1
00:02:03,555 --> 00:02:07,058
Pet Sematary fans, there's a lot of them.

2
00:02:07,092 --> 00:02:08,593
A lot of them.

3
00:02:08,626 --> 00:02:11,629
When we were shooting it, it
was a big studio production

4
00:02:11,663 --> 00:02:14,833
but it was low budget,
and then over the years,

5
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it's just become a big
deal for many people.

6
00:02:18,837 --> 00:02:22,273
I can't tell you why.

7
00:02:22,307 --> 00:02:26,144
People just, it really
hits people somehow.

8
00:02:26,177 --> 00:02:28,980
I first saw Pet Sematary in
the theater when it came out.

9
00:02:29,013 --> 00:02:30,315
I was just a big horror fan.

10
00:02:30,348 --> 00:02:31,583
I used to go see everything,

11
00:02:31,616 --> 00:02:33,618
so anything Stephen King that came out,

12
00:02:33,651 --> 00:02:36,121
you always made sure
you went opening night.

13
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So yeah, I went and saw Pet Sematary

14
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and fell in love with it immediately,

15
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"Sometimes dead's better."

16
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Been quotin' that forever.

17
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It was one of those films that you find

18
00:02:45,530 --> 00:02:48,833
with a group of friends, and
you all immediately love it.

19
00:02:48,867 --> 00:02:50,335
We were exposed to a lot of horror,

20
00:02:50,368 --> 00:02:52,470
but for some reason,
that one really stood out

21
00:02:52,504 --> 00:02:54,973
and scared the hell out of us as kids.

22
00:02:55,006 --> 00:02:57,976
It was my first Stephen
King book that I ever read.

23
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Scared me to death.

24
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He doesn't just write a scary
monster in the closet story.

25
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It's always a psychological aspect to it.

26
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People have really connected
to it, and it's surreal.

27
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It's a blessing, it's amazing.

28
00:03:12,123 --> 00:03:15,160
The way it was shot
visually, was done very well.

29
00:03:15,193 --> 00:03:19,664
Mary Lambert had a great
visual, artistic ability.

30
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It made my career as a film director.

31
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It's still my most successful film.

32
00:03:25,270 --> 00:03:27,472
The term in film was to make it work.

33
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If the lighting worked,
if the editing worked,

34
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if the performance worked,
it all worked really well.

35
00:03:34,579 --> 00:03:36,147
You wanna watch out for that road.

36
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My family was like,
they want me to look good.

37
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They didn't get it on this one.

38
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It was such a specific moment in time

39
00:03:44,923 --> 00:03:50,128
that I hardly remember,
and yet it seems to...

40
00:03:50,161 --> 00:03:53,798
have effected a generation
of people so deeply

41
00:03:53,832 --> 00:03:56,868
on this subconscious level,

42
00:03:56,901 --> 00:04:00,305
that it's just amazing to me
that it could be so powerful.

43
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Well, at least something good come of it,

44
00:04:17,422 --> 00:04:18,890
this place.

45
00:04:18,923 --> 00:04:24,362
Couldn't plant nothing but
corpses here anyway, I guess.

46
00:04:30,034 --> 00:04:32,337
I wrote a book called, Pet Sematary.

47
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I got pretty scared toward
the end of that book,

48
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kind of, "Oh boy."

49
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Some of the things, it was very black,

50
00:04:45,550 --> 00:04:48,653
and when I finished the book,
I actually put it in a drawer

51
00:04:48,686 --> 00:04:51,523
because I didn't think anybody
would wanna read anything

52
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like that, but they did.

53
00:04:53,925 --> 00:04:56,294
When I interviewed Steve
on one of the occasions

54
00:04:56,327 --> 00:05:00,965
back in, I think this was the late 80's,

55
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I asked him about his
preparation for Pet Sematary,

56
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and he told me, he gave me the
name of at least three books

57
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that he had researched carefully

58
00:05:13,544 --> 00:05:16,781
in learning about the lore of the wendigo.

59
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It was essentially a Native
American mythological figure

60
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that was especially pronounced
during the winter months.

61
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The reason that I think the
Indians gave birth to this

62
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is because they wanted to create a taboo

63
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against cannibalism during
those rough winter months

64
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where food is scarce.

65
00:05:41,072 --> 00:05:44,342
The wendigo is essentially
this figure who,

66
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once it's led into a community,

67
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it wrecks havoc on the community.

68
00:05:50,815 --> 00:05:53,952
At the time that King
was writing Pet Sematary,

69
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he was also writer in residence

70
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at the University of Maine Orono,

71
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and the course that he
was teaching was a course

72
00:06:00,358 --> 00:06:04,362
in 19th century British horror fiction.

73
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The three texts were Frankenstein,

74
00:06:06,931 --> 00:06:10,468
Jekyll and Hyde, and Dracula.

75
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I think that all three of those books

76
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have always had a pronounced
influence on Steve.

77
00:06:16,708 --> 00:06:18,042
That's one of the reasons why he wanted

78
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to teach this course.

79
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He's always thought those
books are the seminal texts

80
00:06:22,981 --> 00:06:26,818
in horror literature, but they
also had a pronounced effect

81
00:06:26,851 --> 00:06:29,654
on the writing of Pet Sematary.

82
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All three of those texts,
for example, revolve around

83
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the same theme of the
destruction of the family.

84
00:06:35,593 --> 00:06:40,398
All three of those texts revolve
around a monstrous presence

85
00:06:40,431 --> 00:06:45,036
that threatens to overcome
normative behavior,

86
00:06:45,069 --> 00:06:47,772
and all three of those
texts are about secrets,

87
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specifically male secrets,

88
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and keeping those male secrets from women.

89
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That's what causes, very
often, the destruction

90
00:06:57,615 --> 00:07:01,185
that centers all three of those texts.

91
00:07:01,219 --> 00:07:03,855
You know, Jud Crandall's line that

92
00:07:03,888 --> 00:07:06,190
women are supposed to be
good at keeping secrets,

93
00:07:06,224 --> 00:07:08,359
but I think men might be better.

94
00:07:08,393 --> 00:07:10,628
Another British horror story
to influence Stephen King

95
00:07:10,661 --> 00:07:12,263
while he was writing Pet Sematary

96
00:07:12,296 --> 00:07:15,166
was a 1902 short story by W.W. Jacobs

97
00:07:15,199 --> 00:07:16,734
called The Monkey's Paw.

98
00:07:16,768 --> 00:07:20,004
Essentially The Monkey's
Paw is about a talisman

99
00:07:20,038 --> 00:07:21,973
in the form of a dead monkey's paw

100
00:07:22,006 --> 00:07:24,809
that granted the possessor
of it three wishes,

101
00:07:24,842 --> 00:07:26,844
the issue being that all
three of these wishes

102
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came with a huge price.

103
00:07:28,346 --> 00:07:31,616
Essentially the moral of the
story is, don't mess with fate,

104
00:07:31,649 --> 00:07:33,484
and of course those themes are present

105
00:07:33,518 --> 00:07:36,387
in the story of Pet Sematary,
and I think at one point

106
00:07:36,421 --> 00:07:38,890
King was even quoted as saying that

107
00:07:38,923 --> 00:07:41,592
Pet Sematary is essentially a retelling,

108
00:07:41,626 --> 00:07:44,829
in many ways, of The Monkey's Paw story.

109
00:07:49,901 --> 00:07:53,604
Orrington is a real
small town, very rural.

110
00:07:53,638 --> 00:07:56,808
Why they picked that area
to live in, I'm not sure,

111
00:07:56,841 --> 00:07:59,777
other than it was available, I think.

112
00:07:59,811 --> 00:08:02,747
But, Steve had rented
the house in Orrington

113
00:08:02,780 --> 00:08:04,682
while he was teaching at the university,

114
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and behind the next door neighbor's house

115
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was an actual pet cemetery

116
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the kids in the neighborhood used.

117
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The way his mind works, he
can see something like that

118
00:08:14,592 --> 00:08:18,796
and get the beginnings of a
story, and he obviously did.

119
00:08:18,830 --> 00:08:21,165
They rented the house
right next door to us,

120
00:08:21,199 --> 00:08:23,000
and it had always been
a really creepy house

121
00:08:23,034 --> 00:08:24,435
because nobody had lived there.

122
00:08:24,469 --> 00:08:27,038
It was owned by, we called
it the Pierce house.

123
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It was owned by the Pierce family,

124
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and it was always vacant
for many, many, many years,

125
00:08:33,911 --> 00:08:36,013
and it was just a spooky old house,

126
00:08:36,047 --> 00:08:39,016
like a lot of those old
colonials are in Orrington.

127
00:08:39,050 --> 00:08:41,586
I certainly knew who Stephen
King was when he moved to town.

128
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I had read some of his
books at that point.

129
00:08:44,122 --> 00:08:46,457
I met him down at the corner store,

130
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and he rented an office
at the corner store

131
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to actually write in
for a number of years,

132
00:08:50,495 --> 00:08:52,330
so you would see him all the time,

133
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and he would go out for walks
and kinda cross our lawn.

134
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You'd be sittin' there
watchin' TV and look up,

135
00:08:57,568 --> 00:08:59,537
and hey, there's Stephen King.

136
00:08:59,570 --> 00:09:03,341
We started the Pet Sematary
in the early to mid 70's

137
00:09:03,374 --> 00:09:06,344
out of necessity, basically,
because growing up

138
00:09:06,377 --> 00:09:09,147
on Route 15 in Orrington,
it's a major truck route.

139
00:09:09,180 --> 00:09:10,615
There's an oil depot at the end.

140
00:09:10,648 --> 00:09:12,250
There's a pulp mill
there, so there's trucks

141
00:09:12,283 --> 00:09:13,718
back and forth all the time.

142
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You lost a lotta pets.

143
00:09:15,219 --> 00:09:18,623
There's only so many you
can bury in your side yard so,

144
00:09:18,656 --> 00:09:21,392
we just started puttin' up in the field

145
00:09:21,425 --> 00:09:23,761
and making our little markers for them.

146
00:09:23,795 --> 00:09:28,232
It was a place you could go
visit your dead cat or dog,

147
00:09:28,266 --> 00:09:32,170
or the occasional goldfish
that was intentionally

148
00:09:32,203 --> 00:09:35,406
taken out of the tank
so it could be buried.

149
00:09:35,439 --> 00:09:38,976
The spelling of Pet Sematary,
a neighbor up the road,

150
00:09:39,010 --> 00:09:41,779
Johnny, who was really into spray painting

151
00:09:41,812 --> 00:09:43,981
anything and everything,
we decided our cemetery

152
00:09:44,015 --> 00:09:48,152
had to have a sign, because
there was a growing population.

153
00:09:48,186 --> 00:09:51,189
We gave Johnny the task
of making the sign,

154
00:09:51,222 --> 00:09:54,525
and he showed up with it,
spelled the way it's spelled,

155
00:09:54,559 --> 00:09:56,928
and we had a really good laugh.

156
00:09:56,961 --> 00:09:58,863
We should've known
better than to stick him

157
00:09:58,896 --> 00:10:00,665
with spelling anything.

158
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One of the reasons why
the story of Pet Sematary

159
00:10:02,500 --> 00:10:04,569
is so effective, is
because at least part of it

160
00:10:04,602 --> 00:10:06,270
deals with real life people and events

161
00:10:06,304 --> 00:10:07,505
in Stephen King's life.

162
00:10:07,538 --> 00:10:09,340
Ellie Creed's cat, Church, for example,

163
00:10:09,373 --> 00:10:10,708
and his untimely demise

164
00:10:10,741 --> 00:10:12,877
was based on King's
daughter's cat, Smucky.

165
00:10:12,910 --> 00:10:15,947
Back in 1978, Smucky became
one of the many victims

166
00:10:15,980 --> 00:10:18,749
of Route 15 when he was
unfortunately struck

167
00:10:18,783 --> 00:10:20,184
by a passing vehicle.

168
00:10:20,218 --> 00:10:22,053
Of course, King knew it would
break his daughter's heart

169
00:10:22,086 --> 00:10:23,254
when she found out about it,

170
00:10:23,287 --> 00:10:24,889
so he had considered not telling her,

171
00:10:24,922 --> 00:10:26,557
and it was actually his wife, Tabitha,

172
00:10:26,591 --> 00:10:28,626
that said they had to tell her because,

173
00:10:28,659 --> 00:10:31,529
as she said, she has to
learn about death sometime.

174
00:10:31,562 --> 00:10:33,531
The next day they buried
Smucky in the Pet Sematary,

175
00:10:33,564 --> 00:10:36,100
and it's interesting to note
that when you watch the film,

176
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if you look closely,
you'll see that the crew

177
00:10:38,069 --> 00:10:39,770
actually paid tribute to Smucky

178
00:10:39,804 --> 00:10:42,506
by putting his name on a grave marker.

179
00:10:42,540 --> 00:10:44,575
As far as Gage getting run over,

180
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that was based on one of his
boys running towards the road,

181
00:10:47,511 --> 00:10:51,415
and Steve grabbed him just
at the side of the road

182
00:10:51,449 --> 00:10:53,184
as a truck went by.

183
00:10:53,217 --> 00:10:55,553
I guess he and Tabby were terrified by it,

184
00:10:55,586 --> 00:10:58,589
and eventually it worked
its way into the story.

185
00:10:58,623 --> 00:11:02,193
Stephen told me that in
that period of five seconds,

186
00:11:02,226 --> 00:11:06,364
or 10 seconds, between when
he saw his son in danger

187
00:11:06,397 --> 00:11:09,233
and he saved his son from that danger,

188
00:11:09,267 --> 00:11:14,005
that the entire story of Pet
Sematary flashed into his head.

189
00:11:14,038 --> 00:11:18,776
This is the son that I
took care of as a newborn,

190
00:11:18,809 --> 00:11:21,379
and made this fictional character,

191
00:11:21,412 --> 00:11:23,881
I knew this fictional character.

192
00:11:23,915 --> 00:11:28,686
This was real flesh and
blood, which made it even more

193
00:11:28,719 --> 00:11:33,257
I think emotional, as far
as dealing with child death.

194
00:11:33,291 --> 00:11:36,627
I said to him, "This is a horrible story.

195
00:11:36,661 --> 00:11:38,963
"It's very emotionally charged,

196
00:11:38,996 --> 00:11:43,801
"and I don't think you
should have this published."

197
00:11:43,834 --> 00:11:45,303
He laughed.

198
00:11:45,336 --> 00:11:47,838
When Steve originally wrote
the book and turned it in,

199
00:11:47,872 --> 00:11:49,774
the buying committee didn't like it,

200
00:11:49,807 --> 00:11:51,375
because it dealt with
the death of a child,

201
00:11:51,409 --> 00:11:53,811
and it was a taboo subject back then.

202
00:11:53,844 --> 00:11:57,048
I think Steve and Tabby were in agreement

203
00:11:57,081 --> 00:11:59,016
because it was such a dark story,

204
00:11:59,050 --> 00:12:01,852
that they didn't think
it was what it should be.

205
00:12:01,886 --> 00:12:05,823
So, it wasn't a big deal
that they didn't accept it.

206
00:12:05,856 --> 00:12:08,192
But it set for a few years,

207
00:12:08,225 --> 00:12:11,028
and Steve had left Doubleday
and gone to Viking,

208
00:12:11,062 --> 00:12:14,365
and Doubleday owed him some royalty money.

209
00:12:14,398 --> 00:12:17,168
The way they got it in one lump sum

210
00:12:17,201 --> 00:12:19,437
was, give us another book,

211
00:12:19,470 --> 00:12:22,440
and they decided to give
'em Pet Sematary again,

212
00:12:22,473 --> 00:12:24,241
'cause they promoted it heavily.

213
00:12:24,275 --> 00:12:26,911
If you look on the back of
the dust jacket it says,

214
00:12:26,944 --> 00:12:29,513
is it possible for Stephen
King to terrify himself,

215
00:12:29,547 --> 00:12:30,915
and, this book did it.

216
00:12:30,948 --> 00:12:33,517
When I learned that he had written a book

217
00:12:33,551 --> 00:12:37,655
based on my Pet Sematary, it
was really quite mind boggling

218
00:12:37,688 --> 00:12:41,025
to think that something
I did, in some small way,

219
00:12:41,058 --> 00:12:44,962
inspired such a great
writer to write a book.

220
00:12:44,995 --> 00:12:47,665
I had to have the book
the moment it came out.

221
00:12:47,698 --> 00:12:49,900
When the book came out,
there was a tremendous

222
00:12:49,934 --> 00:12:51,135
demand for it.

223
00:12:51,168 --> 00:12:53,471
It became a huge best seller,

224
00:12:53,504 --> 00:12:55,473
because of that tagline, I think.

225
00:12:55,506 --> 00:12:57,641
People wanna know what would scare Steve,

226
00:12:57,675 --> 00:13:00,611
and so they bought the
book in massive numbers.

227
00:13:00,644 --> 00:13:02,546
It's a fantastic story.

228
00:13:04,315 --> 00:13:05,783
Action.

229
00:13:05,816 --> 00:13:08,786
The era of the 80's is
really, as everyone knows,

230
00:13:08,819 --> 00:13:10,488
the era of the slasher film.

231
00:13:10,521 --> 00:13:13,357
It began in the very
late 70's with Halloween,

232
00:13:13,391 --> 00:13:15,693
and by the time 1980 rolled around,

233
00:13:15,726 --> 00:13:19,463
it was Friday the 13th, and
then a number of minor horrors

234
00:13:19,497 --> 00:13:22,299
like Night School and Graduation Day.

235
00:13:22,333 --> 00:13:24,402
They were usually
associated with a holiday.

236
00:13:24,435 --> 00:13:26,871
By the time the mid 80's came around,

237
00:13:26,904 --> 00:13:29,006
there was really, in my opinion,

238
00:13:29,039 --> 00:13:31,208
the horror film was drifting,

239
00:13:31,242 --> 00:13:34,011
and we were actually seeing
more science fiction stuff,

240
00:13:34,045 --> 00:13:36,580
like Terminator was big, and Aliens.

241
00:13:36,614 --> 00:13:39,050
There was nothing that was strictly horror

242
00:13:39,083 --> 00:13:40,951
until Pet Sematary came along.

243
00:13:40,985 --> 00:13:43,921
Unlike these other films,
where they were slashers,

244
00:13:43,954 --> 00:13:45,589
all the people who died in this film

245
00:13:45,623 --> 00:13:47,425
you cared about to a certain extent.

246
00:13:47,458 --> 00:13:50,728
It's definitely more of
a story of love and loss.

247
00:13:50,761 --> 00:13:53,230
It's one thing to have the scares.

248
00:13:53,264 --> 00:13:55,699
It's another thing to
effect people emotionally.

249
00:13:55,733 --> 00:13:59,270
I just had to put my dog
to sleep a couple weeks ago,

250
00:13:59,303 --> 00:14:01,338
and it just broke my heart,

251
00:14:01,372 --> 00:14:04,475
and the whole Pet Sematary
thing went through my mind,

252
00:14:04,508 --> 00:14:06,043
like, what if, you know?

253
00:14:06,076 --> 00:14:07,244
What if?

254
00:14:07,278 --> 00:14:09,013
Would I, if I could, bring her back?

