Interviews
[Interview] ‘Scream VI’ Producers James Vanderbilt and William Sherak Discuss Legacy, Fandom, and Returning Characters
Hot on the heels of a largely positive critical response (see our own Meagan Navarro’s glowing review here) and an opening weekend performance that has broken franchise records, Scream VI‘s cast and crew are no doubt riding a high right now. The “sequel to the requel” follows the surviving “Core Four” from 2022’s Scream—Sam (Melissa Barrera), Tara (Jenna Ortega), Mindy (Jasmin Savoy Brown), and Chad (Mason Gooding)–as they leave behind the suburban backdrop of Woodsboro and venture to New York City to start anew.
Yet again helmed by Radio Silence’s Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, Scream VI also welcomes back franchise staple Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox), Scream 4 fan-favorite Kirby Reed (Hayden Panettiere), the iconic voice of Ghostface (Roger L. Jackson), and a host of new potential Ghostface victims, including veteran actor Dermot Mulroney (Copycat), Liana Liberato (The Beach House), Jack Champion (Avatar: The Way of Water), Devyn Nekoda (Ginny & Georgia), and Josh Segarra (She-Hulk: Attorney at Law).
Like 2022’s Scream, the sequel is again produced by Project X Entertainment, Spyglass Media Group, and Radio Silence Productions, and distributed by Paramount Pictures. Following its premiere in Manhattan last week, I was fortunate to sit for a chat with two-thirds of the Project X Entertainment team, including Scream VI writer/producer James Vanderbilt (who co-wrote the two latest installments with Guy Busick) and producer William Sherak. Longtime franchise fans, Vanderbilt and Sherak were excited to give their perspectives on maintaining the franchise’s integrity, navigating the Scream fanbase, and favorite moments from the latest installment of the smash slasher series.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Note that while no major explicit spoilers are revealed, some general plot points and themes are discussed.
Readers who have not yet caught Scream VI should beware!
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – MARCH 06: (L-R) James Vanderbilt, Paul Neinstein and William Sherak attend the Global Premiere of Paramount Pictures and Spyglass Media Group’s “Scream VI” at AMC Lincoln Square on March 6, 2023 in New York, New York. (Photo by Jason Mendez/Getty Images for Paramount Pictures)
Though likely a little-known bit of trivia at this point, the founders of Project X proactively sought to take the franchise mantle from late director and horror icon Wes Craven once the franchise rights were ultimately acquired by Spyglass Media Group in 2019. Despite many fans’ beliefs that the franchise would not be able to continue without Craven after 2011’s Scream 4, all was in fact not lost. “We felt the same way after Scream 4, so we were right there with you,” Vanderbilt shares. Sherak adds, “When the opportunity presented itself in the right moment for us, it was one of those… kismet, planets aligned, we could go get it [moments]. It was equally as exciting.”
Despite Project X’s faith in the franchise, Vanderbilt admits that it took a bit of time before the studios fully understood what they still had on their hands. “One of the things that we, right from the jump, were saying to [the studio] was that… you don’t understand how much love there is out there for these movies,” he states. “We wanted to bring them back and we really wanted to do right by them, for the fans and for ourselves. And other people, sort of in looking at it were like, ‘Well… will people care if there’s another Scream movie?’ There was a lot of that going on. And we were very much like, ‘Oh no, you don’t understand!’ Then as we […] made five, and as we started to sort of release stuff–stills and trailers–different people and the studios saw the responses, and they were very excited. It’s not that they didn’t believe it, but it truly is ‘seeing is believing’ with this fandom, I think, in a really amazing way.”
Jenna Ortega (“Tara Carpenter”) stars in Paramount Pictures and Spyglass Media Group’s “Scream VI.”
Sherak spoke especially highly of the major role franchise creator, screenwriter, and producer Kevin Williamson (whom they refer to multiple times as their “north star”) has played in guiding the team in developing the fifth and sixth franchise entries over the last few years. “When Spyglass first allowed us to take the reins with them and develop [the new films], the first thing [we decided] was this only works if we bring Kevin back into the fold,” he states. “His brain is amazing, right? He’s really, really good at this. [laughs] We’ve been fortunate that, not only did we bring him back, but we built a relationship that’s past business… [he] is a friend. And I think that that is, to us, one of the biggest pieces of this, because he’s just so good at this and he really does know what he’s doing more than most. [… Vanderbilt] worked really hard at making sure on that first pitch that Kevin understood it, heard it, and blessed [it].”
