Terrifier 2 Director's Childhood Heroes Were Freddy And Jason, Not Spider-Man [Exclusive Interview]

"Terrifier 2" is one of the most unlikely horror success stories in movie history. 

Seriously. A low-budget slasher film this gobsmackingly violent and depraved — and one with a genre-busting two and a half hour running time to boot — should not have been a massive critical and financial success. It should not have become the watercooler horror film of 2022. It should not have become the movie youngsters (and future horror fans) dared each other to watch at sleepovers. But it did. Damien Leone's sequel, a massive improvement on his first film in every imaginable way, tapped into something. Some people were clearly drawn to Art the Clown, the sadistic supernatural killer at the center of the film. Others found themselves compelled by the movie's dreamlike tone, and its surprising, off-kilter humanity. But everyone seemed equally fascinated by the gore. The kind of gore so ambitious and unrelenting that describing it out loud makes you sound like you should go to prison. 

I recently sat down over Zoom to talk to Damien Leone about the film, which is seeing a theatrical re-release on November 1, 2023 (perfect for those post-Halloween blues). I wanted to know more about Art the Clown, the secrets behind the film's truly filthy violence, how he'd tackle a classic slasher character like Jason Voorhees, and, of course, what's going on with "Terrifier 3."

Note: This interview has been lightly edited for clarity and brevity.

One of my editors at /Film is a former teacher, and all of her former colleagues tell her that their students are obsessed with Art the Clown. They can't stop talking about him. I'm sure you have a strong opinion on young kids being obsessed with the "Terrifier" films.

Wow, you would be surprised. I do a lot of conventions. This weekend in particular, it was a standout. I had a ton of people coming up to me telling me how obsessed their children are with the film. And I'm talking as young as two and three-year-olds, who've either seen these movies all the way through, have seen pieces of these movies, or have just seen the image of Art the Clown, and they're just in love with the image of Art the Clown. So there's something appealing with this character to children.

I understand it, because that was me as a kid. That's as young as I was when I was really introduced to these films, and I was looking up to Freddy and Jason and Michael Myers like they were my Batman and Spider-Man as a little kid. I mean, that shaped my life. That's the reason why I'm here. There's no doubt about it. So I understand the appeal of the monster. It's a very primal thing. That has an impact on us at a very, very young age before we can even explain why. I think it's just instinctual.

Every horror fan knows in their gut, this is how Jason operates, this is how Freddy operates, this is how Michael Myers operates. What makes Art the Clown operate?

As the crazy cat lady says in "Terrifier," the original, he thinks what he's doing is funny because he's laughing. He just really gets a kick out of it, he just gets such pleasure and joy out of doing the horrible things that he does. It might be the only thing that gives him some sort of satisfaction. But I don't know, Art is a love letter to all of these characters that I grew up loving. He really is. And it's all those characters put in a blender in my mind, and that's really what comes out of it. I mean, he's been the silent stalker, slasher, like Jason. He's more gritty like Leatherface. Certainly he's the clown like Pennywise, and he has the personality of Freddy, honestly. I think that's really the charm of the character. I think that's why the character has really taken off as well as it has, is because of his personality and because of what [actor David Howard Thornton] brings to it, of course.

But it's that humanity that comes through from the character, believe it or not, that I think is what people really gravitate toward so much. You feel like you know what he would be saying at any moment, or what he's thinking, even though he doesn't say a word. And I think it's that sense of humor that really attracts him to people, or people to him.

"Terrifier 2" is a long movie. In a genre known for brevity, it brushes up against two and a half hours. How do you maintain a slasher film pace at that length?

I never thought about the length. I think that if it did work, that's the reason. I just shot the organic story that I wrote, basically. I didn't have anybody over my shoulder saying, "This is too long. What are you doing? This can't possibly be." But I knew that we had to just keep the audience's attention throughout the entire movie, so it was very important not to go too long without bringing Art the Clown into the mix back again, or have something exciting happen, or it was very important that every scene with Sienna or Jonathan, I had to keep raising the intensity or raising the stakes. Every scene, you had to learn something new about them, or questions had to arise just to keep the audience invested and interested as you go. So those were the two factors in being able to maintain that length.