255
00:14:09,046 --> 00:14:12,049
The fact that there was a very strong

256
00:14:12,082 --> 00:14:15,286
human emotional base to it all,

257
00:14:15,319 --> 00:14:19,857
is what made it what it
is, a very good story,

258
00:14:19,890 --> 00:14:22,526
an excellent film, I think.

259
00:14:32,736 --> 00:14:36,373
Stephen King really wanted
the film to be made in Maine

260
00:14:36,407 --> 00:14:40,244
because there had been a clamor
about him living in Maine

261
00:14:40,277 --> 00:14:43,614
but his films being shot in Los Angeles.

262
00:14:43,647 --> 00:14:46,917
So, that was one of many
reasons that Pet Sematary

263
00:14:46,951 --> 00:14:49,453
was very difficult to get made.

264
00:14:49,487 --> 00:14:53,424
One was, King insisted
that it be his screenplay,

265
00:14:53,457 --> 00:14:57,428
and his other stipulation
was that it be shot in Maine.

266
00:14:57,461 --> 00:14:59,463
What I understood at the time was,

267
00:14:59,497 --> 00:15:03,400
he was doing this as an answer
to his neighbors in Maine

268
00:15:03,434 --> 00:15:05,269
who said, "Why don't you shoot here

269
00:15:05,302 --> 00:15:07,004
"and bring all that money here?"

270
00:15:07,037 --> 00:15:10,040
A movie brings in lots and lots of money.

271
00:15:10,074 --> 00:15:12,042
That's the bottom line.

272
00:15:12,076 --> 00:15:14,144
But it's expensive for 'em to do it.

273
00:15:14,178 --> 00:15:17,548
They can go to Washington state
and make it look like Maine,

274
00:15:17,581 --> 00:15:20,150
or places in California, or Canada.

275
00:15:20,184 --> 00:15:23,621
When the dollar was cheaper,
Canada was an easy place,

276
00:15:23,654 --> 00:15:25,689
but Maine's expensive to get to.

277
00:15:25,723 --> 00:15:28,292
These were difficulties,
I think, in making the film

278
00:15:28,325 --> 00:15:32,062
financially, and I think
it took a long, long time

279
00:15:32,096 --> 00:15:34,532
for all of the pieces to come into place.

280
00:15:34,565 --> 00:15:35,933
Steve's proud of Maine.

281
00:15:35,966 --> 00:15:38,569
He's proud of the fact
that he's a native here.

282
00:15:38,602 --> 00:15:42,973
He has become such a member
of the Bangor community,

283
00:15:43,007 --> 00:15:46,410
that everybody thinks of
him as a great neighbor,

284
00:15:46,443 --> 00:15:49,146
but Stephen King is an
incredible neighbor too,

285
00:15:49,179 --> 00:15:52,349
because he's donated, and
he's given so much financially

286
00:15:52,383 --> 00:15:55,819
to the Bangor community, to
save public transportation,

287
00:15:55,853 --> 00:16:00,190
to help reconstruct the
library, ball parks,

288
00:16:00,224 --> 00:16:03,093
and I'm sure, numerous other things.

289
00:16:03,127 --> 00:16:05,529
He has this great house in Bangor,

290
00:16:05,563 --> 00:16:08,098
I'm assuming he still
lives there and has this

291
00:16:08,132 --> 00:16:10,534
big wrought iron fence
in front of it with bats,

292
00:16:10,568 --> 00:16:13,437
and kids love to trick-or-treat
there because of it.

293
00:16:13,470 --> 00:16:16,440
Stephen and Tabitha are real people,

294
00:16:16,473 --> 00:16:19,009
and people always look at icons,

295
00:16:19,043 --> 00:16:21,178
like Stephen is of the horror world,

296
00:16:21,211 --> 00:16:23,414
as somebody that's untouchable.

297
00:16:23,447 --> 00:16:25,983
To this day, he gets his own groceries

298
00:16:26,016 --> 00:16:27,885
when he's in town in Bangor.

299
00:16:27,918 --> 00:16:29,987
Very, very approachable.

300
00:16:30,020 --> 00:16:33,123
There's the monetary
aspect of what he's brought

301
00:16:33,157 --> 00:16:36,293
into the state by doing Pet Sematary.

302
00:16:36,327 --> 00:16:39,296
It's a story based in Maine,
why not shoot it here?

303
00:16:39,330 --> 00:16:42,833
Let's give Dale the gerry
pack, and have the doll on it.

304
00:16:42,866 --> 00:16:44,268
Rehearsal please,

305
00:16:44,301 --> 00:16:45,903
everybody else, clear frame.

306
00:16:45,936 --> 00:16:48,038
It was thrilling to all
of us, it was exciting,

307
00:16:48,072 --> 00:16:49,773
because everyone wanted
to know if they were gonna

308
00:16:49,807 --> 00:16:52,376
be in the movie, or have
something to do with the film.

309
00:16:52,409 --> 00:16:55,980
I was so excited that this
opportunity presented itself,

310
00:16:56,013 --> 00:16:59,883
because it's not often that
a big filmmaker comes to town

311
00:16:59,917 --> 00:17:01,986
and you get a chance to be an extra.

312
00:17:02,019 --> 00:17:04,888
I mean, this is Maine,
it's not Los Angeles.

313
00:17:04,922 --> 00:17:07,291
The acting community was
happy that it was happening

314
00:17:07,324 --> 00:17:10,027
because the Maine Film Commission,

315
00:17:10,060 --> 00:17:13,130
for a period of time there,
was making a concerted effort

316
00:17:13,163 --> 00:17:16,100
to try to bring more film into Maine,

317
00:17:16,133 --> 00:17:18,535
especially with the fact that Maine

318
00:17:18,569 --> 00:17:20,704
has such diverse geographics.

319
00:17:20,738 --> 00:17:23,440
It's a great place to bring a film.

320
00:17:23,474 --> 00:17:26,043
It was exciting and marvelously shocking.

321
00:17:26,076 --> 00:17:28,178
I didn't think we'd ever
have a big major film

322
00:17:28,212 --> 00:17:30,014
filmed here in Hancock, Maine.

323
00:17:30,047 --> 00:17:31,849
But everybody was talking about it, sure,

324
00:17:31,882 --> 00:17:34,451
one way or the other, whether
negatively or positively,

325
00:17:34,485 --> 00:17:36,453
and up and down the road here.

326
00:17:36,487 --> 00:17:38,722
Then when they actually came and showed up

327
00:17:38,756 --> 00:17:41,725
and it was real, and we all got a chance.

328
00:17:41,759 --> 00:17:43,560
I don't know how many people in town

329
00:17:43,594 --> 00:17:47,197
actually stopped by the set,
but a lot did, at least once.

330
00:17:47,231 --> 00:17:48,932
We had lots of visitors to the set.

331
00:17:48,966 --> 00:17:51,568
You'd think, in this remote location.

332
00:17:51,602 --> 00:17:54,672
I remember one day looking up,
and there was Charlie Sheen.

333
00:17:54,705 --> 00:17:57,307
He was a friend of David Anderson's,

334
00:17:57,341 --> 00:18:00,311
who was the makeup, he applied the makeup,

335
00:18:00,344 --> 00:18:02,312
him and his assistant, John Blake.

336
00:18:02,346 --> 00:18:05,916
Charlie had just come off
of Wall Street, I guess,

337
00:18:05,949 --> 00:18:07,685
so he was quite the thing.

338
00:18:07,718 --> 00:18:08,919
Who else?

339
00:18:08,952 --> 00:18:11,388
Oh, Kareem Abdul Jabbar showed up.

340
00:18:11,422 --> 00:18:14,825
He was friends with Richard Rubinstein,

341
00:18:14,858 --> 00:18:17,695
and he was hanging out on the set.

342
00:18:17,728 --> 00:18:19,029
It was a fun set.

343
00:18:19,063 --> 00:18:20,531
My sets are always fun, though.

344
00:18:20,564 --> 00:18:23,167
She set up a good
environment to be able to work,

345
00:18:23,200 --> 00:18:26,203
which I think is so important.

346
00:18:26,236 --> 00:18:28,405
And she really made a good movie.

347
00:18:28,439 --> 00:18:30,607
And go.

348
00:18:30,641 --> 00:18:32,976
The reason I directed Pet
Sematary was Stephen King,

349
00:18:33,010 --> 00:18:36,647
because he had authority, he
had approval over the director,

350
00:18:36,680 --> 00:18:39,350
and I was on the list because

351
00:18:39,383 --> 00:18:42,319
I was kinda the flavor of the month,

352
00:18:42,352 --> 00:18:45,122
because of all my music
video work at the time.

353
00:18:45,155 --> 00:18:48,459
I was an up and coming
young director in Hollywood.

354
00:18:48,492 --> 00:18:49,960
She comes from painting.

355
00:18:49,993 --> 00:18:52,096
She went to the Rhode
Island School of Design.

356
00:18:52,129 --> 00:18:55,365
She started as a painter,
she's very visual.

357
00:18:55,399 --> 00:18:57,801
She'll bring in a lot
of different elements,

358
00:18:57,835 --> 00:19:01,305
images from paintings, images from poetry,

359
00:19:01,338 --> 00:19:06,477
rock and roll, so it all has room to play.

360
00:19:06,510 --> 00:19:09,546
It was a woman directing a horror film,

361
00:19:09,580 --> 00:19:12,883
and I don't mean horror
genre kind of film,

362
00:19:12,916 --> 00:19:17,621
but she loved it because it
wasn't just only killing people.

363
00:19:17,654 --> 00:19:21,058
It was a small town,
and it was just a family

364
00:19:21,091 --> 00:19:25,562
moving to a lovely new place.

365
00:19:25,596 --> 00:19:27,197
And odd things happened.

366
00:19:27,231 --> 00:19:28,766
I remember my mother telling us

367
00:19:28,799 --> 00:19:31,535
that she had directed Madonna videos,

368
00:19:31,568 --> 00:19:33,704
and how cool that was,
'cause obviously Madonna

369
00:19:33,737 --> 00:19:35,372
was just the biggest thing at the time.

370
00:19:35,406 --> 00:19:37,608
I want you to stop...

371
00:19:37,641 --> 00:19:41,578
I don't know, at that red box.

372
00:19:41,612 --> 00:19:44,148
There was Halloween, and
there was Friday the 13th.

373
00:19:44,181 --> 00:19:45,382
This was different.

374
00:19:45,416 --> 00:19:48,418
Stephen's script, books, are different

375
00:19:48,452 --> 00:19:51,755
than the Friday's and the Halloween's.

376
00:19:51,789 --> 00:19:56,293
It's got a whole other slant on it.

377
00:19:56,326 --> 00:20:00,330
So, they wanted it done from a softness,

378
00:20:00,364 --> 00:20:03,467
because it made it that much scarier.

379
00:20:03,500 --> 00:20:07,571
Wait til Rachel takes the
baby, for the line.

380
00:20:07,604 --> 00:20:09,173
Okay, let's try it again.

381
00:20:09,206 --> 00:20:10,874
I think at one point, even George Romero

382
00:20:10,908 --> 00:20:12,609
was supposed to direct the film.

383
00:20:12,643 --> 00:20:14,611
He and Stephen King had
worked together before

384
00:20:14,645 --> 00:20:18,182
on Creep Show, but I believe
he was working on Monkey Shines

385
00:20:18,215 --> 00:20:20,617
and was committed to that
project and couldn't do it.

386
00:20:20,651 --> 00:20:23,787
I think ultimately having
Mary direct the film

387
00:20:23,821 --> 00:20:26,557
sort of broke the mold of
a lot of the horror films,

388
00:20:26,590 --> 00:20:27,791
and some of the zombie films

389
00:20:27,825 --> 00:20:30,360
that were being produced in the 1980's.

390
00:20:30,394 --> 00:20:32,162
Where's sound?

391
00:20:32,196 --> 00:20:34,298
Oh, sound is now camera.

392
00:20:34,331 --> 00:20:38,101
I had done Friday the 13th Part Two,

393
00:20:38,135 --> 00:20:41,638
and I really didn't love horror films.

394
00:20:41,672 --> 00:20:44,208
I said, for my career, I'm not gonna shoot

395
00:20:44,241 --> 00:20:45,509
another horror film.

396
00:20:45,542 --> 00:20:47,711
Then Fred Gwynne came to me.

397
00:20:47,744 --> 00:20:50,914
He put his arm around me, and he said,

398
00:20:50,948 --> 00:20:55,052
"Peter, I want you to understand
this is not a horror film.

399
00:20:55,085 --> 00:20:58,288
"This is a film about life and death.

400
00:20:58,322 --> 00:21:03,227
"It's much deeper than
an exploitation film."

401
00:21:03,260 --> 00:21:05,796
But the kicker was, he
said to me, "Listen,

402
00:21:05,829 --> 00:21:10,868
"I lost a child, and I
wouldn't be doing this."

403
00:21:10,901 --> 00:21:14,338
I said, oh my gosh, he lost a child,

404
00:21:14,371 --> 00:21:17,574
and I really liked him, and I
really liked working with him,

405
00:21:17,608 --> 00:21:19,176
and I really liked everybody.

406
00:21:19,209 --> 00:21:21,345
So I decided to do it.

407
00:21:21,378 --> 00:21:25,148
I was hired as lead
greens, which lead greens,

408
00:21:25,182 --> 00:21:27,651
sometimes people go, "What's that?"

409
00:21:27,684 --> 00:21:30,988
It's taking care of any
of the exterior set,

410
00:21:31,021 --> 00:21:34,358
so the Pet Sematary, the
Micmac burial ground,

411
00:21:34,391 --> 00:21:36,260
the front of Jud's house.

412
00:21:36,293 --> 00:21:39,363
Keeping the Pet Sematary
looking creepy was my main job.

413
00:21:39,396 --> 00:21:41,565
I went up to the production office.

414
00:21:41,598 --> 00:21:43,867
I was sittin' there, and
I heard somebody come out

415
00:21:43,901 --> 00:21:47,404
and they said, "We're looking
for some new swing gang,"

416
00:21:47,437 --> 00:21:48,705
and they told me what it was,

417
00:21:48,739 --> 00:21:51,408
it was assistant to the set decorator.

418
00:21:51,441 --> 00:21:54,778
I went up to the set decorator and I said,

419
00:21:54,811 --> 00:21:57,915
"If you will give me a
chance, I will work for you

420
00:21:57,948 --> 00:22:00,250
"for a week for free,
if you like me, hire me.

421
00:22:00,284 --> 00:22:04,221
"If you don't, just say
goodbye and I'll be on my way."

422
00:22:04,254 --> 00:22:07,557
She said, "Okay, you've got
to be in Boot Hill in an hour,

423
00:22:07,591 --> 00:22:10,093
"here's the guy that you're working with,"

424
00:22:10,127 --> 00:22:11,628
and, we took off.

425
00:22:15,465 --> 00:22:18,602
Mary fell in love with Denise
as soon as she walked in.

426
00:22:18,635 --> 00:22:20,938
Denise is a strong actress.

427
00:22:20,971 --> 00:22:24,741
I remember having a screen test with Dale.

428
00:22:24,775 --> 00:22:27,778
It was narrowed down to
four different actors,

429
00:22:27,811 --> 00:22:31,348
two women, two males, and it was...

430
00:22:31,381 --> 00:22:35,519
The phone call came, from Mary, of course,

431
00:22:35,552 --> 00:22:38,956
saying, "We're gonna do this movie!"

432
00:22:38,989 --> 00:22:41,391
Pet Sematary is actually
one of the only horror films

433
00:22:41,425 --> 00:22:45,862
I ever did, and we were in
Stephen King's backyard,

434
00:22:45,896 --> 00:22:49,733
basically, and I think that was perfect.

435
00:22:49,766 --> 00:22:53,070
Dale, in the 80's, was the heartthrob.

436
00:22:53,103 --> 00:22:55,172
There's no doubt about it.

437
00:22:55,205 --> 00:22:59,743
I do remember him coming
in and Mary and I going,

438
00:22:59,776 --> 00:23:01,178
"Wow."

439
00:23:01,211 --> 00:23:04,681
But he was also working incessantly,

440
00:23:04,715 --> 00:23:08,352
so Paramount wanting a bit of a name,

441
00:23:08,385 --> 00:23:10,454
we still had a very small budget.

442
00:23:10,487 --> 00:23:13,523
But Dale was a name that people knew,

443
00:23:13,557 --> 00:23:15,392
and he wanted to do it,

444
00:23:15,425 --> 00:23:18,729
he wanted to have another
side of his personas.

445
00:23:18,762 --> 00:23:20,864
I think that King is very careful about

446
00:23:20,897 --> 00:23:24,901
wanting him to be a doctor
in the course of this film,

447
00:23:24,935 --> 00:23:26,803
and I think the reason for that is because

448
00:23:26,837 --> 00:23:31,008
the role of the doctor is
essentially to defeat death,

449
00:23:31,041 --> 00:23:34,277
or at least to push death into abeyance

450
00:23:34,311 --> 00:23:36,079
for as long as possible.

451
00:23:36,113 --> 00:23:39,716
The story begins, the
narrative begins with Creed

452
00:23:39,750 --> 00:23:43,887
essentially losing his first
patient, Victor Pascow.

453
00:23:43,920 --> 00:23:46,623
The year before, a film
came out that I was in

454
00:23:46,657 --> 00:23:49,893
called The Bedroom Window,
and it got me a lot of notice.

455
00:23:49,926 --> 00:23:52,863
One of the people who had
seen it was Mary Lambert.

456
00:23:52,896 --> 00:23:56,266
She wanted to meet me, and
we talked about the part

457
00:23:56,299 --> 00:23:58,602
and we were on the same page as far as

458
00:23:58,635 --> 00:24:02,739
Pascow being more of
an angel than a ghost.

459
00:24:02,773 --> 00:24:06,043
The cover of my script, before
we started working on it,

460
00:24:06,076 --> 00:24:09,846
I put all these pictures
of angels on the cover

461
00:24:09,880 --> 00:24:12,883
of my script, to
constantly remind me that,

462
00:24:12,916 --> 00:24:16,353
I'm not a ghost, I'm not
a creepy, scary character.

463
00:24:16,386 --> 00:24:19,122
He's like the poster boy for Pet Sematary.

464
00:24:19,156 --> 00:24:22,759
That was Dave's work,
Dave Anderson, my son.

465
00:24:22,793 --> 00:24:26,663
Generally on a film set,
hopefully it's a lot of laughs.

466
00:24:26,697 --> 00:24:28,732
We had a lot of laughs in the trailer

467
00:24:28,765 --> 00:24:30,333
that night when Charlie was there,

468
00:24:30,367 --> 00:24:33,336
and also, oh boy, during
all those makeup hours.

469
00:24:33,370 --> 00:24:35,639
David and John were so great.

470
00:24:35,672 --> 00:24:39,843
The hours went by very quickly
'cause it was just fun,

471
00:24:39,876 --> 00:24:42,646
lively conversations and
a lot of joking around.

472
00:24:42,679 --> 00:24:44,614
We got our SAG cards really young.

473
00:24:44,648 --> 00:24:46,416
I think we started doing baby modeling

474
00:24:46,450 --> 00:24:47,951
when we were six months old,

475
00:24:47,984 --> 00:24:49,619
and I think we did our first
national network commercial

476
00:24:49,653 --> 00:24:51,088
- at three years old.
- Yeah.

477
00:24:51,121 --> 00:24:52,255
We did a lotta twin stuff.