Vanderbilt further admits that, even as a long-time writer, he still managed to get starstruck by Williamson’s reactions to the latest installment. “When we were in New York for the premiere on Monday, Kevin was sitting right behind my father and I. Kevin’s seen the movie a bunch of times and loves the movie, but I could hear him laughing at the movie. It was such an amazing, surreal moment for me as a writer to hear Kevin Williamson laughing at lines I had written in a Scream movie in real time! He’s the best.” Both Vanderbilt and Sherak were also vocal in their praise of Craven’s long-time producing partner Marianne Maddalena, who, like Williamson, served as a producer on 2022’s Scream and an executive producer on Scream VI. “[She] has been nothing but incredible. I mean, Marianne was the one who found the original Ghostface mask on the first one! So it’s just been a pleasure to work with both of them all throughout this process.”
Melissa Barrera (“Sam Carpenter”) and Josh Segarra (“Danny Brackett”) star in Paramount Pictures and Spyglass Media Group’s “Scream VI.”
At this point, it likely goes without saying that the Scream fanbase is quite the vocal community, especially online via platforms like Reddit and Twitter–for better and worse. This was clearly acknowledged via the meta plot turns in 2022’s requel, as Vanderbilt, Busick, and the Radio Silence team have also paid close attention to fan conversations around the franchise over the years. This didn’t change as the team began work on Scream VI. “From my perspective, and I think with Guy Busick, we’re aware of [fan conversations] and we absolutely find… I don’t want to always say inspiration in it, but we’re absolutely aware of it. But also, you know… storytelling, I think, so much is trying to give the audience what they need, not what they want. ‘Cause sometimes you want Dewey Riley to make it all the way through the movie, but… the story needs him not to. So I think it’s a balance in a lot of different ways, and what’s most important to us is telling the best version of the story that we think is a great one. That’s what we really tried to do on [Scream VI] as well. You know, if five is Woodsboro and feels very much like a classic Scream movie, how can six sort of subvert that and still be a Scream movie, but make some moves and do some things that you haven’t seen before, that you won’t expect.”
After a beat, Vanderbilt adds, “I think we’re coming at it from a place of love and, you know, all you can do as a filmmaker is tell the best version of the story that you can. […] My experience has always been that if you’re coming from a place of fear, if you’re coming from a place of not wanting to offend anyone or not wanting to piss anyone off, that’s not a good way to tell a story. You know? I think the best stories come out of, ‘Oh, this is a really cool idea and I want you to come and sit by the campfire with me and let me spin you this tale. And it’s gonna surprise you, and it’s gonna scare you, and there are gonna be moments in it that make you uncomfortable. And you may not like every single one. But I promise you, by the end of the tale, you’re gonna have had an amazing time.’ That’s how we sort of look at these movies and look at storytelling in general. And so, you know, being afraid of that is never a beneficial thing.” Speaking to navigating fan theories, gripes, and wishes for the continuing franchise, Vanderbilt found comfort in Williamson’s advice early on. “I’ll just go back to something that Kevin said to us at the beginning of five when we were first starting out. We were talking about what the story was, and Kevin sort of said, ‘Never forget that these are slasher movies. […] At the end of the day, that’s what they are, and people die in slasher movies–even if these [characters] have amazing fans. That’s what these are.’ And I’ve never forgotten that. Again… he’s the north star!”