I mean, for some people it did not work. That is a large criticism that we get all the time is, "It's too long. What are you thinking? You can't possibly have a slasher film that's that long." I disagree. I think to me, this is bigger than a slasher film. I don't make these movies anymore just to make a slasher film. To me, that's possibly the least interesting aspect of the movie. That doesn't mean that I don't take that aspect very seriously, but it's probably the last thing that I focus on at the end of the screenwriting process. I'm really more invested in Sienna at this point as a character, and her arc, and Art as well. I mean, he's going through this wonderful metamorphosis right now, as is she. And I love seeing them on those paths and seeing where they're going to go, and how those characters, their dynamic plays off of one another. So that's what fascinates me.

And then it's, "Okay, let's not forget that everybody's here to see Art the Clown kill people, and that's what got you here in the first place. So now let's make these kill scenes the coolest, most badass thing as you could possibly imagine." But that's the way my mind operates. I'm really not interested in just a straight slasher movie of just Art killing a new group of people just for the sake of killing people.

Let's talk about those kills. What's the most unlikely ingredient you used in a kill? What's in there?

We did something interesting this time around. What we use a lot is just fat. We know a butcher who would give us sausage casing and then we'd fill them all with just fat to make intestines or whatnot. We use that a lot. Or if we ever just got to dig into a body, we just sort of see all that mush.

But something cool that would happen is we'd mix it with the blood and put it into the blood pumps and the big fat tubes that we use, and it'd make the blood chunkier. And you could see it a lot, especially in the scene where he's killing the coroner. You just see this chunky blood, and the fat is just so soft that it actually could work its way through the tubes.

There's one scene in particular where I wanted the blood to look like blood from the '70s, from "Dawn of the Dead." And it was in the costume shop murder when he kills the dude behind the desk and he decapitates him. So I wanted that blood opaque and it looked like paint, almost. So I was putting powdered milk ... I had to put a lot of powdered milk into the blood to sort of kill the translucency. So I was putting some other weird things in there too, maybe like strawberry syrup or things just to brighten it up and stuff. Maybe paints as well. That was an interesting one. But powdered milk, I remember that. It was very sticky and gross. It smelled ... interesting.

Seeing "Terrifier 2" in theaters, I remember watching the bedroom kill and thinking, "by watching this in the theater, am I being put on some kind of list?" And it stuck with me ever since. What is your favorite "Terrifier" kill out of both movies so far?

Well, I think it's going to be very hard as I go, no matter what I do, no matter how brutal I make these kills, I don't think I'm ever going to top the imagery of the hacksaw scene [from the first film], or really have that impact just because people didn't know what "Terrifier" was when they were watching the original "Terrifier." And until they got to that moment, that was a really shocking moment. That movie takes a turn, and that's the scene that everybody remembers. So although it's not my favorite kill that I've executed, I think that's always going to be the one that "Terrifier" is remembered for. But in terms of a technical level and the way it came out, I really am proud of the bedroom kill scene, the Allie kill from "Terrifier 2." It was harder because of the popularity of the hacksaw scene from part one. There was a lot of added pressure as to, "How do we now top that scene and what's it going to be?" And so we took a lot of time building that.

We actually reconfigured that scene during quarantine because we were shut down. Production was cut down of course, during Covid. And we had started it a couple of days, we shot a couple of days and I didn't think it was coming out good at all. So during quarantine, I called my producer, Phil Falcone, and I said, "Listen, we have all this time on our hands now. Let's just start from scratch. I'm going to write out a list of the worst things you could ever do to a human being. We'll pick about five of them and we'll just really take all the time to craft these special effects, and then when we get out of this lockdown, we'll go back and we'll shoot it."