478
00:24:52,289 --> 00:24:53,590
Usually when you hire twins,

479
00:24:53,623 --> 00:24:55,826
one of the twins will
be a really good athlete

480
00:24:55,859 --> 00:24:57,227
and good at the stunts,

481
00:24:57,260 --> 00:25:00,163
and the other is better with dialogue.

482
00:25:00,197 --> 00:25:03,366
They're never, it's never
an equal thing, though.

483
00:25:03,400 --> 00:25:05,001
They're never interchangeable.

484
00:25:05,035 --> 00:25:06,503
Blaze had an audition first.

485
00:25:06,536 --> 00:25:09,506
She had the first audition,
and I think they liked her

486
00:25:09,539 --> 00:25:12,476
and heard she had a twin, and so I went in

487
00:25:12,509 --> 00:25:14,077
on the callback with her.

488
00:25:14,111 --> 00:25:15,979
They really liked the two of us together,

489
00:25:16,012 --> 00:25:18,048
and because of child
labor laws at the time,

490
00:25:18,081 --> 00:25:19,916
I think that probably
helped, because they realized

491
00:25:19,950 --> 00:25:21,618
they could get more work out of us.

492
00:25:21,651 --> 00:25:22,786
There are a certain amount of hours

493
00:25:22,819 --> 00:25:25,655
a minor is allowed to work,

494
00:25:25,689 --> 00:25:29,259
and that can be detrimental
to your shooting schedule,

495
00:25:29,292 --> 00:25:32,629
'cause you have a teacher
going, "Off the set."

496
00:25:32,662 --> 00:25:37,000
So when you're fortunate
enough to find identical twins,

497
00:25:37,033 --> 00:25:39,936
one is off the set, the next one comes in

498
00:25:39,970 --> 00:25:41,404
and takes over the role.

499
00:25:41,438 --> 00:25:44,241
I love working with children, actually.

500
00:25:44,274 --> 00:25:46,476
They're always in the moment,

501
00:25:46,510 --> 00:25:49,579
they're always present, they
always connect with you,

502
00:25:49,613 --> 00:25:52,516
and they never really have an agenda.

503
00:25:52,549 --> 00:25:57,020
So, for me, when I hear that
I get to work with a kid,

504
00:25:57,053 --> 00:25:58,655
it's a good thing.

505
00:25:58,688 --> 00:26:01,525
It's funny, out of
all the films I've done,

506
00:26:01,558 --> 00:26:04,161
I think I enjoy watching
Pet Sematary the most,

507
00:26:04,194 --> 00:26:07,464
'cause it's the easiest to
disconnect myself from it.

508
00:26:07,497 --> 00:26:10,500
Because I was so young,
and I look so different,

509
00:26:10,534 --> 00:26:13,003
I can enjoy it objectively.

510
00:26:13,036 --> 00:26:17,440
Miko Hughes was in a really
important part of this film,

511
00:26:17,474 --> 00:26:20,577
and he was not even three years old,

512
00:26:20,610 --> 00:26:24,314
and he delivered an actor's performance.

513
00:26:24,347 --> 00:26:26,783
It was another piece of
casting that I really

514
00:26:26,816 --> 00:26:27,884
went to bat for.

515
00:26:27,918 --> 00:26:29,886
Paramount was not happy.

516
00:26:29,920 --> 00:26:31,388
They wanted twins.

517
00:26:31,421 --> 00:26:33,790
Shoot it, shoot it, scheduling.

518
00:26:33,823 --> 00:26:36,526
It didn't matter, and Mary won that fight,

519
00:26:36,560 --> 00:26:40,831
because this is a unique
little boy, to say the least.

520
00:26:40,864 --> 00:26:44,434
Mary did something that
was, I think critical

521
00:26:44,467 --> 00:26:47,304
to the success of the film, which was,

522
00:26:47,337 --> 00:26:50,006
she shot as much as she could in sequence

523
00:26:50,040 --> 00:26:54,211
to get Miko's trust,
that he would feel safe,

524
00:26:54,244 --> 00:26:58,582
that he would get to know everyone,

525
00:26:58,615 --> 00:27:03,486
get to feel safe with me
as his mom, his movie mom,

526
00:27:03,520 --> 00:27:06,823
and would be able to
be free, be able to do

527
00:27:06,856 --> 00:27:10,160
what was going to be asked
of him later on in the film,

528
00:27:10,193 --> 00:27:12,395
as it got progressively more difficult.

529
00:27:12,429 --> 00:27:14,631
Considering I was so
young that my memories

530
00:27:14,664 --> 00:27:18,301
are very spotty, they're
like picture memories.

531
00:27:18,335 --> 00:27:21,905
They're not so much a whole
day, or a specific event.

532
00:27:21,938 --> 00:27:23,974
When my husband, David Anderson,

533
00:27:24,007 --> 00:27:26,810
was doing Miko Hughes'
makeup on Pet Sematary,

534
00:27:26,843 --> 00:27:30,180
he actually would call
me from Maine and say,

535
00:27:30,213 --> 00:27:32,816
"I'm having a tough time here with Miko,

536
00:27:32,849 --> 00:27:35,085
"because he's so young, and I have to put

537
00:27:35,118 --> 00:27:36,553
"these terrible makeups on him."

538
00:27:36,586 --> 00:27:38,021
I think that was the toughest part for him

539
00:27:38,054 --> 00:27:40,257
of the whole movie,
actually, it was trying

540
00:27:40,290 --> 00:27:43,360
to provide an atmosphere
for this very young child

541
00:27:43,393 --> 00:27:45,562
so that he wasn't going
to be scarred for life.

542
00:27:45,595 --> 00:27:47,130
The parents were there,

543
00:27:47,163 --> 00:27:49,766
and they brought him in, I said,

544
00:27:49,799 --> 00:27:52,802
"Is there any way we
can, well not sedate him,

545
00:27:52,836 --> 00:27:54,504
"but does he have a nap time?"

546
00:27:54,537 --> 00:27:57,507
They did, they brought him
in when it was his nap time,

547
00:27:57,540 --> 00:28:00,010
and then I would take a
life cast of his hand,

548
00:28:00,043 --> 00:28:03,079
then I'd try to take a
little life cast of his face

549
00:28:03,113 --> 00:28:05,582
and he'd wake up and
that would get destroyed.

550
00:28:05,615 --> 00:28:08,952
We really never got a
life cast of his face,

551
00:28:08,985 --> 00:28:10,887
so that had to be sculpted.

552
00:28:10,920 --> 00:28:13,657
They were really fabulous about making

553
00:28:13,690 --> 00:28:17,594
a lot of stuff a game, so
that he, psychologically

554
00:28:17,627 --> 00:28:20,163
wouldn't be too damaged.

555
00:28:20,196 --> 00:28:23,133
It's funny, about four years later,

556
00:28:23,166 --> 00:28:26,536
I ran into him at an event,

557
00:28:26,569 --> 00:28:29,773
and he literally ran across the lawn,

558
00:28:29,806 --> 00:28:32,909
jumped in my arms, and gave me a big hug.

559
00:28:32,942 --> 00:28:36,579
So then later, I am acting
myself at Wes Craven's

560
00:28:36,613 --> 00:28:40,183
New Nightmare, and they
cast Miko Hughes as my son,

561
00:28:40,216 --> 00:28:42,285
and it actually made it really easy

562
00:28:42,319 --> 00:28:45,755
to start at a place where we
really knew each other already.

563
00:28:45,789 --> 00:28:49,659
People say it's hard to work
with children and animals.

564
00:28:49,693 --> 00:28:51,661
I worked with both in Pet Sematary,

565
00:28:51,695 --> 00:28:55,131
and I didn't find, actually,
that working with the child

566
00:28:55,165 --> 00:28:56,766
very difficult at all.

567
00:28:56,800 --> 00:28:58,968
The cats were another story altogether.

568
00:28:59,002 --> 00:29:00,537
There was actually a
training that happened

569
00:29:00,570 --> 00:29:02,339
before the film, where
we had to get comfortable

570
00:29:02,372 --> 00:29:05,442
with the cats, and I think
there was seven or nine of them.

571
00:29:05,475 --> 00:29:06,743
There was quite a few cats.

572
00:29:06,776 --> 00:29:07,977
Yeah, there was a whole bunch.

573
00:29:08,011 --> 00:29:10,880
To create the effect in the cat's eyes,

574
00:29:10,914 --> 00:29:15,452
we had heard that cats eyes
are very sensitive to light,

575
00:29:15,485 --> 00:29:19,756
and so we flipped the glass

576
00:29:19,789 --> 00:29:22,525
that was reflecting the
light, so that instead

577
00:29:22,559 --> 00:29:27,297
of directing it onto the
film, it was directing it out.

578
00:29:27,330 --> 00:29:30,600
It's such a minuscule amount of light

579
00:29:30,633 --> 00:29:34,904
that it has no effect on the
scene, you'd never see it.

580
00:29:34,938 --> 00:29:38,641
But for a cat's eyes, the
cat's eyes picked it up.

581
00:29:38,675 --> 00:29:40,377
They all had different
names, and I think they

582
00:29:40,410 --> 00:29:43,513
were all trained for different skills.

583
00:29:43,546 --> 00:29:45,915
They had 'em in a wagon called the Prowla.

584
00:29:45,949 --> 00:29:47,717
They had their names and their little beds

585
00:29:47,751 --> 00:29:50,120
where they slept, and
the night I was there,

586
00:29:50,153 --> 00:29:51,788
they had a scene where
he had to go up the tree.

587
00:29:51,821 --> 00:29:53,256
The cat had to run across the road

588
00:29:53,289 --> 00:29:55,625
and go up the tree out
here, and the little cat,

589
00:29:55,658 --> 00:29:58,027
he was great, he was a ham, really.

590
00:29:58,061 --> 00:29:59,863
It was fun to hear the director say,

591
00:29:59,896 --> 00:30:02,699
"Quiet on the set, cat is acting."

592
00:30:02,732 --> 00:30:05,068
The little guy got outta the box,

593
00:30:05,101 --> 00:30:07,404
and he walked right over
it with his tail twitching,

594
00:30:07,437 --> 00:30:10,540
and went right up the tree,
and went, "Haaah!" like this.

595
00:30:10,573 --> 00:30:13,176
They took it on one take.

596
00:30:21,050 --> 00:30:23,486
There were several casting
calls for local people

597
00:30:23,520 --> 00:30:25,488
to come, to get that look.

598
00:30:25,522 --> 00:30:28,124
They had asked for a lot of
pictures to be sent ahead,

599
00:30:28,158 --> 00:30:30,660
and they were cast on a local basis.

600
00:30:30,693 --> 00:30:32,996
I studied theater at
the University of Maine.

601
00:30:33,029 --> 00:30:35,331
I originally was from Lexington, Mass.,

602
00:30:35,365 --> 00:30:38,401
and went up to the University
of Maine to study theater,

603
00:30:38,435 --> 00:30:40,870
and ended up staying
there after I graduated.

604
00:30:40,904 --> 00:30:43,440
I remember when they had the
advertisements in the paper

605
00:30:43,473 --> 00:30:45,809
and saw one about the casting call,

606
00:30:45,842 --> 00:30:47,610
to go to the Grand Theater.

607
00:30:47,644 --> 00:30:51,748
As soon as I saw the ad, it
was like I was laser focused

608
00:30:51,781 --> 00:30:55,485
on this audition, and I
remember the very first,

609
00:30:55,518 --> 00:30:58,588
there was any number
of different auditions,

610
00:30:58,621 --> 00:31:00,356
one after another, but the first one

611
00:31:00,390 --> 00:31:03,092
was this gigantic open call.

612
00:31:03,126 --> 00:31:04,994
All kinds of people were talking about it,

613
00:31:05,028 --> 00:31:06,529
and lots of people went.

614
00:31:06,563 --> 00:31:10,133
I'd say several hundred,
probably, from the whole county.

615
00:31:10,166 --> 00:31:13,536
It just took hours to
get through the doors

616
00:31:13,570 --> 00:31:16,940
into that theater, and then
we're in the auditorium,

617
00:31:16,973 --> 00:31:19,175
and you sit and you
kinda move your way up,

618
00:31:19,209 --> 00:31:22,245
and finally, you're there with
one of the casting directors.

619
00:31:22,278 --> 00:31:24,914
Basically, everyone is
coming in to be an extra

620
00:31:24,948 --> 00:31:27,851
at that point, or I thought I
was coming in to be an extra.

621
00:31:27,884 --> 00:31:30,353
'Cause to me, growing up in Maine,

622
00:31:30,386 --> 00:31:32,555
the idea of being in a Stephen King movie,

623
00:31:32,589 --> 00:31:36,025
even if I just had a
walk on, was a big deal.

624
00:31:36,059 --> 00:31:37,927
I showed up at this
big room and there were

625
00:31:37,961 --> 00:31:40,029
a lot of children my age.

626
00:31:40,063 --> 00:31:41,931
They were bringing us in one by one,

627
00:31:41,965 --> 00:31:43,600
putting us in front of a camera,

628
00:31:43,633 --> 00:31:47,637
and gave us this scenario about
pretend your dog just died.

629
00:31:47,670 --> 00:31:49,272
Then she looks at me and says,

630
00:31:49,305 --> 00:31:51,574
"Now, I want you to do it again,

631
00:31:51,608 --> 00:31:55,712
"but I want you to pretend
you're possessed by an alien."

632
00:31:55,745 --> 00:31:59,415
I'm like, well, being the
method actress that I am,

633
00:31:59,449 --> 00:32:01,084
I just drew on past experience, right?

634
00:32:01,117 --> 00:32:02,685
No, I'm just kidding.

635
00:32:02,719 --> 00:32:05,154
Well, I've been involved
in trucking my whole life.

636
00:32:05,188 --> 00:32:08,124
I started working with
trucks when I was 14,

637
00:32:08,157 --> 00:32:11,561
and I delivered produce
up in Montreal, Quebec,

638
00:32:11,594 --> 00:32:15,331
and came home and went
to Dysart's Truck Stop

639
00:32:15,365 --> 00:32:19,402
in Harmon, Maine, and Mary
Lambert and Stephen King

640
00:32:19,435 --> 00:32:22,605
and some producers were
there having lunch.

641
00:32:22,639 --> 00:32:24,140
They sat me down, talked to me,

642
00:32:24,173 --> 00:32:27,644
and they wanted me to pretend
I was driving a truck.

643
00:32:27,677 --> 00:32:29,612
At this point when I tell people,

644
00:32:29,646 --> 00:32:32,248
people are just incredibly impressed,

645
00:32:32,282 --> 00:32:34,617
like, "You were in Pet Sematary?"

646
00:32:34,651 --> 00:32:37,020
Then they say, "What part were you?"

647
00:32:37,053 --> 00:32:41,691
And I say, "I played Zelda's sister."

648
00:32:41,724 --> 00:32:44,227
People have a very
visceral reaction to that.

649
00:32:44,260 --> 00:32:45,495
They're still rehearsing,

650
00:32:45,528 --> 00:32:47,864
and they're about to
bring in Zelda, I guess,

651
00:32:47,897 --> 00:32:49,098
as soon as Zelda's ready.

652
00:32:49,132 --> 00:32:51,234
Our brother auditioned to be Zelda

653
00:32:51,267 --> 00:32:53,269
because they were looking for boys.

654
00:32:53,303 --> 00:32:56,706
I knew that Zelda had to be terrifying,

655
00:32:56,739 --> 00:33:00,543
because that's what drives
Rachel over the edge.

656
00:33:00,577 --> 00:33:03,980
Zelda was the freakiest thing of all.

657
00:33:04,013 --> 00:33:06,849
I wanted her to die, I wanted her to die.

658
00:33:06,883 --> 00:33:08,785
I knew that Zelda had to be somebody

659
00:33:08,818 --> 00:33:11,321
that everybody wanted
to die, in order to sell

660
00:33:11,354 --> 00:33:13,823
that scene later with Denise.

661
00:33:13,856 --> 00:33:16,359
I would say still to this
day, when I tell people

662
00:33:16,392 --> 00:33:19,362
that the role of Zelda was
played by a male actor,

663
00:33:19,395 --> 00:33:20,797
that's the most interesting thing

664
00:33:20,830 --> 00:33:22,665
I could possibly tell them about the film.

665
00:33:22,699 --> 00:33:25,168
Well, we started with women,

666
00:33:25,201 --> 00:33:29,572
and many of the women
didn't wanna go that far.

667
00:33:29,606 --> 00:33:32,308
Someone had to come and bring to us

668
00:33:32,342 --> 00:33:35,144
something that we'd never seen,

669
00:33:35,178 --> 00:33:39,015
so when it was not happening with females,

670
00:33:39,048 --> 00:33:40,883
why not open it up?

671
00:33:40,917 --> 00:33:43,953
I just thought that it would be strange,

672
00:33:43,987 --> 00:33:48,024
that if we got a really thin, young boy,

673
00:33:48,057 --> 00:33:50,059
that it would be more frightening.

674
00:33:50,093 --> 00:33:52,762
I auditioned for a casting director,

675
00:33:52,795 --> 00:33:54,530
then another couple days later,

676
00:33:54,564 --> 00:33:56,532
I auditioned for Mary Lambert.

677
00:33:56,566 --> 00:33:59,235
It was in a conference room in an office,

678
00:33:59,268 --> 00:34:01,671
so I got underneath the table

679
00:34:01,704 --> 00:34:04,574
and kinda crawled up over the table

680
00:34:04,607 --> 00:34:08,177
and started crawling toward
Mary as I was doing the lines.

681
00:34:08,211 --> 00:34:11,314
I remember meeting
Andrew, and feeling like,

682
00:34:11,347 --> 00:34:14,951
A, he had the physique
that I was looking for,

683
00:34:14,984 --> 00:34:17,620
but B, that he wanted to do it.

684
00:34:17,654 --> 00:34:19,122
He was into it.

685
00:34:19,155 --> 00:34:22,191
By the time I got to Maine,
I knew what I wanted to do,

686
00:34:22,225 --> 00:34:25,595
which was basically what I
did for Mary in audition.

687
00:34:25,628 --> 00:34:27,530
I didn't really know, at that point,

688
00:34:27,563 --> 00:34:30,366
what they were going
to be putting on me
in terms of makeup.

689
00:34:30,400 --> 00:34:33,536
That only helped, but
I already had a voice,

690
00:34:33,569 --> 00:34:35,672
and I figured I would roll with

691
00:34:35,705 --> 00:34:38,441
whatever they gave me to do physically.

692
00:34:38,474 --> 00:34:43,713
I read the part about Zelda
and how she has meningitis,

693
00:34:43,746 --> 00:34:46,215
and I researched a
little bit and found out

694
00:34:46,249 --> 00:34:49,385
that meningitis, what
it is and how it looks,

695
00:34:49,419 --> 00:34:54,023
and my object was to recreate
that spine deforming like that

696
00:34:54,057 --> 00:34:56,759
and the stages that they go through,

697
00:34:56,793 --> 00:34:59,562
and then they start losing weight,

698
00:34:59,595 --> 00:35:02,031
getting sick, on the verge of dying.

699
00:35:02,065 --> 00:35:05,234
They glued around an eighth of an inch

700
00:35:05,268 --> 00:35:09,405
to a half of an inch of foam
all over the face and head,

701
00:35:09,439 --> 00:35:12,408
around the neck, the hands, and of course,

702
00:35:12,442 --> 00:35:14,010
all the way down the back,
which is where you get

703
00:35:14,043 --> 00:35:16,279
that cool back thing.