Sherak adds: “I think on top of that, once you go to shoot it, you kind of embrace the fact that we decided the movie we’re gonna make. And then you keep your head down and you go make that movie. You don’t then lift your head up and go, ‘What are the fans saying while we’re doing it?’ You embrace the movie you all decided on and then you go make it because otherwise you end up with mish-mosh, right? And I think we’ve all done a really good job of that. […] The second you start taking opinions while you’re shooting… that’s a recipe for a bad outcome.” In addition to decidedly maintaining a sense of focus on the story at hand among the filmmaking team, Vanderbilt and Sherak both expressed a sense of comfort in the process knowing that many of the actors involved in both recent installments are also major franchise fans, including Gooding, Champion, and Dylan Minnette (2022’s Scream). “The fans exist in so many places, and are also multi-generational. Some of these kids weren’t alive when the first one came out! [laughs]”
Dermot Mulroney (“Detective Bailey “) and Hayden Panettiere (“Kirby Reed”) star in Paramount Pictures and Spyglass Media Group’s “Scream VI.”
Speaking on the direction of Scream VI, Vanderbilt states that he and Busick knew early on that they wanted the relationship between the Carpenter sisters and their struggles navigating the world after the events of the fifth film to be the grounding focus of the story–a core idea very much in line what many fans have long appreciated about the previous Scream films. “I think one of the tricks of a great […] Scream movie or a great any movie is that even if the events are heightened, there has to be some emotional relatability. And so the idea of two siblings–with one thinking the other one is hovering too much [and] the younger one [wanting] to go out on their own–that’s a very relatable story. […] It felt really organic to us and exciting. And then, you know, as with anything, you put that pot on a stove and you turn up the heat under it and see what happens. […] Without giving too much away, we talked a lot about the idea of family in the movie and what family means and how family comes from many different directions.”
In addition to an emotional anchor, Scream films are also widely known for their meta-commentary on subjects ranging from the horror genre to the film industry to toxic fandom. Up front, Scream VI sees a focus on the court of public opinion, particularly with Sam’s arc as a survivor following the 2022 Woodsboro murders. “[These] movies should feel rooted in the year they’re made in a real way,” Vanderbilt states. “So, you know, 2011 and Scream 4 was really the rise of ‘I don’t need friends, I need fans’… [it] was perfectly encapsulated. So there’s some stuff in this movie that, with the idea that people believed Sam was responsible for what happened in Woodsboro… that felt very 2023. Something like that could happen and people online could go, ‘Well, I mean maybe it’s a false flag operation or maybe she did the whole thing!” […] That felt like something that would not happen 10 years ago… that would never happen to Sidney Prescott, but it would be something that happened to Sam Carpenter. So, I think reflecting where we are culturally is always sort of […] the secret sauce of these movies, past and hopefully present.”
Courteney Cox (“Gale Weathers”) stars in Paramount Pictures and Spyglass Media Group’s “Scream VI.”
Given the high level of awareness of fan discourse behind the scenes, Project X and company were set on giving fan-favorite characters their moments to shine (and scream) in the latest installment. In addition to the return of the Meeks-Martin twins from the previous installment–nephew and niece of franchise favorite Randy Meeks (Jamie Kennedy) and children of Martha Meeks (Heather Matarazzo)–the latest film also welcomes back Panettiere’s Kirby, who was seen in Scream 4 presumably near death but was canonically confirmed as having survived via an easter egg in last year’s entry. “Listen, Wes said she was alive so that was good enough for me,” Vanderbilt says with a smile. Sherak adds, “We had Zoomed with Hayden on five just to see what her thoughts were of acting again. You know, she had taken some time [off]… and she had told us that she was really into it so we knew going in that she would be receptive to being part of it. And when Jamie and Guy delivered a script with that character–Kirby being Kirby, which was just awesome–we went to her and she was great. She’s a pro. She’s been doing this forever, since she was a little kid. That camera turns on her and she’s magical! She’s really good at it and loves the character.”
Cox, whose Gale Weathers returns following the death of her franchise love interest and best friend Dewey Riley (David Arquette), was also game to step back into the killer’s path in the New York City setting. Vanderbilt and Sherak have nothing but love for the veteran actress, particularly for warmly welcoming the new cast members and crew with open arms on the set of the fifth film. “Courtney is such a gamer,” Sherak gushes. “She gets there, she is the sweetest, most professional… like couldn’t be nicer. And then the ability to bring her back was so much fun.” As audiences are now aware, one particular sequence in Scream VI puts Gale face to face with the killer in a manner that is much more threatening–and physically taxing–than she has experienced in many of the past films. By Sherak’s report, Cox was all in. “We said, look, here’s the sequence… you good with it? And she was good with it! […] She did it, and I mean she really did it. That is a practical location. We blocked it out, she ran through it… like, that is not a set. She did the work and she’s… she’s a joy to have on set!”
