometimes mean a film is in trouble, but for these horror movies, it was for the best.
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00:00Refusing Leonardo DiCaprio's charm, putting a devout Catholic in agony, and finding the
00:06sexy in Creatures from Hell.
00:08Replacing an actor can sometimes mean a film is in trouble, but for these horror movies,
00:13it was for the best.
00:15As is the case with many slasher franchises, several actors have portrayed Jason Voorhees,
00:20but it's not often that we get the definitive portrayal of an icon seven movies in.
00:25That's the case for Friday the 13th though.
00:27In Part 7, The New Blood, Kane Hodder stepped in.
00:31He would go on to play Jason in three more films, Jason Takes Manhattan, Jason Goes to
00:35Hell, and Jason X.
00:37When you think of Jason Voorhees, it's probably Hodder's brutal, animalistic version of the
00:42character who comes to mind.
00:44Hodder told Inverse that he stood in front of a mirror and tried to figure out what new
00:47spin he could put on the character, saying,
00:49That's where I came up with the kind of heaving chest, because even though he's motionless,
00:54he still looks like he's about to explode.
00:56Sure enough, Hodder's Jason is a hulking force of nature, exactly what the character should
01:01have been all along.
01:03The 2022 version of Hellraiser seems curiously uncomfortable with the BDSM implications of
01:09both Clive Barker's original story and the 1987 film that kicked off the franchise.
01:14The original Hellraiser is sadistically and sexually fascinated by bodies, but the new
01:18movie feels repulsed by them, prioritizing the grotesque rather than engaging with the
01:23implications of the idea that for the Cenobites, pain is pleasure.
01:27The exception?
01:28Jamie Clayton's new take on Pinhead.
01:31The Sense8 star turned out to be a brilliant recasting choice when she assumed the character
01:35from Doug Bradley.
01:36Surprisingly, she told USA Today that she'd never even seen the original until the night
01:41before she auditioned for the remake, saying,
01:43I had no idea how sexy it was.
01:46While some might say the filmmakers didn't really understand the source material either,
01:50Clayton got it.
01:51Her Pinhead terrifies in all the right ways, perfectly embodying the Hell Priest's threatening
01:56sensuality.
01:59Director Mary Herron was preparing her adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis' controversial novel
02:03American Psycho when the studio decided Leonardo DiCaprio should play the lead role.
02:08Herron told Vice that she refused to meet with him, believing him to be all wrong for
02:12the murderous Patrick Bateman.
02:14She explained,
02:15I knew I would find him charming, and then I would find myself getting into doing it
02:19with him.
02:20You have to trust your instinct, or else it's going to be a disaster.
02:24Herron feared that the script would be altered to make Bateman more sympathetic.
02:27After all, DiCaprio had just starred in Titanic, and Herron worried his fans would expect something
02:32totally different from the psychopaths he wanted to present.
02:35As a result, the studio dropped her as director.
02:38Ultimately, DiCaprio left the project after his casting had been announced, which meant
02:42that Herron could direct it after all.
02:45She got her star Christian Bale, and the rest is horror history.
02:49Finally towing the line between steely blankness and undeniable charisma, Bale's portrayal
02:54of Patrick Bateman remains one of the greatest villain performances of all time.
02:59Kathy Bates won a well-deserved Best Actress Oscar for her role as Annie Wiltz, the disturbed
03:04nurse at the heart of Rob Reiner's adaptation of Stephen King's Misery, but the film almost
03:09turned out quite differently.
03:11A pre-Hocus Pocus Bette Midler was offered the part, but she turned it down, telling
03:15Variety that not only was the character too violent, but she wasn't funny enough for Midler.
03:20She explained,
03:21The character was so not funny, so without any qualities of redemption.
03:26It's a shame Midler couldn't find the humor on the page, but Bates sure did, so it's for
03:31the best that the part went to her instead.
03:33They just cheated us!
03:35This isn't fair!
03:36He didn't get out of the cock-a-doodie car!
03:41Sterling Jarens played Judy Warren in The Conjuring and its sequel, and she proved perfectly
03:46serviceable as the daughter of Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson's demon-hunting duo.
03:50However, by the time the franchise got around to 2019's Annabelle Comes Home, Jarens was
03:55simply too old to play the part again.