704
00:35:16,312 --> 00:35:21,484
Turn this guy into a
woman, and add rubber on him,

705
00:35:21,517 --> 00:35:24,187
it was quite a challenge to do that.

706
00:35:24,220 --> 00:35:27,623
I thought it was gonna
be five hours, six hours.

707
00:35:27,657 --> 00:35:30,259
It just kept going, because
after they put it on,

708
00:35:30,293 --> 00:35:31,928
then they had to make it up.

709
00:35:31,961 --> 00:35:33,963
After that, I never got out of makeup

710
00:35:33,996 --> 00:35:37,100
for the next 24 hours at least.

711
00:35:37,133 --> 00:35:40,403
We just shot 'til it was done,

712
00:35:40,436 --> 00:35:44,540
and by that time I really
wanted to pull it off,

713
00:35:44,574 --> 00:35:47,677
because it was very claustrophobic,

714
00:35:47,710 --> 00:35:51,447
and I did actually, and skin
started to come with it,

715
00:35:51,481 --> 00:35:53,449
so I stopped that immediately

716
00:35:53,483 --> 00:35:57,754
because they had to put a
solvent on to dissolve the glue,

717
00:35:57,787 --> 00:36:00,890
which they glued it on,
and then it took another

718
00:36:00,923 --> 00:36:02,959
eight hours for them to take it off.

719
00:36:02,992 --> 00:36:05,061
So by that time, I was cooked.

720
00:36:05,094 --> 00:36:07,130
I was blown away by his acting.

721
00:36:07,163 --> 00:36:10,666
He just got into that
character, and so well.

722
00:36:10,700 --> 00:36:15,571
He was terrifying, and in between takes,

723
00:36:15,605 --> 00:36:19,175
he would sort of go back to
being a normal 18 year old boy,

724
00:36:19,208 --> 00:36:23,045
but then he would start to
kind of screw around with me

725
00:36:23,079 --> 00:36:25,782
and be like, "Rachel."

726
00:36:25,815 --> 00:36:28,985
The Zelda scene is definitely my favorite,

727
00:36:29,018 --> 00:36:31,020
'cause that scared the shit outta me.

728
00:36:31,053 --> 00:36:34,891
That was legitimately one of
those moments when I was a kid,

729
00:36:34,924 --> 00:36:38,227
and I saw that, it
creeped me out big time.

730
00:36:38,261 --> 00:36:40,530
You can put your makeup on somebody,

731
00:36:40,563 --> 00:36:44,066
but if they don't act the
part and believe this makeup

732
00:36:44,100 --> 00:36:46,536
and believe themselves, that they are

733
00:36:46,569 --> 00:36:50,173
this poor distressed
woman, it doesn't work,

734
00:36:50,206 --> 00:36:54,243
and he worked that makeup
and he worked that character.

735
00:36:54,277 --> 00:36:57,914
When I read the script,
my first reaction to it

736
00:36:57,947 --> 00:37:00,283
was that it was like a child's drawing.

737
00:37:00,316 --> 00:37:02,418
It's about the death of a child.

738
00:37:02,451 --> 00:37:05,454
The heart of this movie
is the death of a child,

739
00:37:05,488 --> 00:37:08,591
and that the movie itself
is like a child's drawing.

740
00:37:08,624 --> 00:37:12,762
There's a mommy and a daddy,
and a house and a tree,

741
00:37:12,795 --> 00:37:16,332
and a brother and a sister, and a cat.

742
00:37:16,365 --> 00:37:19,869
It was in my mind like
that, but the person

743
00:37:19,902 --> 00:37:23,172
who's not in that
drawing, is Jud Crandall,

744
00:37:23,206 --> 00:37:25,908
and he's critical to the narrative.

745
00:37:25,942 --> 00:37:30,012
He is the one that sets
the whole story in motion.

746
00:37:30,046 --> 00:37:32,815
He shouldn't have done what he did.

747
00:37:32,849 --> 00:37:36,252
His advice is what causes
Louis to do the thing

748
00:37:36,285 --> 00:37:37,954
that destroys him.

749
00:37:37,987 --> 00:37:39,489
Jud Crandall.

750
00:37:39,522 --> 00:37:42,191
I live just across the road.

751
00:37:42,225 --> 00:37:44,427
You wanna watch out for that road.

752
00:37:44,460 --> 00:37:45,962
Them damn trucks go back and forth

753
00:37:45,995 --> 00:37:47,597
all day and most the night.

754
00:37:47,630 --> 00:37:50,600
- I feel like most
people remember Jud's
character the most.

755
00:37:50,633 --> 00:37:53,102
Pretty much every time
you mention Pet Sematary,

756
00:37:53,135 --> 00:37:54,871
someone does that cooky,

757
00:37:54,904 --> 00:37:56,739
- that cooky Maine accent.
- His great Maine accent.

758
00:37:56,772 --> 00:37:58,975
- Yeah, it's great.
- "Down that road over there."

759
00:37:59,008 --> 00:38:00,376
Everyone's got their impression

760
00:38:00,409 --> 00:38:02,078
of Fred Gwynne in that movie.

761
00:38:02,111 --> 00:38:03,546
I've always loved Fred Gwynne.

762
00:38:03,579 --> 00:38:05,982
I loved Car 54, I loved the Munsters,

763
00:38:06,015 --> 00:38:07,750
I've seen him on Broadway.

764
00:38:07,783 --> 00:38:11,821
He was an amazing actor,
and not fully appreciated,

765
00:38:11,854 --> 00:38:16,225
I don't think, by the industry.

766
00:38:16,259 --> 00:38:18,961
I never thought of anyone else but Fred,

767
00:38:18,995 --> 00:38:22,598
and at first, Paramount felt
that because of the Munsters,

768
00:38:22,632 --> 00:38:25,234
that people would think it was funny,

769
00:38:25,268 --> 00:38:27,503
and that it would take
people outta the movie.

770
00:38:27,536 --> 00:38:30,606
I said, "Well let me go meet with him."

771
00:38:30,640 --> 00:38:33,075
That did nothing to dissuade me.

772
00:38:33,109 --> 00:38:34,977
I felt immediately in love with him.

773
00:38:35,011 --> 00:38:36,212
I didn't change my mind.

774
00:38:36,245 --> 00:38:37,914
I came back, and I told Paramount that

775
00:38:37,947 --> 00:38:39,749
that was what I wanted.

776
00:38:39,782 --> 00:38:41,584
You don't look further.

777
00:38:41,617 --> 00:38:43,152
You look no further.

778
00:38:43,185 --> 00:38:45,721
"What, he'd like to play this?

779
00:38:45,755 --> 00:38:48,691
"Book it, next."

780
00:38:48,724 --> 00:38:50,159
It was Fred Gwynne!

781
00:38:50,192 --> 00:38:55,731
The first time I met Fred,
we immediately had a chemistry.

782
00:38:55,765 --> 00:39:00,236
He's just a big ole bear, a big ole kid,

783
00:39:00,269 --> 00:39:02,872
and I ended up spending
a lot of time with Fred.

784
00:39:02,905 --> 00:39:06,676
I ended up going to, he
had a cabin on a lake,

785
00:39:06,709 --> 00:39:09,445
and I went to dinner at his house

786
00:39:09,478 --> 00:39:12,782
with his wife, Debra, many, many nights.

787
00:39:12,815 --> 00:39:15,451
He was incredible in the role.

788
00:39:15,484 --> 00:39:17,887
He was exactly that guy.

789
00:39:17,920 --> 00:39:19,989
He was exactly Jud Crandall,

790
00:39:20,022 --> 00:39:23,326
when you read the book with his accent.

791
00:39:23,359 --> 00:39:27,163
And it was such a part
that he had not played.

792
00:39:27,196 --> 00:39:29,365
That's what you look for in the actors,

793
00:39:29,398 --> 00:39:32,969
the ones that haven't
played it a million times,

794
00:39:33,002 --> 00:39:36,539
so that when he plays
something differently,

795
00:39:36,572 --> 00:39:39,408
the audience just goes, "Wow!"

796
00:39:39,442 --> 00:39:41,410
Okay, yeah.

797
00:39:41,444 --> 00:39:44,547
I loved the man, I really did.

798
00:39:44,580 --> 00:39:48,250
It was the best part of the
experience of Pet Sematary

799
00:39:48,284 --> 00:39:51,454
for me, was being with Fred
Gwynne, meeting Fred Gwynne

800
00:39:51,487 --> 00:39:54,290
and becoming a really good friend of his.

801
00:39:54,323 --> 00:39:57,259
I did get to meet Fred Gwynne, thankfully.

802
00:39:57,293 --> 00:39:59,428
It was just a moment.

803
00:39:59,462 --> 00:40:03,332
It was a moment of
looking up, and then up,

804
00:40:03,366 --> 00:40:05,468
at this very, very tall man

805
00:40:05,501 --> 00:40:08,871
whose voice was like a pipe organ.

806
00:40:08,904 --> 00:40:10,239
It was beautiful.

807
00:40:10,272 --> 00:40:12,341
I have a couple
children's books he gave me.

808
00:40:12,375 --> 00:40:14,010
He was an illustrator and a writer.

809
00:40:14,043 --> 00:40:15,945
He wrote some kids books,
and they're really,

810
00:40:15,978 --> 00:40:17,813
really interesting, you know, for kids,

811
00:40:17,847 --> 00:40:22,018
kinda interesting ideas,
and really cool artwork.

812
00:40:22,051 --> 00:40:25,888
I still have those, signed
from him, and packed away.

813
00:40:25,921 --> 00:40:27,690
I kinda fell in love with him.

814
00:40:27,723 --> 00:40:30,126
I think it's hard to not
fall in love with him.

815
00:40:30,159 --> 00:40:33,162
I'd always loved his work, and
so meeting him was thrilling.

816
00:40:33,195 --> 00:40:35,264
We talked a little bit
about doing a Maine accent,

817
00:40:35,297 --> 00:40:36,999
him and I, 'cause we
were two of the people

818
00:40:37,033 --> 00:40:38,901
who were doing a Maine accent,

819
00:40:38,934 --> 00:40:42,872
and he just was...

820
00:40:42,905 --> 00:40:46,342
You just wanted to hug him.

821
00:40:46,375 --> 00:40:47,877
Or you wanted him to hug you, actually.

822
00:40:47,910 --> 00:40:49,245
It's interesting because of the,

823
00:40:49,278 --> 00:40:52,214
I guess because of what
the movie was about,

824
00:40:52,248 --> 00:40:54,650
we would spend a lot of
time talking about death,

825
00:40:54,683 --> 00:40:58,354
and the hereafter, what do you
think's gonna happen after,

826
00:40:58,387 --> 00:41:00,423
and Fred had this very clear vision

827
00:41:00,456 --> 00:41:03,159
of what he thought was
coming after his death,

828
00:41:03,192 --> 00:41:06,295
which was the most beautiful concept,

829
00:41:06,328 --> 00:41:09,065
the most beautiful image,
the most beautiful place

830
00:41:09,098 --> 00:41:13,102
he could ever imagine, he said,
"That's where I'm gonna be.

831
00:41:13,135 --> 00:41:15,304
"That's what's gonna happen."

832
00:41:15,337 --> 00:41:17,840
He was very specific about it,

833
00:41:17,873 --> 00:41:20,643
and I have a feeling he's there.

834
00:41:24,513 --> 00:41:26,549
I think everybody was
really into doing this movie.

835
00:41:26,582 --> 00:41:28,451
I think we all felt we
were lucky to be there,

836
00:41:28,484 --> 00:41:30,152
and having a good time doing it.

837
00:41:30,186 --> 00:41:31,387
I wanted to make it work.

838
00:41:31,420 --> 00:41:33,389
Working with Susan
Blommaert was wonderful.

839
00:41:33,422 --> 00:41:36,425
I hired her because she
has a solid body of work

840
00:41:36,459 --> 00:41:38,160
and she's a really good actress.

841
00:41:38,194 --> 00:41:40,763
I was there, actually, when they hung her,

842
00:41:40,796 --> 00:41:42,598
and it really freaked me out.

843
00:41:42,631 --> 00:41:43,899
It looked so real.

844
00:41:43,933 --> 00:41:46,602
Whenever you hang somebody in a movie,

845
00:41:46,635 --> 00:41:48,938
you have to build a harness,
and then the harness

846
00:41:48,971 --> 00:41:51,307
has to be in such a way
that you don't sense

847
00:41:51,340 --> 00:41:53,175
that they're hanging from their arms,

848
00:41:53,209 --> 00:41:56,045
and the actor's got to give you something,

849
00:41:56,078 --> 00:41:58,647
otherwise it looks like they're
hanging from their arms.

850
00:41:58,681 --> 00:42:00,983
I actually asked the production company

851
00:42:01,016 --> 00:42:04,453
to see if I could talk to a psychiatrist.

852
00:42:04,487 --> 00:42:08,090
I wanted to talk to
somebody about what insight

853
00:42:08,124 --> 00:42:09,792
they might be able to give me

854
00:42:09,825 --> 00:42:12,194
of the state of a person who is actually

855
00:42:12,228 --> 00:42:14,697
able to take their own life.

856
00:42:14,730 --> 00:42:17,666
Because my feeling, my instinct was that,

857
00:42:17,700 --> 00:42:20,503
by the time you're actually ready

858
00:42:20,536 --> 00:42:24,340
to walk off the table,

859
00:42:24,373 --> 00:42:29,245
I think you probably have gone
through the gamut of emotion,

860
00:42:29,278 --> 00:42:33,849
and I think you're just, on a mission.

861
00:42:33,883 --> 00:42:39,021
I had decided that my
mother died of cancer,

862
00:42:39,054 --> 00:42:41,157
and that I took care of her,

863
00:42:41,190 --> 00:42:44,727
and I knew exactly what I
was in for, with cancer.

864
00:42:44,760 --> 00:42:48,898
So, when I walked down the
stairs and got on the table,

865
00:42:48,931 --> 00:42:51,500
and put the rope around my neck,

866
00:42:51,534 --> 00:42:54,870
I remember thinking, "I'm going to mama."

867
00:42:54,904 --> 00:42:59,408
And I do remember saying, "Mama, mama,"

868
00:42:59,441 --> 00:43:02,111
as I walked to the edge of the table.

869
00:43:02,144 --> 00:43:05,614
When the film was
playing in New York City,

870
00:43:05,648 --> 00:43:09,051
I got a call from a friend.

871
00:43:09,084 --> 00:43:13,956
She said, "You have got to go to Midtown

872
00:43:13,989 --> 00:43:17,326
"to see Pet Sematary."

873
00:43:17,359 --> 00:43:19,862
Times Square has, often the movie houses

874
00:43:19,895 --> 00:43:24,133
are very participatory,
depending on the genre of film,

875
00:43:24,166 --> 00:43:26,368
and so when I got up on the table

876
00:43:26,402 --> 00:43:28,237
and started walking to
the edge of the table,

877
00:43:28,270 --> 00:43:30,039
she said there was a whole crowd of kids

878
00:43:30,072 --> 00:43:33,175
that went, "Jump, bitch!"

879
00:43:42,585 --> 00:43:45,788
I was completely entranced with the nature

880
00:43:45,821 --> 00:43:47,590
and the landscape of Maine.

881
00:43:47,623 --> 00:43:50,392
I went to school in New
England and I love New England,

882
00:43:50,426 --> 00:43:52,695
and I had never spent
that much time in Maine.

883
00:43:52,728 --> 00:43:55,965
I'd been to Maine before, but
mostly along the sea coast.

884
00:43:55,998 --> 00:43:59,468
I love New England, and Maine is kind of

885
00:43:59,501 --> 00:44:02,304
the epitome of everything
that's good about New England.

886
00:44:02,338 --> 00:44:04,406
Being in Maine was tremendous.

887
00:44:04,440 --> 00:44:08,310
It was so beautiful, and
we, of course frequented

888
00:44:08,344 --> 00:44:13,015
all the local restaurants
and little shops.

889
00:44:13,048 --> 00:44:14,683
Our parents actually
rented a house in Maine

890
00:44:14,717 --> 00:44:16,652
during the filming of the movie.

891
00:44:16,685 --> 00:44:19,655
We had birthday parties,
which where we pretty much

892
00:44:19,688 --> 00:44:22,091
invited anybody we had
met during the filming

893
00:44:22,124 --> 00:44:24,760
that was under 10 years old
and lived on our streets.

894
00:44:24,793 --> 00:44:27,963
The locals in Ellsworth were
all really nice, very kind.

895
00:44:27,997 --> 00:44:29,965
I got to know several of them

896
00:44:29,999 --> 00:44:32,568
because I would hang
out at the local diner.

897
00:44:32,601 --> 00:44:34,837
That's where I would go for breakfast.

898
00:44:34,870 --> 00:44:36,872
I would listen to what people were saying

899
00:44:36,905 --> 00:44:41,443
about this film company
invading their little town.

900
00:44:41,477 --> 00:44:44,146
A lot of them did not
like the traffic hang ups.

901
00:44:44,179 --> 00:44:45,914
Everyone was warned, the film company

902
00:44:45,948 --> 00:44:47,449
was very good about telling us.

903
00:44:47,483 --> 00:44:50,653
They even provided schedules
so that we know that the road

904
00:44:50,686 --> 00:44:53,622
was gonna be blocked off
at certain days and hours,

905
00:44:53,656 --> 00:44:56,425
but still, and it was true for me too,

906
00:44:56,458 --> 00:44:57,993
one time 'cause I was in a hurry,

907
00:44:58,027 --> 00:45:01,730
and we'd zoom up the road and
say, "Oh damn, the movie,"

908
00:45:01,764 --> 00:45:03,732
and have to turn around and go back again.

909
00:45:03,766 --> 00:45:06,268
Some people were bothered
by the lights at nighttime.

910
00:45:06,302 --> 00:45:08,404
They were very glaring out here,

911
00:45:08,437 --> 00:45:10,406
and you could see them for miles away.

912
00:45:10,439 --> 00:45:13,575
It was like a space ship had
landed in Hancock, Maine.

913
00:45:13,609 --> 00:45:15,911
My boyfriend at the
time was David Anderson,

914
00:45:15,944 --> 00:45:18,514
and he was the special
effects makeup artist on set,

915
00:45:18,547 --> 00:45:22,818
and he had invited me to come
to Maine for a long weekend.

916
00:45:22,851 --> 00:45:27,056
Dave met Heather at a
party, where she was at,

917
00:45:27,089 --> 00:45:30,793
but he was working on a Wes
Craven film at the time.

918
00:45:30,826 --> 00:45:34,763
We ended up spending the
night in a little town,

919
00:45:34,797 --> 00:45:36,999
I think it was Bar Harbor,

920
00:45:37,032 --> 00:45:39,435
and he proposed to me that night.

921
00:45:39,468 --> 00:45:42,371
I was totally surprised,
and he actually didn't

922
00:45:42,404 --> 00:45:44,973
have a ring for me, but
he had bought a diamond

923
00:45:45,007 --> 00:45:47,476
at the Ellsworth Jewelry Shop, I think,

924
00:45:47,509 --> 00:45:50,412
and so he presented that to me.

925
00:45:50,446 --> 00:45:53,782
I have to say, I was completely
flabbergasted!

926
00:45:53,816 --> 00:45:55,684
But, I ended up saying yes.

