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Terrifier actor Michael Leavy speaks about his new horror film, fandom in indie film promotion, and assembling the "Avengers of horror." His new movie, Stream, features a cast including Tim Curry (The Rocky Horror Picture Show, It), Jeffrey Combs (Re-Animator, The Frighteners), Danielle Harris (Halloween franchise, Hatchet franchise), David Howard Thornton (Terrifier franchise, The Mean One), Dee Wallace (E.T., The Howling), Tony Todd (Candyman franchise, Final Destination franchise) and Bill Moseley(The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Part 2, The Devil's Rejects), and more.
Leavy's new film follows a family of four on a vacation meant to iron out tensions that goes horribly wrong when they find they can't leave their hotel and have been roped into a game of cat and mouse being broadcast to the world. The film faced hardship due to COVID, but Leavy banked on his fans to back him up. As he told Variety, “COVID hit us right in the middle of production and we had used all of our funds for PPE and the HEPA filters [...] So we ended up saying, ‘Let’s bring this to the horror community.’ And we offered producer credits and things like that for anybody who wanted to get involved.”
Still, Leavy was surprised by just how much the horror community was willing to back them up after the trailer got a ton of attention. "It was so surreal," Leavy said. "You never know if something’s going to take off. As horror fans and cinema fans, we want to put stuff on the screen that we enjoy and want to see. We always are truthful to that, and I think if you’re honest with your filmmaking, people will gravitate towards it. [...] There’s this movement that’s going on all around the internet where our fans are buying tickets for people who can’t afford to see Stream in theaters. For strangers. It just shows how powerful and strong and passionate our fanbase is. But at the same time, it also shows that there’s a want and need for creative, new, fun, entertaining movies that they may feel the studios aren’t giving them right now."
As horror fans and cinema fans, we want to put stuff on the screen that we enjoy and want to see.
Maybe he shouldn't have been so shocked though, considering he brought together an all-star crew of horror legends together for the film. "Fans are calling it the Avengers of horror or the Expendables of horror. We never set out to do that. We set out to get the best actors for the roles we could find. There were a few that we targeted — obviously, being horror fans. Jeffrey Combs is unbelievable. I’m biased of course, but I think this is one of his top three performances. And, obviously Danielle Harris. Then eventually it became like, 'Oh, wow, there’s a really big horror cast here.' The fanboy kind of came out."
Tim Reid Returns to Horror in Stream
There was one actor that Leavy was particularly excited to have on-board. "What was awesome was we got Tim Reed from Sister, Sister and WKRP in Cincinnati. He doesn’t do horror. He only has done one horror in his whole life. It was Stephen King’s It in the 1990s when he was a big TV star at the time and he never did horror again. But he read the script and he really enjoyed it. He said, 'There’s some heart to this story. There’s some character development that you don’t usually see in slashers. I’m in.' And that’s how we got him. The story convinced a lot of people to jump on board." Another actor from It that is joining the film is the iconic Tim Curry, in his first film role since 2010.
Leavy's passion for filmmaking--as well as his all-star cast--give good reason for horror fans to be excited about this new slasher. The buzz and fandom surrounding the film go to show that there is still passion backing indie filmmaking in the horror scene. Hopefully, Stream will further stoke that flame.
Source: Variety.
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