03:57Instead, McKenna Grace stepped in, and showed why she's one of her generation's most promising
04:02up-and-coming talents.
04:04She's precocious, yet still childlike, able to fully carry a horror film about a girl
04:08and her babysitter being terrorized by a haunted doll.
04:12As Grace told Collider,
04:13I do have a big responsibility to live up to, because they're so good in all of the
04:17other films.
04:18I'm like, I hope I do as good as them.
04:21In the end, she did.
04:23Annabelle Comes Home stands head and shoulders above most Conjuring spin-offs, thanks in
04:27large part to her performance.
04:30Linda Blair did a phenomenal job playing Reagan McNeil in The Exorcist, and even earned an
04:34Oscar nomination.
04:36But audiences may not know that Blair had help.
04:39Academy Award-winning actor Mercedes McCambridge dubbed over Reagan's voice in the scenes in
04:43which the fully-possessed character babbles all sorts of spooky noises.
04:47While audiences expressed concern about Blair's sanity after playing the role, it turns out
04:51they should have been worried about McCambridge instead.
04:54The Touch of Evil star was tortured by the things she had to make the child say, telling
04:58The New York Times,
04:59I'm a product of 16 years of convent education, and I'm still a devout Catholic.
05:05So speaking those vile, blaspheming words was an agony for me.
05:09In the same interview, McCambridge revealed that they did indeed film Blair saying the
05:13profane things that Reagan squeals while possessed.
05:16Footage of Blair's vocal performance is on YouTube, and it proves that replacing Blair's
05:20voice was a good thing.
05:22Well, then let's introduce ourselves.
05:25I'm Damian Karras.
05:26And I'm the devil!
05:27Now kindly undo these strips.
05:30Hayley Lou Richardson stands out in numerous films and shows like The Edge of Seventeen
05:35and the second season of The White Lotus.
05:37Aside from a role in M. Night Shyamalan's 2016 film Split, Richardson hasn't really
05:42dipped her toe in the horror genre.
05:44That almost changed in 2019.
05:47Richardson told Backstage that she was considered for the leading role in Ari Aster's sun-drenched
05:52nightmare Midsommar.
05:54Producers wanted to meet her.
05:56She turned them down, however, unwilling to do a horror film again so soon after Split.
06:01Aster subsequently tapped Florence Pugh, whose performance delivered a live wire of grief
06:05and torment.
06:07She was nominated for an Oscar for that same year's Little Women.
06:10But if you ask us, they recognized the wrong film.
06:14When Jonathan Demme began preparing his adaptation of The Silence of the Lambs, he knew exactly
06:19who he wanted to cast as Clarice Starling.
06:22Demme had just worked with Michelle Pfeiffer on Married to the Mob, and he felt she'd
06:26be the perfect person to play the FBI agent tasked with interviewing pop culture's most
06:30notorious cannibal.
06:32But Pfeiffer, it seemed, disagreed, with Demme telling the Daily Beast,
06:35It was way too dark for her, so Michelle ran away from that part.
06:39Pfeiffer also told the New Yorker that she particularly hated the film's ending, which
06:43resists the good-over-evil closure one might expect from a horrific film like this.
06:48Instead, they cast Jodie Foster, and the resulting performance won her an Oscar.
06:53Her version of Clarice is a no-nonsense interrogator who can spar with Hannibal like no one else.
07:00Aside from the 2010 remake, a Nightmare on Elm Street villain Freddy Krueger has always
07:04been played by Robert Englund.
07:07It's a good thing, too.
07:08Unlike most slashers, Freddy talks.
07:10A lot.
07:11What do you know?
07:12A beat-my-eyes score?
07:16Englund's performance toes the line between funny and frightening, making Freddy a killer
07:24who loves a killer joke as much as he loves killing.
07:27As a result, Englund gives probably the most iconic performance in slasher history.
07:32It wasn't always going to be this way, however.
07:34Titanic star David Warner was originally cast as Freddy, getting far enough in the process
07:39that he sat for makeup tests, later shared by Bloody Disgusting.
07:43With his background in theatrical training, it's an open question what kind of energy
07:47Warner would have brought to A Nightmare on Elm Street.
