Chiller Theatre is an annual convention located in Parsippany, NJ. Chiller has celebrity photo ops, signings, contests, etc. Before I talk about the iconic “Scream” franchise. This year I had the pleasure of meeting horror icon Allen Robinson, who played “Ghostface” in “Scream 2.” While speaking to the horror icon, I got to learn more about the “Scream” franchise and how he makes the magic happen. But let’s talk a little bit about the “Scream” franchise first.
“Scream” is an iconic horror/mystery/slasher movie franchise. The franchise has six films to date and a TV series. The franchise has received many awards/nominations. For example, the franchise won Best Movie twice at the 2023 MTV Awards (for “Scream” and “Scream VI”).
“Scream II” was released on December 12, 1997 and “Scream III” was released three years later in 2000. It was supposed to be the last movie of the then trilogy. But, 11 years later, the franchise was revisited for “Scream IV”,which was released on April 15, 2011. The fifth movie of the “Scream” franchise was released on January 14, 2022.
This was the first movie of the series without director Wes Craven, who died in 2015. In February 2022, it was confirmed that “Scream VI” was in the making. Craven had some problems with the Motion Picture Association of America because of the violence of the movie. Craven was forced to take out a lot of the violence in “Scream III” because of the Columbine High School massacre. The movie and its themes had to be re-evaluated and changed when the MeToo movement happened.
“I was blessed to be able to be put in that role. When you’re filming, you don’t know that it’s going to be a big success,” Robinson said. “So when it came out, it was really cool and I was very proud that it became an iconic character and had iconic scenes.”
“Scream II” on December 12, 1997. The movie again focuses on Sidney Prescott as the main character. But, now she is in college. The new killers use Ghostface again to hide their identity. The film was a huge financial success again. The script for “Scream II” was accidentally leaked during production. So, the film had to undergo a lot of rewrites and change all of the killers identities.
During my conversation with Robinson, I asked him if we could play a game and asked what’s his favorite scary movie?
“Well, my favorite is an old time one. I was an Alford Hitchcock fan. I got to work doubling Norman Bates Anthony Perkins in “Psycho IV”, his last Psycho movie and I was his stunt double for Norman Bates in “Psycho”. said Robinson “Now Alfred Hitchcock had long passed since then and it was a different Director but it was still part of the “Psycho” franchise so that was really cool at least for me.”
Well, that was a chance of a lifetime. I would like to thank Allen Robinson for such a great memory from Chiller October 2024 and for such amazing answers to all of my questions.