927
00:45:55,718 --> 00:45:57,219
I think that there's really

928
00:45:57,252 --> 00:45:59,722
no place in the world like Maine.

929
00:45:59,755 --> 00:46:02,925
It's like Maine is a
character within the story.

930
00:46:02,958 --> 00:46:05,427
One of the leading characters, I think,

931
00:46:05,461 --> 00:46:08,897
the town, the area, the way it looks,

932
00:46:08,931 --> 00:46:10,799
the people, the houses.

933
00:46:10,833 --> 00:46:12,234
It's a big part of the movie.

934
00:46:12,267 --> 00:46:14,403
The whole vibe of the
place just lent itself

935
00:46:14,436 --> 00:46:18,340
to that kind of picture,
that kind of, what if,

936
00:46:18,374 --> 00:46:22,144
what could happen, and
anything could happen.

937
00:46:22,177 --> 00:46:26,415
I can't imagine not
shooting that film in Maine.

938
00:46:26,448 --> 00:46:31,286
You get out of your reality,
and you completely invest

939
00:46:31,320 --> 00:46:33,922
in this imaginary tale.

940
00:46:33,956 --> 00:46:35,724
For us actors it was great,

941
00:46:35,758 --> 00:46:38,627
because we could just
soak up the local culture

942
00:46:38,660 --> 00:46:40,863
and try our best to replicate it.

943
00:46:40,896 --> 00:46:43,732
And it's not so much like the accents,

944
00:46:43,766 --> 00:46:45,868
that you can learn an accent anywhere,

945
00:46:45,901 --> 00:46:49,304
like Fred's accent or
the housekeeper's accent.

946
00:46:49,338 --> 00:46:51,807
But it's hard not to make it too cliche.

947
00:46:51,840 --> 00:46:53,142
You don't want it too cliche.

948
00:46:53,175 --> 00:46:56,245
I do remember a line, though.

949
00:46:56,278 --> 00:46:59,548
I think he asked me how
I'm feeling, or something.

950
00:46:59,581 --> 00:47:01,283
"I'm better, no worse."

951
00:47:01,316 --> 00:47:04,420
The land is part of the story.

952
00:47:04,453 --> 00:47:07,556
The characters refer to
the land being sacred,

953
00:47:07,589 --> 00:47:09,625
the land being dangerous,

954
00:47:09,658 --> 00:47:13,662
the land being a character in the movie.

955
00:47:13,695 --> 00:47:16,265
You needed to be in that place,

956
00:47:16,298 --> 00:47:19,435
and we were blessed that we were there

957
00:47:19,468 --> 00:47:22,171
and not on some Hollywood sound stage.

958
00:47:22,204 --> 00:47:25,040
I mean, it's 20 minutes
from Stephen King's house,

959
00:47:25,074 --> 00:47:27,309
and Stephen King was obviously around,

960
00:47:27,342 --> 00:47:29,845
he was around for the
rehearsals, the read throughs.

961
00:47:29,878 --> 00:47:33,015
When we got there, he was around
the first day of shooting.

962
00:47:33,048 --> 00:47:35,384
It was fun, having him on the set,

963
00:47:35,417 --> 00:47:40,022
and watching him collaborate
with Mary on different things.

964
00:47:40,055 --> 00:47:42,791
But he wasn't trying to push his ideas.

965
00:47:42,825 --> 00:47:44,793
In fact, there were some things that,

966
00:47:44,827 --> 00:47:47,329
like the ending and different things,

967
00:47:47,362 --> 00:47:51,066
that he actually liked the
changes made from the book.

968
00:47:51,099 --> 00:47:52,401
He endorsed them.

969
00:47:52,434 --> 00:47:54,203
Remember Fred following him going,

970
00:47:54,236 --> 00:47:57,039
"You know man, I really
wanna pick your brain."

971
00:47:57,072 --> 00:47:58,574
Fred kept saying that to Stephen,

972
00:47:58,607 --> 00:48:00,476
and I think it freaked
Stephen out, which it's hard

973
00:48:00,509 --> 00:48:02,611
to believe that anything
could freak Stephen King out,

974
00:48:02,644 --> 00:48:04,413
but I think it freaked him out a little.

975
00:48:04,446 --> 00:48:07,249
As a writer of horror novels and films,

976
00:48:07,282 --> 00:48:10,185
it's just, you think he's
gonna be really scary,

977
00:48:10,219 --> 00:48:14,389
and he's a big guy, but he
was really a gentle, nice guy.

978
00:48:14,423 --> 00:48:16,458
I remember him picking
us up over his head,

979
00:48:16,492 --> 00:48:20,462
and reading our Archie
comic books with us.

980
00:48:20,496 --> 00:48:21,482
Ready.

981
00:48:21,497 --> 00:48:23,098
Ready, and go.

982
00:48:25,300 --> 00:48:28,437
That's a cut.

983
00:48:28,470 --> 00:48:33,809
The locations in Maine, the
physical landscape in Maine

984
00:48:33,842 --> 00:48:36,678
is like a fairy tale landscape, the rocks

985
00:48:36,712 --> 00:48:40,048
and the moss and the ocean and the cliffs

986
00:48:40,082 --> 00:48:43,018
and the mountains and the fog.

987
00:48:43,051 --> 00:48:46,755
Bill Dunn, the location
manager, did a spot on job

988
00:48:46,788 --> 00:48:49,825
at finding some remote, yet close by,

989
00:48:49,858 --> 00:48:53,161
only an hour within our
centrally located studios

990
00:48:53,195 --> 00:48:54,997
here in Ellsworth.

991
00:49:03,305 --> 00:49:06,775
Mary and the other principals fell in love

992
00:49:06,808 --> 00:49:11,380
with the house that was
going to be the Creed house.

993
00:49:11,413 --> 00:49:14,716
It was the perfect house for this movie.

994
00:49:14,750 --> 00:49:17,219
It just was right out of the book.

995
00:49:17,252 --> 00:49:20,289
It had so many of the elements
we wanted for that house,

996
00:49:20,322 --> 00:49:25,294
but it was missing a
tree with the tire swing.

997
00:49:25,327 --> 00:49:27,829
They decided the best case scenario

998
00:49:27,863 --> 00:49:30,199
was to go with the house they love,

999
00:49:30,232 --> 00:49:35,304
and move a mature tree
to plant in this yard

1000
00:49:35,337 --> 00:49:37,573
and put their tire swing on there.

1001
00:49:37,606 --> 00:49:39,641
There's still a spot
in the lawn down there.

1002
00:49:39,675 --> 00:49:42,411
It was about five in the
morning they put that tree in,

1003
00:49:42,444 --> 00:49:44,179
but it didn't make it.

1004
00:49:44,212 --> 00:49:47,416
We tried to save it, we
watered it and watered it,

1005
00:49:47,449 --> 00:49:49,217
but it had to come down.

1006
00:49:49,251 --> 00:49:51,153
Betty and Charlie Lewis were two

1007
00:49:51,186 --> 00:49:53,589
of the finest people that I met.

1008
00:49:53,622 --> 00:49:55,757
They're good Maine people,

1009
00:49:55,791 --> 00:49:58,093
and concerned about their property,

1010
00:49:58,126 --> 00:50:01,063
but totally amenable to, just
as long as you put it back

1011
00:50:01,096 --> 00:50:03,799
the way it was, we'll be okay with that.

1012
00:50:03,832 --> 00:50:05,601
At the time we were running a paint

1013
00:50:05,634 --> 00:50:09,805
and wallpaper store
in Ellsworth, but
friends were visiting,

1014
00:50:09,838 --> 00:50:12,641
and they approached him on the porch,

1015
00:50:12,674 --> 00:50:16,011
and he sent them to
Ellsworth to talk to us.

1016
00:50:16,044 --> 00:50:19,114
They would've moved us
out of town someplace.

1017
00:50:19,147 --> 00:50:20,549
We moved across the street.

1018
00:50:20,582 --> 00:50:23,585
We were living in here, and we said,

1019
00:50:23,619 --> 00:50:25,354
"No, we'll just move over there

1020
00:50:25,387 --> 00:50:27,222
"and live in the little house."

1021
00:50:27,255 --> 00:50:29,191
She still did her laundry in the ranch,

1022
00:50:29,224 --> 00:50:32,160
'cause she could access
that, so we'd see her,

1023
00:50:32,194 --> 00:50:34,129
and at any point she'd
say, "I'm comin' out.

1024
00:50:34,162 --> 00:50:36,031
"You better stop rolling!"

1025
00:50:36,064 --> 00:50:39,534
And she'd be coming out with
her laundry out back.

1026
00:50:39,568 --> 00:50:43,472
They rebuilt, you know they
rented that place in Ellsworth

1027
00:50:43,505 --> 00:50:47,042
and they rebuilt the kitchen.

1028
00:50:47,075 --> 00:50:49,411
They had every detail, even the nick

1029
00:50:49,444 --> 00:50:51,813
out of a door or something.

1030
00:50:51,847 --> 00:50:55,417
We built all the interiors
up about four feet,

1031
00:50:55,450 --> 00:50:58,387
and the reason for that
is because we had stairs

1032
00:50:58,420 --> 00:51:01,423
that had to look like they
were going downstairs,

1033
00:51:01,456 --> 00:51:04,860
so we built it raised up off of the floor

1034
00:51:04,893 --> 00:51:07,029
to accommodate that.

1035
00:51:07,062 --> 00:51:09,765
When we weren't working on the big house,

1036
00:51:09,798 --> 00:51:13,201
we were in this studio
space, reconstructing

1037
00:51:13,235 --> 00:51:17,539
what was matching, what was
inside the family's home,

1038
00:51:17,572 --> 00:51:20,809
trying to match it to every detail.

1039
00:51:20,842 --> 00:51:23,612
The designers had extremely detailed plans

1040
00:51:23,645 --> 00:51:27,416
of exactly how it should look,
so it looked exactly like it.

1041
00:51:27,449 --> 00:51:29,618
I remember thinking it was so cool

1042
00:51:29,651 --> 00:51:33,488
how Jud's house was fake,
it was actually a set

1043
00:51:33,522 --> 00:51:37,225
built onto another house,
so that it could be

1044
00:51:37,259 --> 00:51:39,795
across the street from the Creed house.

1045
00:51:39,828 --> 00:51:42,798
We couldn't find two houses that I liked

1046
00:51:42,831 --> 00:51:46,268
that were in that proximity, so we built

1047
00:51:46,301 --> 00:51:51,907
a facade in front of this
little modern ranch house

1048
00:51:51,940 --> 00:51:54,409
that was across the street
from the Creed's house.

1049
00:51:54,443 --> 00:51:56,812
We have this little
house that we need to build

1050
00:51:56,845 --> 00:52:00,916
this lovely Victorian
around, so the first thing is

1051
00:52:00,949 --> 00:52:03,885
we laid out the footprint of it,

1052
00:52:03,919 --> 00:52:06,755
and then we brought in a utility truck

1053
00:52:06,788 --> 00:52:10,659
that planted telephone poles
in a row along the front,

1054
00:52:10,692 --> 00:52:13,462
which was gonna be part of the structure

1055
00:52:13,495 --> 00:52:17,299
that would stabilize
everything we built around it.

1056
00:52:17,332 --> 00:52:20,235
Then we also, on top of the small house,

1057
00:52:20,268 --> 00:52:23,538
we built this structure,
they were like big platforms

1058
00:52:23,572 --> 00:52:26,108
that were lifted down onto the roof,

1059
00:52:26,141 --> 00:52:29,745
and that was the framework for
holding the sides together,

1060
00:52:29,778 --> 00:52:31,813
'cause it wasn't even a four-sided house.

1061
00:52:31,847 --> 00:52:35,317
It was really a
couple of facades that
looked like a house.

1062
00:52:35,350 --> 00:52:37,986
Once those telephone poles were in place,

1063
00:52:38,019 --> 00:52:40,622
then we started building
the house, framing it out

1064
00:52:40,655 --> 00:52:43,492
very much like you would a real house,

1065
00:52:43,525 --> 00:52:46,361
except without necessarily the foundation.

1066
00:52:46,394 --> 00:52:48,997
So we would build it up with the studs,

1067
00:52:49,030 --> 00:52:52,734
and get the whole framework
with two by fours,

1068
00:52:52,768 --> 00:52:56,938
like any other house, but one
of the big differences we had

1069
00:52:56,972 --> 00:52:59,541
was taking the sheet rock,

1070
00:52:59,574 --> 00:53:02,411
which normally goes on
the inside of a house,

1071
00:53:02,444 --> 00:53:05,614
and we put it on the
outside of the structure

1072
00:53:05,647 --> 00:53:09,084
so that we started creating
a fire barrier between

1073
00:53:09,117 --> 00:53:13,855
that structure and the
little house that was inside.

1074
00:53:13,889 --> 00:53:16,358
Then once that sheet rock was on,

1075
00:53:16,391 --> 00:53:19,795
then we finished the
house to make it look like

1076
00:53:19,828 --> 00:53:21,663
it was a real house.

1077
00:53:21,696 --> 00:53:25,033
We did real shingles and
trim, and finished it out

1078
00:53:25,066 --> 00:53:30,572
so from the outside it looked quite real.

1079
00:53:30,605 --> 00:53:32,908
If you've read the book Pet Sematary,

1080
00:53:32,941 --> 00:53:36,845
Stephen does describe the
house as having undergone

1081
00:53:36,878 --> 00:53:40,182
a transformation, as if the evil spirits

1082
00:53:40,215 --> 00:53:44,686
from the Pet Sematary have
come through the earth,

1083
00:53:44,719 --> 00:53:47,789
and I really wanted it to feel that way,

1084
00:53:47,823 --> 00:53:50,392
'cause when I couldn't get all those moss

1085
00:53:50,425 --> 00:53:54,296
and all that stuff that
was in the woods in Maine,

1086
00:53:54,329 --> 00:53:56,131
and I realized what it was gonna cost us

1087
00:53:56,164 --> 00:53:59,868
in terms of time and money
to bring in an entire crew

1088
00:53:59,901 --> 00:54:03,705
and walk up this hill, to
shoot a little patch of moss.

1089
00:54:03,738 --> 00:54:05,907
I'm like, "Well, let's
put it in Jud's house."

1090
00:54:05,941 --> 00:54:10,812
The idea was that in this
kinda nightmarish scene,

1091
00:54:10,846 --> 00:54:13,281
everything was supposed to
look like it was sinking

1092
00:54:13,315 --> 00:54:16,551
into the floor and
oozing through the walls.

1093
00:54:16,585 --> 00:54:19,888
There was this beautiful
old Victorian organ

1094
00:54:19,921 --> 00:54:22,224
that was one of the props in it,

1095
00:54:22,257 --> 00:54:26,795
and they had me take a saw and
slice the bottom off of it,

1096
00:54:26,828 --> 00:54:28,830
set it back down on the floor

1097
00:54:28,864 --> 00:54:31,266
so it looked like it was
sinking into the floor,

1098
00:54:31,299 --> 00:54:33,535
which broke my heart because
it was this beautiful antique

1099
00:54:33,568 --> 00:54:35,403
I just sawed right in half.

1100
00:54:35,437 --> 00:54:37,339
That was one of the places
where I was really happy

1101
00:54:37,372 --> 00:54:39,908
with what the designers came up with.

1102
00:54:39,941 --> 00:54:43,211
We took an expandable
foam in between the lath

1103
00:54:43,245 --> 00:54:45,981
of the walls, and sprayed it in there

1104
00:54:46,014 --> 00:54:48,416
and it grows and oozes and drips out

1105
00:54:48,450 --> 00:54:53,889
so it looks like this ooze
is really invading the house.

1106
00:54:53,922 --> 00:54:56,892
They had the flashback
scene of Jud's house

1107
00:54:56,925 --> 00:55:00,428
when it's all pristine and
beautiful and brand new.

1108
00:55:00,462 --> 00:55:03,265
Well, we had already distressed the house

1109
00:55:03,298 --> 00:55:05,600
and it had taken three
weeks to get it there,

1110
00:55:05,634 --> 00:55:09,004
and we were right ready
to shoot and Mary said,

1111
00:55:09,037 --> 00:55:13,174
"Oh no, we forgot to shoot
the house before we did that,"

1112
00:55:13,208 --> 00:55:15,143
because there's the Jud scene,

1113
00:55:15,176 --> 00:55:17,178
we forgot about the young
flashback, and she goes,

1114
00:55:17,212 --> 00:55:19,214
"Well, let's do it tomorrow morning."

1115
00:55:19,247 --> 00:55:22,150
So we had a turnover of 12 hours

1116
00:55:22,183 --> 00:55:24,920
to get the house back to pristine,

1117
00:55:24,953 --> 00:55:26,655
then what ends up in the shot

1118
00:55:26,688 --> 00:55:28,690
is only that corner of the house,

1119
00:55:28,723 --> 00:55:32,360
and we're like, "Oh my God."

1120
00:55:32,394 --> 00:55:34,829
There was a small
trailer, and in the trailer

1121
00:55:34,863 --> 00:55:37,332
was me and the dog, getting made up

1122
00:55:37,365 --> 00:55:38,967
at the same time.

1123
00:55:39,000 --> 00:55:41,903
The dog getting to look like
he had come back from the dead,

1124
00:55:41,937 --> 00:55:44,773
and not looking great, so
every time he went out,

1125
00:55:44,806 --> 00:55:46,641
they kept sending him back because

1126
00:55:46,675 --> 00:55:48,109
he didn't look crappy enough.

1127
00:55:48,143 --> 00:55:49,811
They did set me up with a trailer

1128
00:55:49,844 --> 00:55:52,681
where they gave me a
costume and my breakfast,

1129
00:55:52,714 --> 00:55:55,250
and then they brought
me to another trailer

1130
00:55:55,283 --> 00:55:58,520
for hair and makeup,
then they put me on set.

1131
00:55:58,553 --> 00:56:01,790
Matt Ferrell played young Jud in the film,

1132
00:56:01,823 --> 00:56:03,992
and little did I know then what connection

1133
00:56:04,025 --> 00:56:05,727
I would have with him later.

1134
00:56:05,760 --> 00:56:08,763
He later became a student of
mine at Bangor High School.

1135
00:56:08,797 --> 00:56:12,067
She, before I even met
her, before I knew her,

1136
00:56:12,100 --> 00:56:13,702
knew that I was attending that school

1137
00:56:13,735 --> 00:56:15,370
and remembered me from that set,

1138
00:56:15,403 --> 00:56:18,373
and had no problem telling
the entire theater class

1139
00:56:18,406 --> 00:56:23,712
about my yelling out my own
name instead of my dog's name.

1140
00:56:23,745 --> 00:56:25,480
Mary was very patient with him.

1141
00:56:25,513 --> 00:56:28,450
She'd say, "Now come on
out, out of the door.

1142
00:56:28,483 --> 00:56:31,453
"We're rolling, but don't
let that bother you."

1143
00:56:31,486 --> 00:56:33,955
He would come out, and
he immediately said,

1144
00:56:33,989 --> 00:56:36,124
"Jud, what's the matter boy?"

1145
00:56:36,157 --> 00:56:37,359
Cut.

1146
00:56:37,392 --> 00:56:40,962
We did nine takes of
him calling Spot, Jud.

1147
00:56:40,996 --> 00:56:43,398
When finally the director
actually was a little short

1148
00:56:43,431 --> 00:56:47,702
with me and she said, "No,
your name's Jud, this is Spot!"