07:51In the original Predator, the late Kevin Peter Hall ultimately played the creature who stalks
07:55Arnold Schwarzenegger and friends through the jungle, and he excelled at bringing the
07:59Predator's alien physicality through, even buried under layers of prosthetics.
08:03Originally, though, then-future action star Jean-Claude Van Damme was cast as the Predator,
08:09and he even started filming.
08:11Thinking with the Stan Winston School of Character Arts, special effects artist Steve Johnson
08:15revealed that Van Damme wanted to show off his martial arts skills instead of crafting
08:19an alien movement for the character, and didn't realize his role was essentially just a stuntman.
08:24We get him out there for the first shot, and he's just seething.
08:29Van Damme leaving the film led to a redesign of the Predator suit, finally landing on the
08:33look fans know and love.
08:36Tobey Hooper's original Texas Chainsaw Massacre ranks as one of the best slasher films ever
08:41made.
08:42The movie introduced audiences to Gunnar Hansen's Leatherface, a frightening, chainsaw-wielding
08:47cannibal who wears a mask made of human skin.
08:50For many TCM fans, Hansen's version of Leatherface stands head and shoulders above the rest of
08:54the franchise.
08:55However, the Texas Chainsaw Massacre Part II is also great, but Hansen's performance
09:01simply would not have fit.
09:03Hooper directed the sequel, but this time he went for laughs.
09:06In Bill Johnson, Hooper found a Leatherface to match his vibe.
09:10Johnson told Joe Blow that he tried to focus on the relationship between his character
09:13and his family, an approach the movie needed.
09:17Will Poulter, star of Midsommar, was originally cast as the new Pennywise the Clown in the
09:222017 version of It.
09:24Variety announced his casting way back in 2015, when Carrie Fukunaga was slated to direct
09:29that movie.
09:30Eventually, Andy Muschietti replaced Fukunaga.
09:33Then, The Hollywood Reporter reported that Poulter was out too, replaced by Bill Skarsgård.
09:38Poulter probably would have been a great Pennywise, but it's hard to argue that he should have
09:42had the part over Skarsgård, who turned in a deranged, instantly iconic performance in
09:47the resulting film.
09:49Skarsgård told Collider that he found it difficult to craft his take on Pennywise until
09:53he actually settled in the makeup chair.
09:55So it's a good thing the filmmakers were able to envision Skarsgård, because it's
09:59hard to imagine the movie without him.
10:02The opening scene in Wes Craven's Scream is one of the most surprising in all of horror
10:06history.
10:07Drew Barrymore's death tells audiences that Scream will be a slasher movie like no other,
10:12even as it poked fun at the genre by referencing numerous other examples of it.
10:16However, Scream almost looked quite different.
10:19On The Drew Barrymore Show, Barrymore revealed that she was originally cast as Sidney Prescott,
10:24the part eventually portrayed by Neve Campbell.
10:26Barrymore claims that she suggested that she play Casey Becker instead.
10:31What if I die, and then it'll be like all bets are off, anybody could get killed in
10:37this movie.
10:38The casting shuffle worked out well.
10:40Campbell's Sidney is one of the best final girls of all time, and without the shock of
10:44seeing a big star like Barrymore die first, Scream may not have been as successful as
10:48it was.
10:51Stephen King wrote Doctor Sleep as a direct sequel to The Shining, following Danny Torrance
10:55in adulthood.
10:56King famously hated Stanley Kubrick's film adaptation, but writer and director Mike Flanagan
11:01smartly recognized that many audiences are more familiar with Kubrick's Shining than
11:06King's.
11:07In paying homage to both sources, he needed to find a way to flash back to events at the
11:11Overlook Hotel in a way that felt familiar.
11:14Flanagan ultimately chose to recast Danny's parents, with Alex Esso stepping in for Shelley
11:19Duvall's character, Wendy.
11:21Henry Thomas as Jack Nicholson is great, but it's Esso who really shines.
11:25Her portrayal of Wendy contains elements of Duvall's unhinged interpretation, but Flanagan
11:30also gives us a glimpse of the Torrance's lies before they reach the Overlook Hotel.
11:34Esso's Wendy is a warm, caring mother, making her eventual shocking devolution into madness
11:40even more tragic.