Melissa Barrera (“Sam Carpenter”), Jenna Ortega (“Tara Carpenter”), Jasmin Savoy Brown (“Mindy Meeks-Martin”), and Mason Gooding (“Chad Meeks-Martin”) star in Paramount Pictures and Spyglass Media Group’s “Scream VI.”
While the prospects for a seventh Scream installment are still up in the air at the time of this publication, there are unsurprisingly already fervent demands for another film among fans and speculation about where the story could go next. Still, Vanderbilt and Sherak appear content with enjoying the process one day at a time and reflecting on their own favorite moments from Scream VI for the time being. “I’m gonna give you two answers,” Sherak says. “Reading [the script], it was always the subway. It really was. It was always the subway. And I think that scene delivers in spades. But I think that, for me, watching it, I actually think it ended up being the ladder scene. […] That scene to me encapsulates everything that Jamie and Guy did in six, in one scene from start to finish.”
Vanderbilt appears to favor the film’s quieter moments upon reflection. “It’s crazy ’cause you focus on the set pieces and you focus on all of that stuff. But then, for me… it’s just some of the character moments. It’s actually them sitting around that table. You know what I mean? And one of the wonderful things about being able to make a sequel is you know who you’re writing for and you know what they’re capable of. And so being able to give [Barrera, Ortega, Savoy Brown, and Gooding] more to do and know they could park it and then watching them park it is incredibly fulfilling. That by the time you get to the ladder, you actually care if someone’s going to fall or not–not because it’s scary to fall, but because you care about the characters. That’s the thing I think I’m really proud of.”
Scream VI is now playing in theaters everywhere.
Interviews
John E.L. Tenney Discusses UAPs, Conspiracy Theories, and Possible Origins of the Phenomena [Interview]
Welcome back to DEAD Time. Even if you’ve only dabbled in the paranormal, chances are you’re familiar with John E.L. Tenney. Tenney is one of the most sought-after and well-known experts in the world and has more than 30 years of experience with UFOs, paranormal research, occult phenomena, and conspiracy theories. He has authored over a dozen books and worked as a consultant and appeared on TV shows like Unsolved Mysteries, Sightings, Hellier, and Kindred Spirits.
In a previous installment of DEAD Time, Bloody Disgusting talked with Tenney and his best friend and co-host of the What’s Up Weirdo Podcast, Jessica Knapik, about their favorite haunted locations and Tenney shared the terrifying true story of an exorcism he attended.
This month, Bloody Disgusting was excited to have the opportunity to talk with John E.L. Tenney about conspiracy theories surrounding UFOs and UAPs, hoaxes, possible origins of the phenomena, and a lot more.
Bloody Disgusting: You’ve been actively investigating unexplained paranormal and occult phenomena for over 30 years, so you’ve probably seen it all. I’d like to talk about UFOs and wonder what you think about the term being changed to UAP – Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena?
John E.L. Tenney: I don’t have a big problem with it. We’ve seen the change in the moniker of strange objects before, going from flying discs to flying saucers to UFOs. So, it’s just another kind of cyclical, completely benign name change. I think the only thing that worries me about it is that people think that by changing the name it somehow changes the credibility of the sightings; by giving it this term that the government will use, UAP, it somehow discounts all of the flying saucers, flying discs, experiences, UFO experiences from the 1940s up until now.
BD: Last year David Grusch, a former intelligence officer, became a whistleblower and claimed the government had recovered nonhuman crafts with nonhuman species inside. What do you think about his claims?
JT: Well, it’s really interesting with his testimony to Congress because he used very specific language. Very specific questions were asked, and he answered them in very specific ways. So, even to your point, if I’m remembering the way the testimony went, he was asked about extraterrestrials, and he said that they had found non-human biologics. Now that term, non-human biologics, can be applied to anything that has life that’s just not human. So, that could be viruses, that could be molds, that could be spores. So, because the question was asked about extraterrestrials, and he answered affirmatively that there was non-human life, the media ran with the idea that he said that there were extraterrestrials. The majority of life on this planet is non-human biologics.