1149
00:56:47,736 --> 00:56:49,637
What most people don't
realize is that there were

1150
00:56:49,671 --> 00:56:52,073
actually two dogs that were used for Spot,

1151
00:56:52,107 --> 00:56:53,441
and in the scene you'll notice the shadow

1152
00:56:53,475 --> 00:56:55,010
of the original dog on the sheet

1153
00:56:55,043 --> 00:56:56,911
that was hanging from the clothesline.

1154
00:56:56,945 --> 00:56:58,713
The reason that dog was never
actually seen in the film

1155
00:56:58,747 --> 00:57:00,715
was because of the fact
that he just couldn't

1156
00:57:00,749 --> 00:57:02,350
act convincingly scary.

1157
00:57:02,384 --> 00:57:05,253
They didn't use a live
dog during the scene.

1158
00:57:05,286 --> 00:57:07,489
I was staring at a stuffed animal

1159
00:57:07,522 --> 00:57:11,593
while I was delivering my lines.

1160
00:57:19,534 --> 00:57:22,237
The armory where we built the interior

1161
00:57:22,270 --> 00:57:27,208
of Fred's bedroom, it's now
the Rec Center in Bangor.

1162
00:57:27,242 --> 00:57:31,212
We had rented the armory,
and were sharing it

1163
00:57:31,246 --> 00:57:35,283
with the state National Guard.

1164
00:57:35,316 --> 00:57:40,622
We also had the special effects
that were making the bodies,

1165
00:57:40,655 --> 00:57:43,525
John Blake and David Anderson,

1166
00:57:43,558 --> 00:57:47,128
created these awesome dummies.

1167
00:57:47,162 --> 00:57:49,898
They had two of Fred, one where he was

1168
00:57:49,931 --> 00:57:53,068
just getting his mouth
cut through, and one

1169
00:57:53,101 --> 00:57:58,406
with his jaw all eaten up
by the evil Gage creature.

1170
00:57:58,440 --> 00:58:01,376
Denise's dummy was actually a body cast

1171
00:58:01,409 --> 00:58:04,612
that they did of her, weighed 70 pounds.

1172
00:58:04,646 --> 00:58:10,085
So when Dale's carrying it,
it's heavy, it's really heavy.

1173
00:58:10,118 --> 00:58:13,955
The Miko dummy, Miko's
body actually is bigger

1174
00:58:13,988 --> 00:58:15,957
than the little dummy.

1175
00:58:15,990 --> 00:58:17,792
We used that all over the place.

1176
00:58:17,826 --> 00:58:20,295
It was used flying out of the ceiling.

1177
00:58:20,328 --> 00:58:23,231
When Denise Crosby drops
down, her body drops down,

1178
00:58:23,264 --> 00:58:25,733
then the puppet came
flying down on a cable.

1179
00:58:25,767 --> 00:58:27,402
Here you can see this is the puppet,

1180
00:58:27,435 --> 00:58:30,572
and it comes down, so she's hanging there

1181
00:58:30,605 --> 00:58:32,841
and the puppet comes down and attacks.

1182
00:58:32,874 --> 00:58:35,877
When I'm acting with a puppet,
I call it Star Trek acting,

1183
00:58:35,910 --> 00:58:39,047
and I know the way they're
gonna cut it and edit it.

1184
00:58:39,080 --> 00:58:43,318
As long as I give a true commitment to,

1185
00:58:43,351 --> 00:58:46,354
that this is happening, this is him,

1186
00:58:46,387 --> 00:58:49,390
in the end when all the editing is done,

1187
00:58:49,424 --> 00:58:51,459
it will come out and look real.

1188
00:58:51,493 --> 00:58:54,129
He also wound up getting burnt.

1189
00:58:54,162 --> 00:58:56,431
We had two of 'em, he
got set in the corner

1190
00:58:56,464 --> 00:58:59,768
and the fire came to him
and he got burned up.

1191
00:58:59,801 --> 00:59:02,770
One of the state police
who came in just to poke,

1192
00:59:02,804 --> 00:59:06,141
a state police officer stopped
by to see what was going on,

1193
00:59:06,174 --> 00:59:09,310
poked his head in, and
saw Fred covered up,

1194
00:59:09,344 --> 00:59:10,812
he thought it was a real person,

1195
00:59:10,845 --> 00:59:12,514
with his face half eaten off.

1196
00:59:12,547 --> 00:59:15,150
He went runnin' for the
bathroom, retching like crazy.

1197
00:59:15,183 --> 00:59:16,651
It was very realistic.

1198
00:59:16,684 --> 00:59:18,720
We were shooting through the night,

1199
00:59:18,753 --> 00:59:21,022
and we did two nights of shooting,

1200
00:59:21,055 --> 00:59:23,324
one night on a sound
stage and the other night

1201
00:59:23,358 --> 00:59:27,162
in the house, Bellview,
I think it was called.

1202
00:59:27,195 --> 00:59:29,797
Bellview was chosen because it's the most

1203
00:59:29,831 --> 00:59:32,033
Chicago looking house in Hancock.

1204
00:59:32,066 --> 00:59:34,235
When Bellview was built,
it was very controversial

1205
00:59:34,269 --> 00:59:37,972
because it was an English
style house from England

1206
00:59:38,006 --> 00:59:40,575
all of a sudden on Hancock Point,

1207
00:59:40,608 --> 00:59:43,244
and that Tudor style is not,

1208
00:59:43,278 --> 00:59:46,214
there's no other house
in Hancock like that.

1209
00:59:46,247 --> 00:59:48,783
I suppose that's why, I'm sure
that's why they picked it,

1210
00:59:48,817 --> 00:59:51,052
because the inside as well as the outside

1211
00:59:51,085 --> 00:59:53,321
could be a suburb of Chicago.

1212
00:59:53,354 --> 00:59:55,623
Scene as Denise Crosby's
running through the airport

1213
00:59:55,657 --> 00:59:59,027
and gets to me and shakes
me like a rag doll,

1214
00:59:59,060 --> 01:00:02,964
is what I remember anyway, and
tells me to stop the plane,

1215
01:00:02,997 --> 01:00:05,934
and my brilliant line was, "I can't."

1216
01:00:05,967 --> 01:00:08,469
It was filmed in the Bangor
International Airport,

1217
01:00:08,503 --> 01:00:10,104
and in fact, all the airport scenes

1218
01:00:10,138 --> 01:00:12,006
were filmed in that airport,

1219
01:00:12,040 --> 01:00:14,742
and I fly in and out of
there all the time today.

1220
01:00:14,776 --> 01:00:17,946
I see the very corner where
that scene was filmed.

1221
01:00:17,979 --> 01:00:20,648
I often travel through that same gate.

1222
01:00:20,682 --> 01:00:24,085
One of the locations that
we shot at, on a Saturday,

1223
01:00:24,118 --> 01:00:28,723
was at the Ellsworth City
Hall, the back steps of it,

1224
01:00:28,756 --> 01:00:31,426
and we had to shoot there because

1225
01:00:31,459 --> 01:00:34,829
we weren't allowed to
go on Orono's campus,

1226
01:00:34,862 --> 01:00:38,066
which is where the character, Louis Creed,

1227
01:00:38,099 --> 01:00:39,801
is supposed to be the doctor

1228
01:00:39,834 --> 01:00:42,170
of Cutler Health Center on Orono campus,

1229
01:00:42,203 --> 01:00:44,572
but, we weren't allowed to shoot there so,

1230
01:00:44,606 --> 01:00:47,609
Ellsworth graciously
gave us their City Hall

1231
01:00:47,642 --> 01:00:51,713
and let us change two of
their offices into ER rooms.

1232
01:00:51,746 --> 01:00:53,681
The actual filming locations in movies

1233
01:00:53,715 --> 01:00:55,984
are often far more geographically complex

1234
01:00:56,017 --> 01:00:57,585
than they appear in the film,

1235
01:00:57,619 --> 01:00:59,487
and Pet Sematary's certainly no exception.

1236
01:00:59,520 --> 01:01:01,289
Take for instance the
journey from the Creed house

1237
01:01:01,322 --> 01:01:02,890
to the Micmac burial ground.

1238
01:01:02,924 --> 01:01:04,692
The path behind the house is long gone,

1239
01:01:04,726 --> 01:01:06,728
but if you were to follow
where it was into the woods,

1240
01:01:06,761 --> 01:01:08,129
you wouldn't find the spot

1241
01:01:08,162 --> 01:01:09,897
where the actual Pet Sematary was.

1242
01:01:09,931 --> 01:01:12,667
You'd have to walk one town
over to Ellsworth to see it.

1243
01:01:12,700 --> 01:01:15,136
Beyond the deadfall was a
trail of twisted tree roots

1244
01:01:15,169 --> 01:01:17,538
that Fred and Dale had
climbed, and that in fact

1245
01:01:17,572 --> 01:01:19,974
is an actual hiking trail
in Arcadia National Park,

1246
01:01:20,008 --> 01:01:21,509
almost 20 miles away.

1247
01:01:21,542 --> 01:01:23,411
And of course, one of the
most impressive locations

1248
01:01:23,444 --> 01:01:25,179
in the film was an old granite quarry,

1249
01:01:25,213 --> 01:01:27,649
one of a few that can be
found on Mount Desert Island.

1250
01:01:27,682 --> 01:01:29,851
You'll see, as you did in the film,

1251
01:01:29,884 --> 01:01:31,653
what are called hash marks.

1252
01:01:31,686 --> 01:01:35,857
They're the slab marks of
where the cutting machine

1253
01:01:35,890 --> 01:01:39,460
digs out a slab of
granite, but, amazingly,

1254
01:01:39,494 --> 01:01:43,531
Fred was so spry and able to
actually hoist himself up,

1255
01:01:43,564 --> 01:01:46,701
so when you see Fred
walking through the quarry,

1256
01:01:46,734 --> 01:01:49,604
he's really walking and
jumping up on those stones.

1257
01:01:49,637 --> 01:01:52,273
There's no safety net.

1258
01:01:52,307 --> 01:01:54,142
Welcome to Micmac.

1259
01:01:54,175 --> 01:01:57,045
What do you know
about this location, Shaw?

1260
01:01:57,078 --> 01:01:59,947
Well, somebody's buried up here.

1261
01:01:59,981 --> 01:02:02,951
I don't know who it is,
nobody will tell me.

1262
01:02:02,984 --> 01:02:04,419
I've been asking a long time.

1263
01:02:04,452 --> 01:02:05,453
Let's check the crew list

1264
01:02:05,486 --> 01:02:07,722
and see who's not here.

1265
01:02:12,694 --> 01:02:13,995
Right now we're standing at the site

1266
01:02:14,028 --> 01:02:16,864
of the Micmac Cemetery,
it's actually a very old

1267
01:02:16,898 --> 01:02:22,236
blueberry field in Sedgwick, Maine.

1268
01:02:22,270 --> 01:02:25,540
This was a great and
really interesting shoot.

1269
01:02:25,573 --> 01:02:28,009
It was a few nights of night shooting.

1270
01:02:28,042 --> 01:02:30,945
Actually, probably a
week of night shooting.

1271
01:02:30,978 --> 01:02:32,947
It was great to be out here at night.

1272
01:02:32,980 --> 01:02:36,217
I was, one night, on standby, so basically

1273
01:02:36,250 --> 01:02:39,354
I came out here and sat
around most of the night.

1274
01:02:39,387 --> 01:02:42,690
I remember the trucks being
parked out in this area

1275
01:02:42,724 --> 01:02:46,994
behind where the actual
camera work was all done.

1276
01:02:47,028 --> 01:02:50,698
First of all, just to
get a feeling for what

1277
01:02:50,732 --> 01:02:54,035
the place looks like, you can't
tell unless you're up high,

1278
01:02:54,068 --> 01:02:56,571
so I knew we needed a crane for that,

1279
01:02:56,604 --> 01:03:00,942
to get the high angle looking down.

1280
01:03:00,975 --> 01:03:04,912
Then dollying across the rocks
and figuring out those things

1281
01:03:04,946 --> 01:03:08,950
so it's not boring, and it
keeps the viewers' interest

1282
01:03:08,983 --> 01:03:12,019
to do interesting things visually.

1283
01:03:12,053 --> 01:03:14,756
We were out here before dark, setting up

1284
01:03:14,789 --> 01:03:16,157
and getting ready for things,

1285
01:03:16,190 --> 01:03:20,261
and there was a big
ring of rocks out here.

1286
01:03:20,294 --> 01:03:25,833
That was the Micmac stones,
they were white washed.

1287
01:03:25,867 --> 01:03:28,469
They stood out very well, there
was great pattern in there.

1288
01:03:28,503 --> 01:03:30,038
The greens crew had gotten out there

1289
01:03:30,071 --> 01:03:32,540
and had spent a lotta time
white washing the rocks

1290
01:03:32,573 --> 01:03:34,008
and setting them out.

1291
01:03:34,041 --> 01:03:36,878
In doing research on
the Micmac and finding out

1292
01:03:36,911 --> 01:03:40,648
that they had the tripod animal fetishes

1293
01:03:40,681 --> 01:03:44,619
coming up through, where if
you got the spirit animal

1294
01:03:44,652 --> 01:03:46,988
of the person that's just died

1295
01:03:47,021 --> 01:03:49,590
and burned the remains of that animal,

1296
01:03:49,624 --> 01:03:52,126
it carries their soul to heaven.

1297
01:03:52,160 --> 01:03:55,563
When I first go up to the burial ground,

1298
01:03:55,596 --> 01:03:57,732
I'm not supposed to be affected by it,

1299
01:03:57,765 --> 01:04:01,135
but at night, that movies took
on a whole different feeling,

1300
01:04:01,169 --> 01:04:03,404
and we did a lot of night shooting.

1301
01:04:03,438 --> 01:04:06,941
When it's cold and dark
and everything gets quiet,

1302
01:04:06,974 --> 01:04:09,210
and they say, "Quiet on set,"

1303
01:04:09,243 --> 01:04:10,745
it gets a little eerie.

1304
01:04:10,778 --> 01:04:13,648
The Pet Sematarys mirrored one another,

1305
01:04:13,681 --> 01:04:17,084
which is, I think, a very
effective device in itself,

1306
01:04:17,118 --> 01:04:20,421
to have one cemetery be this place

1307
01:04:20,455 --> 01:04:25,259
where children have
come to bury their pets,

1308
01:04:25,293 --> 01:04:29,997
and that is a place that's lush and green.

1309
01:04:30,031 --> 01:04:32,400
Jud Crandall says, "This is a good place,

1310
01:04:32,433 --> 01:04:33,868
"this is a safe place.

1311
01:04:33,901 --> 01:04:36,170
"It's a place where
children come to grieve."

1312
01:04:36,204 --> 01:04:38,406
How can you call it a good thing?

1313
01:04:38,439 --> 01:04:41,609
A graveyard for pets killed in the road,

1314
01:04:41,642 --> 01:04:45,880
built and maintained by
brokenhearted children.

1315
01:04:45,913 --> 01:04:47,882
I think it's rather extraordinary.

1316
01:04:47,915 --> 01:04:50,117
Extraordinarily morbid.

1317
01:04:50,151 --> 01:04:54,822
Then there is the other
ground that has soured,

1318
01:04:54,856 --> 01:04:57,792
and it mirrors the one
that's underneath it

1319
01:04:57,825 --> 01:05:01,963
in so far as, like the
Pet Sematary itself,

1320
01:05:01,996 --> 01:05:06,067
it revolves around circles and
it revolves around spirals.

1321
01:05:06,100 --> 01:05:09,737
But these circles and
spirals are not about closure

1322
01:05:09,770 --> 01:05:13,608
as they are, I think, in
the lower Pet Sematary.

1323
01:05:13,641 --> 01:05:16,978
They're about opening out, and of course,

1324
01:05:17,011 --> 01:05:20,515
they open out as an invitation to evil,

1325
01:05:20,548 --> 01:05:24,552
to join this place and to
participate in the dark magic

1326
01:05:24,585 --> 01:05:26,454
that's at work there.

1327
01:05:26,487 --> 01:05:31,425
Whereas in the actual Pet
Sematary where the kids come,

1328
01:05:31,459 --> 01:05:35,229
the leash stays there, there's closure.

1329
01:05:35,263 --> 01:05:38,165
The circle closes at that point.

1330
01:05:38,199 --> 01:05:41,002
We had to replicate a piece
of the Micmac burial ground.

1331
01:05:41,035 --> 01:05:44,438
We had to build a six foot
stanchion so they could fit

1332
01:05:44,472 --> 01:05:47,708
the cameraman underneath,
and then we had to carve

1333
01:05:47,742 --> 01:05:50,144
out of styrofoam some big rocks,

1334
01:05:50,177 --> 01:05:53,247
and Miko's little hand
was to push up through

1335
01:05:53,281 --> 01:05:55,883
and then to wave at the camera.

1336
01:05:55,917 --> 01:05:59,987
And he did just that, but
got lots of dirt in his mouth

1337
01:06:00,021 --> 01:06:03,691
when he did it, so he's waving
and choking at the same time.

1338
01:06:03,724 --> 01:06:05,293
I remember being really impressed

1339
01:06:05,326 --> 01:06:07,795
with the actual Pet Sematary set,

1340
01:06:07,828 --> 01:06:09,664
because they did such a good job at making

1341
01:06:09,697 --> 01:06:12,266
all the different graves of
all the different animals

1342
01:06:12,300 --> 01:06:14,168
look like they're from different eras.

1343
01:06:14,201 --> 01:06:16,604
When they showed
me the location, they said,

1344
01:06:16,637 --> 01:06:19,473
"This is where you're going
to build the Pet Sematary."

1345
01:06:19,507 --> 01:06:22,710
The first thing I did, hire
my brother who's a landscaper,

1346
01:06:22,743 --> 01:06:24,812
to actually excavate the land.

1347
01:06:24,845 --> 01:06:28,015
We brought in truckloads of
dirt, dumped it in the center.

1348
01:06:28,049 --> 01:06:32,086
We raked and did a
topographical map, basically,

1349
01:06:32,119 --> 01:06:35,556
of where we were gonna
map out the three circles.

1350
01:06:35,590 --> 01:06:38,492
I brought in the
truckloads of the boulders

1351
01:06:38,526 --> 01:06:41,429
and dumped 'em at two points where then

1352
01:06:41,462 --> 01:06:43,130
I was gonna build the deadfall.

1353
01:06:43,164 --> 01:06:45,066
They were able to make it look like

1354
01:06:45,099 --> 01:06:47,835
something that had just
naturally come about.

1355
01:06:47,868 --> 01:06:49,437
We brought in tons and tons

1356
01:06:49,470 --> 01:06:51,305
of sod from Surry Gardens,

1357
01:06:51,339 --> 01:06:54,909
and then we went to the
dump, and got a whole bunch

1358
01:06:54,942 --> 01:06:59,013
of fencing, we got some
newel posts that were there,

1359
01:06:59,046 --> 01:07:01,849
any kinda junk that we could find.

1360
01:07:01,882 --> 01:07:03,851
We tried to think like kids,

1361
01:07:03,884 --> 01:07:06,520
and how they would build something.

1362
01:07:06,554 --> 01:07:08,055
It was like this little circle,

1363
01:07:08,089 --> 01:07:10,224
and you could walk around it
for like an hour and a half

1364
01:07:10,257 --> 01:07:13,260
looking at all the little fake details.