And that's what we did. We built these effects, we spent months building them in Phil's basement, and then we went and shot for an additional five days straight of just murdering poor Casey Hartnett in a freezing cold barn. That's where we built that set in the middle of winter. And she's the MVP of that scene for sure, because not a lot of people would be able to suffer through that. She really did suffer through that, and she delivered such an incredible performance. So I really always got to give her a shout-out when we mention that scene.

My team came across a forum discussion where a bunch of horror fans were discussing how you'd be the ideal person to bring back "Friday the 13th." Would you be interested in taking on a mainstream horror icon like that? Do you have a Jason Voorhees pitch up your sleeve?

I wish I had one up my sleeve, but I've been on record for quite some time now saying if I could ever remake one slasher film, it would be "Friday the 13th." Jason was always my favorite slasher since I was a little kid, and I think that there's a way to ... I mean, my approach would be to keep it in the '80s, honestly. I would have it take place in the early '80s. I would try and make him as scary as possible because I feel like that's something they kind of lost as the movies went along. You just start getting too comfortable with these villains and you need to be scared of them again. And of course it would be brutal. Believe it or not, I've gotten to talk to some people who are execs who are in charge of that franchise. I've expressed my interest in it. I think I'm still a little too obscure on that Hollywood list of people that they would approach to direct that film.

I've been told, "Listen, everybody and their mother wants to make that movie. It's a long list." So unfortunately, I don't think I'd get to make it now, but maybe when they reboot it in the next 20 years, I'll be able to take a crack at it. But that would be a dream project and so would "A Nightmare on Elm Street." I would absolutely love ... I think there's a lot of interesting stuff and scary stuff you can do with Freddy that we haven't seen in a long time. The hard thing about "Nightmare Elm Street" is just finding that new Robert Englund. That would be the hardest thing, of course.

As much as I love "Halloween," I feel like I don't have an idea of how to make that fresh. I think "Halloween" needs to rest for a little bit. Part one is so perfect, the original "Halloween," and then we've just seen all these other variations of the character, just making him very brutal, doing this, doing that, where I don't know what else I could really bring to that table. So as much as I love Michael Myers and "Halloween," that's one I wouldn't be too eager to jump on.

I'm actually a "Halloween Ends" fan. I know that one's controversial, but with that ending, I'm like, "Let's give Michael Myers about five years off. Let's take a break and let him get scary again."

There's nothing wrong with that. Just take a breather. Five years is going to go by like that.

Has the financial success of "Terrifier 2" opened doors on what you can pull off in "Terrifier 3?" Were there ideas that you felt you weren't in position to do before that you can now pull off?

To be determined, honestly, because even though you get more money, then you get to hire more people, but those people charge a lot of money. So then you wind up kind of being back in the same position as you were, ultimately, if that makes any sense. Because that was one of the reasons why we were able to do so much crazy stuff in "Terrifier 2" is because we did everything ourselves. The amount of special effects that basically me and Phil did, my producer Phil Falcone, we did almost everything. There were some days we had other makeup artists helping us out, but that was a 75-day shoot. So maybe we had two weeks' worth of other makeup artists or something helping us, and basically just helping us apply makeups that we already made and things like that. But you're talking like a million dollar budget just on the effects. So that's how much it would really cost to do those. And we did them for nothing. We just bought the supplies and spent 18 hours a night at Phil's just building these things for months. 

But that being said, one of the great things that I can do now is hire a Hollywood makeup team to come in and do all the effects. That allows me to be a better director. That's a lot of pressure off of my shoulders. I can focus on one thing instead of a hundred things. So that's going to be really exciting. And the other thing it's going to allow me to do is shoot the movie in three months as opposed to three years. So everybody will get "Terrifier 3" much sooner, which is well worth the money.

"Terrifier 2" returns to theaters on November 1, 2023.