BD: What are your thoughts on the Interdimensional hypothesis and ultraterrestrials as explanations for UAPs?
JT: I think that where our research spans, we really have to kind of broaden our field. So, whether something exists in this kind of plane of reality with us or in an alternate dimension or an alternate universe or an alternate reality is something that we can give thought to and that we can craft ideas about. It’s just that the further away we get from something that is experiential and experienced by tons of people, and the harder it is to prove scientifically, doesn’t necessarily give us better ideas, right? I think that there’s really nothing wrong with the way that people have been thinking about aliens for 100 years, which are life forms that have developed technology and intelligence and come from somewhere else within our reality. It’s just as people start to research and sometimes that doesn’t seem fulfilling, or sometimes the experiencer says something which doesn’t match reality.
It’s just as people start to research and sometimes that doesn’t seem fulfilling, or sometimes the experiencer says something which doesn’t match reality, people start to jump to conclusions that perhaps it’s multi-dimensional. Perhaps it’s an ultraterrestrial when I don’t know if you need to make that leap so fast. And by doing that you take focus off of that which can be researched. We have hundreds of thousands of cases which don’t seem to be ultraterrestrials or interdimensional, and they’ve never been really well researched. And as we start to get new cases and new fascinating ways to think about them,we do kind of leave all of those hundreds of thousands of cases behind because, well, maybe it was just a hubcap someone threw in the air. The more mysterious it gets, the more those earlier cases which now seem mundane to us, which are probably very important to the formation of how we think about things, get lost in the shuffle.
BD: One of the most famous UFO stories is the Kelly-Hopkinsville encounter in 1955, which involved a group of people who arrived at the police station and claimed their farmhouse was being attacked by small alien creatures who came from a spaceship. Do you think there is any truth to this story, or do you think it was a case of mass hysteria?
JT: Kelly-Hopkinsville, much like even the Flatwoods monster in Braxton County, West Virginia, are incidents where people have what seem to be super normal experiences. They don’t make any money off of it, they actually become ridiculed in the community. There’s no beneficial point for them making up the experience. In Braxton County with the Flatwoods Monste, you have, 10 or 12 people seeing a giant 11-foot-tall creature with a burning head come down out of a UFO. And all these cases are researched, and they seem to have some physical evidence, some physical traces, whether it’s tracks in the ground or even in the Kelly-Hopkinsville case, you can actually see the shotgun blast where they shot at the creatures through the door. So, there’s something there to research. I don’t think that it’s written off as mass psychosis in the sense that how many people would willingly subject themselves to ridicule by making up a story with no monetary or power dynamic beneficial to them.
BD: That would make sense. They’re not getting anything by going public with their story.
JT: Except scorn and ridicule. In Michigan in 1960, the largest UFO sighting in American history, it went over the course of about a week and a half. Thousands of people saw flying saucers in the air. The government was called out. It’s now called The Swamp Gas incident because the government said it was just swamp gas that everyone saw. This was a really big turning point because even the people who were involved in it, once the government had said it was swamp gas, everybody, most of the people involved said that if they ever saw anything again, they’d never talk about it because paint was thrown on their houses. They were called frauds everywhere that they went. So, it’s actually like really detrimental to a person to report these sightings. And that 1966 case two was the first time that Congress actually took up the idea of investigating flying saucers. Because the Michigan congressman at the time was Gerald Ford, and he went on the floor of the House and called for investigations into flying saucers.
BD: I know you also deal with conspiracy theories sometimes. Obviously, there’s going to be conspiracy theories thrown around if the government is looking into either the whistleblower or some of these other incidents.
JT: I think that first and foremost, it’s interesting that when we look at the way it’s portrayed in the media now with congressional hearings and people of rank and people with government positions talking about UFOs, because of the way that we remember history and tell history, we forget that there have been congressional hearings on UFOs in the past. There have been high-ranking people in the past that have talked about seeing flying saucers, whether it’s Air Force pilots or admirals in the Royal Air Navy in England, this has happened before. The only difference now is the way that it’s covered in the media and our media cycle makes it seem much more prevalent than it ever was in the 1970s.