1365
01:07:13,294 --> 01:07:17,264
What remains here are
the left and right piles

1366
01:07:17,298 --> 01:07:20,434
of granite stone that we had brought in

1367
01:07:20,468 --> 01:07:24,238
to mark the deadfall, because the deadfall

1368
01:07:24,271 --> 01:07:29,343
I ended up using at least six truckloads,

1369
01:07:29,377 --> 01:07:33,014
and that's pulp truckloads of dead wood

1370
01:07:33,047 --> 01:07:35,616
that we had gathered.

1371
01:07:35,650 --> 01:07:39,754
What's interesting is that,
even after 25 plus years,

1372
01:07:39,787 --> 01:07:43,190
one of the stumps, we
had 18 stumps brought in,

1373
01:07:43,224 --> 01:07:45,459
one of the stumps is remaining that was

1374
01:07:45,493 --> 01:07:49,130
one of our major
footholds for Fred Gywnne.

1375
01:07:49,163 --> 01:07:52,166
Mommy, daddy, this one's a goldfish.

1376
01:07:52,199 --> 01:07:54,502
They wasn't all killed by the road,

1377
01:07:54,535 --> 01:07:58,372
especially the ones from
back in my time, as a child.

1378
01:07:58,406 --> 01:08:00,741
The road wasn't even paved then.

1379
01:08:00,775 --> 01:08:03,044
I'm standing currently in the dead center

1380
01:08:03,077 --> 01:08:04,478
of the Pet Sematary.

1381
01:08:04,512 --> 01:08:07,481
Had a circumference of about 120 feet,

1382
01:08:07,515 --> 01:08:10,484
diameter if we were to
really measure it out,

1383
01:08:10,518 --> 01:08:13,220
but there's so much overgrowth right now.

1384
01:08:13,254 --> 01:08:18,759
But right here is where little
Spot was buried, Jud's dog.

1385
01:08:18,793 --> 01:08:22,863
Coming!

1386
01:08:22,897 --> 01:08:25,666
I just farted.

1387
01:08:25,700 --> 01:08:27,702
The gate, the iron gate, was right about

1388
01:08:27,735 --> 01:08:31,505
between those two trees,
so that you swept in,

1389
01:08:31,539 --> 01:08:35,910
were able to see that massive deadfall.

1390
01:08:35,943 --> 01:08:38,579
When you first came in through that gate,

1391
01:08:38,612 --> 01:08:42,383
it funneled all the way
through here to the deadfall.

1392
01:08:42,416 --> 01:08:47,088
These two telephone poles
were put in as a back support

1393
01:08:47,121 --> 01:08:52,660
for, there was a very huge
backdrop here of plywood

1394
01:08:52,693 --> 01:08:56,297
that they built in holes so
they could light through.

1395
01:08:56,330 --> 01:08:59,967
That's where you get that
really fantastic blue light

1396
01:09:00,000 --> 01:09:04,004
coming through the Pet Sematary.

1397
01:09:04,038 --> 01:09:06,207
One of the more powerful
yet subtle elements

1398
01:09:06,240 --> 01:09:07,875
of the film is the music.

1399
01:09:07,908 --> 01:09:10,344
I think Elliot Goldenthal
did a brilliant job

1400
01:09:10,378 --> 01:09:13,547
of utilizing children's choir to accent

1401
01:09:13,581 --> 01:09:16,083
some of the horror that
was happening in the film.

1402
01:09:16,117 --> 01:09:19,487
This was Elliot's first big film score,

1403
01:09:19,520 --> 01:09:23,724
and I felt like he had that
sense of the fairy tale

1404
01:09:23,758 --> 01:09:25,893
that I was going for.

1405
01:09:25,926 --> 01:09:28,662
The focus of a child in the movie

1406
01:09:28,696 --> 01:09:33,234
is the central focus of the whole thing,

1407
01:09:33,267 --> 01:09:39,240
and I think she wanted
to bring a sense of...

1408
01:09:39,273 --> 01:09:42,777
innocence and horror colliding together.

1409
01:09:42,810 --> 01:09:44,211
He's a mad genius.

1410
01:09:44,245 --> 01:09:47,314
He's like Mozart or, you know, lists.

1411
01:09:47,348 --> 01:09:51,852
There was a toy piano, there
was various homemade samples

1412
01:09:51,886 --> 01:09:55,389
that we made, scraping
different instruments

1413
01:09:55,422 --> 01:09:59,293
against the piano strings
and et cetera, et cetera,

1414
01:09:59,326 --> 01:10:01,829
but the main, main sound effect

1415
01:10:01,862 --> 01:10:04,365
was how I orchestrated the strings.

1416
01:10:04,398 --> 01:10:06,934
There was so many similarities to Psycho,

1417
01:10:06,967 --> 01:10:10,204
so I made the decision to mainly score it

1418
01:10:10,237 --> 01:10:14,441
for string orchestra, like Psycho was

1419
01:10:14,475 --> 01:10:17,878
without borrowing any particular melodies

1420
01:10:17,912 --> 01:10:23,818
or being influenced by
Bernard Herrmann's...

1421
01:10:23,851 --> 01:10:26,620
melodic approach or harmonic approach.

1422
01:10:26,654 --> 01:10:30,157
I get a phone call at like, I don't know,

1423
01:10:30,191 --> 01:10:32,927
it's like three or four in the morning.

1424
01:10:32,960 --> 01:10:34,695
He was working on this score, and he's,

1425
01:10:34,728 --> 01:10:37,731
"Mary, there's the most
amazing grand piano here,

1426
01:10:37,765 --> 01:10:41,969
"and I'm in this palazzo,
and you've gotta hear it."

1427
01:10:42,002 --> 01:10:46,540
He sets the phone down, and
starts playing the piano,

1428
01:10:46,574 --> 01:10:49,310
and he just played it for about an hour.

1429
01:10:49,343 --> 01:10:51,045
I think I went back to sleep.

1430
01:10:51,078 --> 01:10:53,147
I woke back up, it was really fabulous,

1431
01:10:53,180 --> 01:10:56,984
and I went, "Elliot,
come back to the phone!

1432
01:10:57,017 --> 01:10:58,219
"It's great!"

1433
01:10:58,252 --> 01:10:59,887
I love the fact that the Ramones

1434
01:10:59,920 --> 01:11:01,722
were able to be part of the film.

1435
01:11:01,755 --> 01:11:03,624
Couldn't pick a better
band to be part of it.

1436
01:11:03,657 --> 01:11:05,159
I've been a fan my entire life.

1437
01:11:05,192 --> 01:11:08,863
Stephen King's a big fan,
and he wanted Ramone's songs

1438
01:11:08,896 --> 01:11:11,065
in the movie, so he chose Sheena

1439
01:11:11,098 --> 01:11:14,301
and then he gave the book
to Dee Dee Ramone to read

1440
01:11:14,335 --> 01:11:16,604
and he wrote it in 40 minutes,

1441
01:11:16,637 --> 01:11:20,107
Pet Sematary, the main
song of the soundtrack

1442
01:11:20,140 --> 01:11:23,611
in the movie itself, so, it's very simple.

1443
01:11:23,644 --> 01:11:26,647
We met Stephen in his house in Maine,

1444
01:11:26,680 --> 01:11:29,416
had dinner with him at his house,

1445
01:11:29,450 --> 01:11:32,820
and one thing led to
another and that was it.

1446
01:11:43,864 --> 01:11:46,200
The sky was interesting.

1447
01:11:46,233 --> 01:11:50,871
It was so blue and crystal when it was,

1448
01:11:50,905 --> 01:11:54,041
if you remember the kite
flying scene and the picnic,

1449
01:11:54,074 --> 01:11:57,111
and right before Gage runs the road,

1450
01:11:57,144 --> 01:12:00,848
before the terrible
accident with the truck.

1451
01:12:00,881 --> 01:12:03,417
That was the most perfect
day I'd ever seen.

1452
01:12:03,450 --> 01:12:07,221
I remember chasing the kite handle

1453
01:12:07,254 --> 01:12:09,723
through the field, very vaguely.

1454
01:12:09,757 --> 01:12:12,693
I just remember because it
wasn't attached to a kite.

1455
01:12:12,726 --> 01:12:15,095
They were just running it,
trying to get me to chase it.

1456
01:12:15,129 --> 01:12:17,331
The kite had to be attached to a balloon

1457
01:12:17,364 --> 01:12:18,966
because there wasn't any wind

1458
01:12:18,999 --> 01:12:21,001
on the one day that they
were trying to film that.

1459
01:12:21,035 --> 01:12:24,271
Well the scene with the
truck is interesting because,

1460
01:12:24,305 --> 01:12:27,608
from my perspective, I
didn't really see much of it.

1461
01:12:27,641 --> 01:12:30,878
I'm not sure exactly
how the effect was done.

1462
01:12:30,911 --> 01:12:34,048
I know there was a giant
mirror they had in the road.

1463
01:12:34,081 --> 01:12:37,584
I really wanted the audience to feel like

1464
01:12:37,618 --> 01:12:39,486
he was in that road.

1465
01:12:39,520 --> 01:12:41,755
I wanted to tear people up with it,

1466
01:12:41,789 --> 01:12:44,491
but at the same time, I didn't wanna put,

1467
01:12:44,525 --> 01:12:47,728
ever put Miko in any kind of danger.

1468
01:12:47,761 --> 01:12:51,632
There was no way to have a
stunt person in the road,

1469
01:12:51,665 --> 01:12:56,303
so, the one shot where the
truck was actually moving

1470
01:12:56,337 --> 01:12:59,707
towards him, and he was
actually in the shot,

1471
01:12:59,740 --> 01:13:01,108
we used a mirror.

1472
01:13:01,141 --> 01:13:02,977
They shot into the
mirror, and they placed him

1473
01:13:03,010 --> 01:13:05,346
in front of the mirror, facing,

1474
01:13:05,379 --> 01:13:07,748
you know, the truck is coming this way,

1475
01:13:07,781 --> 01:13:10,784
and then you just place
him wherever you want him.

1476
01:13:10,818 --> 01:13:13,420
It can be far away, you
can zoom in to the mirror

1477
01:13:13,454 --> 01:13:15,222
and bring the truck a lot closer.

1478
01:13:15,255 --> 01:13:18,192
The industrial area where
you see me coming out of

1479
01:13:18,225 --> 01:13:20,961
with the big gas tanks, the tank farm,

1480
01:13:20,995 --> 01:13:25,599
that was down in Hampden,
Maine, at Cold Brook Energy.

1481
01:13:25,632 --> 01:13:29,103
Coming out of the paper
mill in Bucksport, Maine,

1482
01:13:29,136 --> 01:13:32,373
so we kinda traveled
around Penobscot county

1483
01:13:32,406 --> 01:13:34,241
quite a bit, and Hancock county.

1484
01:13:34,274 --> 01:13:36,877
I had to do a lotta
retakes because there was

1485
01:13:36,910 --> 01:13:40,914
a very small tractor,
cab, and they actually had

1486
01:13:40,948 --> 01:13:43,517
three people sittin' beside me.

1487
01:13:43,550 --> 01:13:46,253
There was a person on
the back of the truck.

1488
01:13:46,286 --> 01:13:48,989
That's one of the most frightening scenes,

1489
01:13:49,023 --> 01:13:52,159
is the truck and the
character that the truck

1490
01:13:52,192 --> 01:13:54,228
actually plays in that movie.

1491
01:13:54,261 --> 01:13:55,829
I thought it was just brilliant.

1492
01:13:55,863 --> 01:13:56,930
My wife had mentioned that it looked like

1493
01:13:56,964 --> 01:13:58,799
I was driving 90 miles an hour.

1494
01:13:58,832 --> 01:14:01,502
I'm assuming that was trick photography.

1495
01:14:01,535 --> 01:14:04,004
I wasn't going more than 10 miles an hour.

1496
01:14:04,038 --> 01:14:06,173
It couldn't turn the truck around,

1497
01:14:06,206 --> 01:14:08,075
so they had to go way back up to Hancock

1498
01:14:08,108 --> 01:14:10,978
up to Route One
practically, and come again.

1499
01:14:11,011 --> 01:14:12,913
And everyone wanted to know
what the hell's going on

1500
01:14:12,946 --> 01:14:15,416
with that oil truck,
because it kept going by

1501
01:14:15,449 --> 01:14:18,919
people's houses,
like they'd lost their way.

1502
01:14:18,952 --> 01:14:20,554
They actually put an ear plug in me

1503
01:14:20,587 --> 01:14:22,656
so I could sing along to the music,

1504
01:14:22,690 --> 01:14:24,391
so that was a big help.

1505
01:14:24,425 --> 01:14:27,895
I just couldn't sing that song
without hearing the music.

1506
01:14:27,928 --> 01:14:32,166
Watching it now, it has a strong impact...

1507
01:14:32,199 --> 01:14:35,402
for the movie and of course it's sad,

1508
01:14:35,436 --> 01:14:38,705
but I think it's different,
and I've had a few people,

1509
01:14:38,739 --> 01:14:42,276
more than a few people at
cons come up and tell me,

1510
01:14:42,309 --> 01:14:45,345
the same thing, that
they were okay with it

1511
01:14:45,379 --> 01:14:48,215
watching it before, but
then after they had kids,

1512
01:14:48,248 --> 01:14:49,750
watching that scene makes that

1513
01:14:49,783 --> 01:14:51,518
the hardest scene in the movie.

1514
01:14:51,552 --> 01:14:55,422
It's innocence lost in it's purest sense,

1515
01:14:55,456 --> 01:14:58,258
and you see this precious little boy,

1516
01:14:58,292 --> 01:15:03,664
so it wasn't hard to find
the emotion for that.

1517
01:15:03,697 --> 01:15:08,635
It would be something you
almost couldn't recover from.

1518
01:15:08,669 --> 01:15:10,871
The thought of losing one of my children,

1519
01:15:10,904 --> 01:15:13,540
I have three beautiful children...

1520
01:15:19,480 --> 01:15:22,950
That's just the un, sorry,

1521
01:15:22,983 --> 01:15:26,854
that's the unthinkable.

1522
01:15:26,887 --> 01:15:29,289
They needed five baby coffins,

1523
01:15:29,323 --> 01:15:33,260
and we picked 'em up, we went
to the Saint Joseph Church,

1524
01:15:33,293 --> 01:15:38,165
and that's where the funeral
for Gage was gonna be.

1525
01:15:38,198 --> 01:15:41,568
We went in, and we dressed the set.

1526
01:15:41,602 --> 01:15:46,907
They shot the scene, we all
came back to undress the scene.

1527
01:15:46,940 --> 01:15:49,209
Max, who was the lead man, he said,

1528
01:15:49,243 --> 01:15:51,178
"Okay, everybody grab a coffin, let's go

1529
01:15:51,211 --> 01:15:52,412
"load 'em into the truck."

1530
01:15:52,446 --> 01:15:55,983
So I grab a coffin, and
Max grabbed a coffin,

1531
01:15:56,016 --> 01:15:59,787
Well, when he grabbed it, he
kind of lost his grip on it,

1532
01:15:59,820 --> 01:16:02,322
and when he did, the lid flipped up,

1533
01:16:02,356 --> 01:16:05,392
and there was a little body in the coffin.

1534
01:16:05,425 --> 01:16:07,828
I dropped my coffin and went to run,

1535
01:16:07,861 --> 01:16:11,431
and there was a pole right here, and bang.

1536
01:16:11,465 --> 01:16:14,301
I smacked my face right into the pole.

1537
01:16:14,334 --> 01:16:16,270
I was terrified!

1538
01:16:16,303 --> 01:16:19,173
The most difficult day of shooting for me,

1539
01:16:19,206 --> 01:16:24,344
absolutely, was the
funeral of my child, Gage.

1540
01:16:24,378 --> 01:16:28,315
I knew it was in the script,
I knew it was coming.

1541
01:16:28,348 --> 01:16:30,651
I was not looking forward to it.

1542
01:16:30,684 --> 01:16:35,122
I knew that it was going to be
exceedingly, physically hard,

1543
01:16:35,155 --> 01:16:39,693
because you have to create a state

1544
01:16:39,726 --> 01:16:43,764
that you need to sort of remain in,

1545
01:16:43,797 --> 01:16:45,699
for the rest of the day.

1546
01:16:45,732 --> 01:16:47,734
You have to bring up all these emotions,

1547
01:16:47,768 --> 01:16:49,970
and at the time I had no children,

1548
01:16:50,003 --> 01:16:53,574
so I had to associate his death

1549
01:16:53,607 --> 01:16:55,542
with someone that I loved,

1550
01:16:55,576 --> 01:16:59,513
someone that was close to me.

1551
01:16:59,546 --> 01:17:03,417
It was very, very difficult
because it went on,

1552
01:17:03,450 --> 01:17:08,789
and on, and on, from me rushing
to the coffin and all that.

1553
01:17:08,822 --> 01:17:11,458
It was grueling, it was a grueling day,

1554
01:17:11,491 --> 01:17:12,960
it was very emotional.

1555
01:17:12,993 --> 01:17:15,429
I just wanted it to be big and ugly.

1556
01:17:15,462 --> 01:17:19,600
The idea that people would
get into a fist fight

1557
01:17:19,633 --> 01:17:23,604
at the burial of a baby like that,

1558
01:17:23,637 --> 01:17:25,806
and that they would knock the coffin over

1559
01:17:25,839 --> 01:17:29,243
and the body would, you know,
you would glimpse the body.

1560
01:17:29,276 --> 01:17:32,479
There was something about that
that was so powerful to me

1561
01:17:32,512 --> 01:17:36,450
when I read the scene and when
I thought about the scene.

1562
01:17:36,483 --> 01:17:39,786
I just knew that we
had to have that moment

1563
01:17:39,820 --> 01:17:43,457
where the little hand
pops outta the coffin,

1564
01:17:43,490 --> 01:17:46,727
because it's like he's...

1565
01:17:46,760 --> 01:17:48,395
It's foreshadowing the fact

1566
01:17:48,428 --> 01:17:50,497
that he's gonna come back from the dead.

1567
01:17:50,530 --> 01:17:53,300
The coffin opens up, and
he rises from the dead,

1568
01:17:53,333 --> 01:17:55,135
briefly, at his funeral.

1569
01:17:55,168 --> 01:17:58,272
I have a major memory of that scene.

1570
01:17:58,305 --> 01:18:02,476
My grandchild was in a coffin,
and because I was so angry

1571
01:18:02,509 --> 01:18:07,781
with his father and went to confront him,

1572
01:18:07,814 --> 01:18:11,251
I lost my sense,

1573
01:18:11,285 --> 01:18:13,487
and ended up knocking over

1574
01:18:13,520 --> 01:18:19,226
the coffin with my grandchild in it,

1575
01:18:19,259 --> 01:18:23,463
and I just became so full of grief,

1576
01:18:23,497 --> 01:18:25,732
and I started to cry.

1577
01:18:25,766 --> 01:18:28,268
I don't know what's still on the screen,

1578
01:18:28,302 --> 01:18:31,672
whether we did it again
and I changed my attitude,

1579
01:18:31,705 --> 01:18:32,906
I don't remember.

1580
01:18:32,940 --> 01:18:35,075
I haven't seen it in such a long time.

1581
01:18:35,108 --> 01:18:38,545
But I was so moved by
the event, that I cried.