If your UFO story got told in the five major newspapers of the world, that’s a huge story. But now this one story is being retold in 700 online newspapers. It seems like there’s much more being told, but it’s really not as much as it’s ever been. And the government is bad, pretty notoriously, at keeping secrets. Big ones too. There are so many people involved. There are so many people that would have to be involved, even with things that might sound really kind of off the rails. But like when people talk about someplace like Area 51 that has, you know, hundreds of UFOs supposedly stored in it, and there’s thousands of people that work there, one of the things you have to take into account is simple things like waste management. Who takes care of the plumbing? Who takes the garbage out? The secrets would eventually slip. There are so many people involved in something like that, right? And we’re also now dealing with congressmen, businessmen, elected representatives who are of an age where they grew up as fans of science fiction.
We’ve never experienced that before. When all of the former elected officials and Air Force pilots and military officials, all those earlier people grew up, science fiction was a kid’s thing. These people now that are elected representatives and officials, grew up with Star Trek and Star Wars and watching In Search of and Unsolved Mysteries. So, when they get into positions of power, their natural curiosity is to talk about the things they have always been curious about just like us. And so, it doesn’t mean that they have any more information; it’s just that they have more interest and more personal identity attached to high strangeness than previous elected officials.
BD: That’s such a great point. That had not even occurred to me.
JT: I think it was Representative Adam Schiff, a few years ago, went on the floor of the House and talked about Star Trek and Spock, like he’s a fan of Star Trek. So, when you see people now interested in having UFO hearings, you have to remember that those people are also fans of modern-day science fiction.
BD: Do you have a personal theory that might explain what UAPs really are and where they come from?
JT: There’s a part of me, of course, that is very interested in the fact that the rise of UAP and sightings of things flying in the sky has proportionally increased with the ability for every day, normal human beings to buy objects that can fly around and flash in the sky. Drones are a good example. But I think that it’s important to look back at the older cases that aren’t so much involved with easily accessible technology that we have. I think that the UFO phenomenon, the UAP phenomenon, the flying saucer phenomenon, is much larger than just one answer. I think that you may have a multitude of extraterrestrial creatures, interdimensional creatures, ultraterrestrials, the kind of belief systems that form around mythology with different religions—I think all of those things can be happening at one time. And when you look at it through your personal lens, you might not see it as separate, individual cases, and lump them all together. So, I really think it’s important for people to look at each UFO case individually without saying, “Oh, objects must be a tic tac shape. Oh, objects must be a disc shape. Oh, objects must conform to what I think a flying saucer, UFO, or UAP case is.” The best research that people can do is to look at each case individually and uniquely because each case is unique and individual.
Obviously, not everyone is a researcher, but there are a lot of people who think that if I see a UFO, in Michigan for example, on Monday and then people see a UFO on Wednesday, in Michigan, that these must be the same UFO, when it’s two completely separate events happening. When you talk to people and drill down, yes, there may be commonalities between the sightings, but the differences are really where the interesting theories and ideas come from. Saying that everything is just a tic tac really does disservice to strangeness in and of itself. What I tell people is that when you look back on the history of UFOs, and you look at some of the UFO photographs taken in the 40s, 50s, 60s, and 70s, the ones that have remained, the ones we can’t prove are hoaxes—you have to remember that if those people did hoax the remaining photographs we have that show weird things in the sky, those people never considered that we would have easily accessible computers to debunk their photographs. So, the fact that a photograph from the 1940s or 1950s cannot be disproven with all of the technology that we have now makes those cases even more fascinating because the tic tac video might be great but I’m pretty sure that thousands of people in the country could make a video that looks just like it right now within a few minutes.
It really fascinates me that people really miss the fact that the average age for a congressperson right now is about 57. They all grew up watching Lost in Space, Close Encounters, and Star Trek and sitting around the television and reading comic books and loving it. They are the first generation who have access to power and who have had a real fandom to it.
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