1582
01:18:38,578 --> 01:18:41,815
There's not a lot of action in grief.

1583
01:18:41,848 --> 01:18:45,018
I mean, grief is a very solitary thing,

1584
01:18:45,052 --> 01:18:48,722
and it's a bleak landscape.

1585
01:18:48,755 --> 01:18:52,426
I just love the fact that
Stephen wrote this scene

1586
01:18:52,459 --> 01:18:55,562
at the funeral, where Louis has a fight

1587
01:18:55,595 --> 01:18:58,932
with the father in law.

1588
01:18:58,966 --> 01:19:01,635
I know a lot of people thought
that scene was in poor taste.

1589
01:19:01,668 --> 01:19:04,204
I had to re-cut that
scene over and over again

1590
01:19:04,237 --> 01:19:07,841
before everyone was happy with it.

1591
01:19:07,874 --> 01:19:10,344
I just knew that it was really important,

1592
01:19:10,377 --> 01:19:12,079
and it needed to stay in the movie.

1593
01:19:12,112 --> 01:19:14,014
It's part of the reason that people

1594
01:19:14,047 --> 01:19:16,883
were so affected by the film.

1595
01:19:16,917 --> 01:19:20,721
The loss of the child, and
just wanting to bring back

1596
01:19:20,754 --> 01:19:23,790
that child, no matter what.

1597
01:19:23,824 --> 01:19:26,426
Looking at photos isn't enough.

1598
01:19:26,460 --> 01:19:28,028
There's gotta be something else,

1599
01:19:28,061 --> 01:19:30,263
because you just wanna hang on.

1600
01:19:30,297 --> 01:19:32,532
There was that scene with Fred and I,

1601
01:19:32,566 --> 01:19:35,702
and him talking to me around the table,

1602
01:19:35,736 --> 01:19:39,006
and he says, "I'm tellin' ya,
I know what you're thinking,

1603
01:19:39,039 --> 01:19:43,210
"don't do it, don't do
it," but my mind is set.

1604
01:19:51,418 --> 01:19:54,588
Right now we're at Mount
Hope Cemetery in Bangor, Maine,

1605
01:19:54,621 --> 01:19:56,690
where they filmed certain scenes

1606
01:19:56,723 --> 01:19:58,725
for Stephen King's Pet Sematary.

1607
01:19:58,759 --> 01:20:01,294
One of them was, Missy
Dandridge's funeral,

1608
01:20:01,328 --> 01:20:03,363
which was down there, and that's also

1609
01:20:03,397 --> 01:20:05,999
where Stephen King
officiated at her funeral.

1610
01:20:06,033 --> 01:20:09,569
You can even see this
little knoll in the stairway

1611
01:20:09,603 --> 01:20:11,238
that goes up from it.

1612
01:20:11,271 --> 01:20:13,073
I was running a store
in downtown Waterville,

1613
01:20:13,106 --> 01:20:15,575
which is about an hour south of here,

1614
01:20:15,609 --> 01:20:17,110
and a customer came in one day and said,

1615
01:20:17,144 --> 01:20:18,578
"Rod, did you know that they're filming

1616
01:20:18,612 --> 01:20:20,247
"a Stephen King movie here in Maine?"

1617
01:20:20,280 --> 01:20:21,715
And I said, "No, what movie?"

1618
01:20:21,748 --> 01:20:23,550
He said, "Pet Sematary, we just came back

1619
01:20:23,583 --> 01:20:25,352
"from watching some of the filming."

1620
01:20:25,385 --> 01:20:28,722
So instantly, the word
Fangoria popped into my head.

1621
01:20:28,755 --> 01:20:31,658
I had written for them twice,
but nothing really big,

1622
01:20:31,691 --> 01:20:34,428
and I thought, "Wow, this is
my chance for the big time.

1623
01:20:34,461 --> 01:20:36,430
"I can actually get a set visit."

1624
01:20:36,463 --> 01:20:37,664
And that was it.

1625
01:20:37,697 --> 01:20:40,567
I just came here and walked up here.

1626
01:20:40,600 --> 01:20:42,669
They were filming so I was very quiet.

1627
01:20:42,702 --> 01:20:46,440
There were about 150 people
on the side of this knoll,

1628
01:20:46,473 --> 01:20:49,509
watching this man that was
going through his motions of,

1629
01:20:49,543 --> 01:20:51,178
and I could hardly tell what was going on,

1630
01:20:51,211 --> 01:20:53,380
but it was Dale Midkiff, and he was giving

1631
01:20:53,413 --> 01:20:56,683
a soliloquy about his dead
son and how it was so unfair

1632
01:20:56,716 --> 01:20:58,618
that he had died so young.

1633
01:20:58,652 --> 01:21:01,321
All of a sudden ambling over from the left

1634
01:21:01,354 --> 01:21:06,259
was Brad Greenquist, looking
exactly as he did in the movie.

1635
01:21:06,293 --> 01:21:09,629
Fangoria was the only, as far as I know,

1636
01:21:09,663 --> 01:21:11,998
the only magazine to
have any correspondent

1637
01:21:12,032 --> 01:21:13,467
on the actual set.

1638
01:21:13,500 --> 01:21:15,335
At the time, there were
a lotta genre magazines,

1639
01:21:15,368 --> 01:21:17,771
like Cinefantastic, and Film Facts,

1640
01:21:17,804 --> 01:21:20,040
and other assorted magazines but,

1641
01:21:20,073 --> 01:21:23,944
I'm Maine, I'm local, so it
didn't cost much to send me up.

1642
01:21:23,977 --> 01:21:26,713
I'm an hour away, and
I was eager to do it.

1643
01:21:26,746 --> 01:21:30,984
There was this one period,
it was like 21 days straight,

1644
01:21:31,017 --> 01:21:34,988
and I swear, if we had gotten
three hours in that 21 days

1645
01:21:35,021 --> 01:21:37,224
of sleep, we were lucky.

1646
01:21:37,257 --> 01:21:39,092
So we went out to see if we could catch

1647
01:21:39,125 --> 01:21:40,927
a couple hours of sleep.

1648
01:21:40,961 --> 01:21:43,663
We laid down, as no sooner
had we gotten to sleep

1649
01:21:43,697 --> 01:21:46,500
when we heard this loud booming voice,

1650
01:21:46,533 --> 01:21:49,302
and it was, I don't
remember the exact words,

1651
01:21:49,336 --> 01:21:53,740
but it was like, "Praise be father,"

1652
01:21:53,773 --> 01:21:56,710
and opened up the door
and there was Stephen King

1653
01:21:56,743 --> 01:22:00,347
practicing for his graveyard scene.

1654
01:22:00,380 --> 01:22:04,584
There really was no
better role for him to play

1655
01:22:04,618 --> 01:22:06,686
but to be the minister.

1656
01:22:06,720 --> 01:22:09,456
I think it's just brilliant,
and I think it's fun,

1657
01:22:09,489 --> 01:22:10,824
and I think it's entertaining

1658
01:22:10,857 --> 01:22:13,793
for all the actors on the set.

1659
01:22:13,827 --> 01:22:17,230
My first scene that I had to do was

1660
01:22:17,264 --> 01:22:22,202
to scare this old lady
that's hanging up her clothes

1661
01:22:22,235 --> 01:22:26,072
on an old fashioned clothesline.

1662
01:22:26,106 --> 01:22:29,776
That was kind of like
a quick and dirty thing,

1663
01:22:29,809 --> 01:22:34,481
where they wanted him to do something.

1664
01:22:34,514 --> 01:22:36,750
He was like a zombie, and they wanted him

1665
01:22:36,783 --> 01:22:38,919
to do something dramatic that would show

1666
01:22:38,952 --> 01:22:41,288
that he was just out of his mind.

1667
01:22:41,321 --> 01:22:43,423
Mary described what she wanted out of me,

1668
01:22:43,456 --> 01:22:46,693
and the whole bit, to come
in and raise my hands up

1669
01:22:46,726 --> 01:22:49,496
and do this crazy ghoulish laugh.

1670
01:22:49,529 --> 01:22:53,867
The next scene was working with
Chuck Courtney in the house.

1671
01:22:53,900 --> 01:22:56,403
That's where basically I tried to talk him

1672
01:22:56,436 --> 01:22:58,438
into being dead with me,

1673
01:22:58,471 --> 01:23:02,409
and the town is there to
basically burn down the house

1674
01:23:02,442 --> 01:23:05,212
because I'm an eyesore to the community.

1675
01:23:05,245 --> 01:23:08,181
Burning down the Baterman
house was really fun,

1676
01:23:08,214 --> 01:23:11,051
'cause we just, we burned
the whole house down,

1677
01:23:11,084 --> 01:23:12,686
we burned it to the ground.

1678
01:23:12,719 --> 01:23:14,120
I've worked with Chuck in the past,

1679
01:23:14,154 --> 01:23:16,523
and I knew he was a little bit nervous so,

1680
01:23:16,556 --> 01:23:20,160
I kept him calm and I got
him in the fire clothes

1681
01:23:20,193 --> 01:23:22,462
and set him up, and started with burning

1682
01:23:22,495 --> 01:23:24,097
on the legs and the couch area

1683
01:23:24,130 --> 01:23:26,266
until we got around the kitchen,

1684
01:23:26,299 --> 01:23:28,201
and burned him up pretty good.

1685
01:23:28,234 --> 01:23:30,437
The special effects department pumped in

1686
01:23:30,470 --> 01:23:32,872
eight canisters of propane gas,

1687
01:23:32,906 --> 01:23:36,476
and then had some fans to
pump it up to the ceiling.

1688
01:23:36,509 --> 01:23:40,614
The wind shifted just at the
moment that the gas caught,

1689
01:23:40,647 --> 01:23:43,750
and that all lifted up
and was brought over

1690
01:23:43,783 --> 01:23:46,419
onto where all the spectators
were, all the debris,

1691
01:23:46,453 --> 01:23:49,656
so it was a little harrowing of a shoot.

1692
01:23:49,689 --> 01:23:52,826
My favorite part of the film is at the end

1693
01:23:52,859 --> 01:23:56,796
when Rachel Creed comes
back, and Gage comes back

1694
01:23:56,830 --> 01:24:00,900
in the little blue suit
that mimics the painting

1695
01:24:00,934 --> 01:24:04,971
that was on the wall in
Rachel's family house,

1696
01:24:05,005 --> 01:24:10,110
when Gage kills the gigantic Fred Gwynne.

1697
01:24:10,143 --> 01:24:14,180
Gage is under the bed, and he lashes out

1698
01:24:14,214 --> 01:24:17,517
with a scalpel and cuts Fred's leg,

1699
01:24:17,550 --> 01:24:20,820
that was the scene in the script.

1700
01:24:20,854 --> 01:24:23,289
I thought, "Well, that
seems kind of weird.

1701
01:24:23,323 --> 01:24:25,191
"He lashes out, cuts him in the leg,

1702
01:24:25,225 --> 01:24:28,028
"and Fred is vulnerable at that point?"

1703
01:24:28,061 --> 01:24:30,730
Didn't seem practical, so I said,

1704
01:24:30,764 --> 01:24:35,235
"What if Fred is bending down,
and his foot is at an angle

1705
01:24:35,268 --> 01:24:38,638
"where the Achilles tendon is stretched,

1706
01:24:38,672 --> 01:24:42,776
"and then when Gage reaches
out, cuts the Achilles tendon,

1707
01:24:42,809 --> 01:24:47,914
"Fred is down for the count,
and Gage can attack him."

1708
01:24:47,947 --> 01:24:49,282
They loved the idea.

1709
01:24:49,315 --> 01:24:51,851
I had Fred there, and that's when I took

1710
01:24:51,885 --> 01:24:54,154
a cast of his foot in that position,

1711
01:24:54,187 --> 01:24:55,722
and that was Fred's foot, cast.

1712
01:24:55,755 --> 01:24:57,857
It was designed so that
when you took a lever

1713
01:24:57,891 --> 01:25:00,393
and pulled it down like
that, the gash would open up.

1714
01:25:00,427 --> 01:25:01,895
Normally it was closed like that,

1715
01:25:01,928 --> 01:25:04,064
then you just go like
that, and it would open up.

1716
01:25:04,097 --> 01:25:07,200
I thought it was really
scary is when Gage was,

1717
01:25:07,233 --> 01:25:09,436
- I guess, eating...
- His neck.

1718
01:25:09,469 --> 01:25:10,870
- Jud's...
- Jud's neck.

1719
01:25:10,904 --> 01:25:12,872
We had this appliance on Fred's neck.

1720
01:25:12,906 --> 01:25:16,042
It was an appliance that
kind of looked normal,

1721
01:25:16,076 --> 01:25:18,478
and then you bite it and rip it off,

1722
01:25:18,511 --> 01:25:20,447
and we're trying to tell Miko,

1723
01:25:20,480 --> 01:25:22,515
"It's all a game, it's not real.

1724
01:25:22,549 --> 01:25:24,718
"You're gonna bite Fred,
it's just an appliance,

1725
01:25:24,751 --> 01:25:26,786
"see, it's an appliance, it's rubber."

1726
01:25:26,820 --> 01:25:30,690
So they roll the cameras,
he goes in and he lunges

1727
01:25:30,724 --> 01:25:34,861
and he grabs the rubber and he
bites it and he pulls it off.

1728
01:25:34,894 --> 01:25:38,031
It was a beautiful
scene, and then Fred went

1729
01:25:38,064 --> 01:25:41,101
into ballistics, like "Ahh!, you know,

1730
01:25:41,134 --> 01:25:43,203
Fred's going, "Ahhhghh!"

1731
01:25:43,236 --> 01:25:46,306
Giving death chortles
and everything like that,

1732
01:25:46,339 --> 01:25:49,375
and Miko freaked out, I mean
he literally freaked out.

1733
01:25:49,409 --> 01:25:52,712
He thought he had ripped Fred's neck off.

1734
01:25:52,746 --> 01:25:54,948
The crew, everybody just froze,

1735
01:25:54,981 --> 01:25:56,750
and the parents rushed to me.

1736
01:25:56,783 --> 01:25:59,819
Everybody was feeling really
bad that they did this

1737
01:25:59,853 --> 01:26:02,422
to the kid, we traumatized him.

1738
01:26:07,827 --> 01:26:10,730
It certainly was the
highlight of the movie,

1739
01:26:10,764 --> 01:26:12,465
having that fire.

1740
01:26:12,499 --> 01:26:16,736
There was a space between
the facade of Jud's house

1741
01:26:16,770 --> 01:26:20,306
and the house behind
it, and we designed it

1742
01:26:20,340 --> 01:26:23,143
with the idea that we were
gonna burn the facade.

1743
01:26:23,176 --> 01:26:24,911
I came for the house burning.

1744
01:26:24,944 --> 01:26:28,681
I was not working that
day, but I came because

1745
01:26:28,715 --> 01:26:32,619
Mary and everybody was
talking about it on the set,

1746
01:26:32,652 --> 01:26:35,955
that we may burn the
entire state of Maine down.

1747
01:26:35,989 --> 01:26:38,291
They had all these tanks of gas behind it,

1748
01:26:38,324 --> 01:26:39,626
all different colors.

1749
01:26:39,659 --> 01:26:43,797
They assured me that
nothing would go wrong.

1750
01:26:43,830 --> 01:26:47,834
We were trying to be as
careful as we possibly could.

1751
01:26:47,867 --> 01:26:49,235
Safety was an issue.

1752
01:26:49,269 --> 01:26:51,704
It's tough to plan for something that

1753
01:26:51,738 --> 01:26:54,407
you really don't do on a regular basis.

1754
01:26:54,440 --> 01:26:56,976
Production designers
and the effects people

1755
01:26:57,010 --> 01:26:58,645
collaborated on it, and they said,

1756
01:26:58,678 --> 01:27:01,347
"Don't worry, we're not gonna
burn the other house down,"

1757
01:27:01,381 --> 01:27:03,583
and that's not my area of expertise.

1758
01:27:03,616 --> 01:27:06,853
It never even really
got close to the house,

1759
01:27:06,886 --> 01:27:08,521
but it did, it burned.

1760
01:27:08,555 --> 01:27:11,591
I do remember a lot of
people there, from the town.

1761
01:27:11,624 --> 01:27:13,293
There were a lot of spectators.

1762
01:27:13,326 --> 01:27:16,496
Standing across the
street, quite a ways away,

1763
01:27:16,529 --> 01:27:19,432
and it felt like the fire
was right in my face.

1764
01:27:19,466 --> 01:27:21,000
It was so intense.

1765
01:27:21,034 --> 01:27:23,903
This thing went up like hell.

1766
01:27:23,937 --> 01:27:25,905
Hell came out from the ground.

1767
01:27:25,939 --> 01:27:27,941
We rehearsed many times
where I'm supposed to walk,

1768
01:27:27,974 --> 01:27:29,876
where I've gotta walk,
where I'm supposed to walk,

1769
01:27:29,909 --> 01:27:34,013
so I'm certainly seen by
the camera and the house.

1770
01:27:34,047 --> 01:27:35,582
It's like, "Be in character,

1771
01:27:35,615 --> 01:27:37,083
"but don't screw up the shot, Dale,

1772
01:27:37,116 --> 01:27:39,419
"because these people are
going to be really angry

1773
01:27:39,452 --> 01:27:40,820
"with you if you do."

1774
01:27:40,854 --> 01:27:43,456
You see him going by the house,

1775
01:27:43,489 --> 01:27:45,992
after he set the house on
fire, and he's go the dummy,

1776
01:27:46,025 --> 01:27:47,594
you see him go like this.

1777
01:27:47,627 --> 01:27:50,697
Dale actually got a second
degree burn on his face

1778
01:27:50,730 --> 01:27:52,165
while he was carrying the dummy,

1779
01:27:52,198 --> 01:27:53,366
because he couldn't put her up

1780
01:27:53,399 --> 01:27:55,368
high enough to cover his face.

1781
01:27:55,401 --> 01:27:59,606
At the end, when everybody
said cut, blah blah blah,

1782
01:27:59,639 --> 01:28:03,409
and everybody was moving
away, I did watch it burn.

1783
01:28:03,443 --> 01:28:04,577
It was a bit odd.

1784
01:28:04,611 --> 01:28:08,414
It felt like an ending to me, in a way.

1785
01:28:08,448 --> 01:28:10,183
In terms of the ending of the film,

1786
01:28:10,216 --> 01:28:12,619
there were three versions
that were kicked around

1787
01:28:12,652 --> 01:28:13,820
as possibilities.

1788
01:28:13,853 --> 01:28:15,521
The first one was that Stephen King wrote

1789
01:28:15,555 --> 01:28:17,624
in his original screenplay, which was

1790
01:28:17,657 --> 01:28:19,792
Rachel Creed comes back to the house,

1791
01:28:19,826 --> 01:28:22,962
finds Louis playing cards on
the floor, the phone rings.

1792
01:28:22,996 --> 01:28:24,264
It's Ellie from Chicago.

1793
01:28:24,297 --> 01:28:26,499
She's calling to see if her father's okay,

1794
01:28:26,533 --> 01:28:28,635
and Rachel picks up the phone.

1795
01:28:28,668 --> 01:28:31,337
Of course, she's undead
and she's looking gross,

1796
01:28:31,371 --> 01:28:35,508
and in a normal voice says,
"Yes, of course, we're fine,

1797
01:28:35,542 --> 01:28:38,711
"daddy's fine, and we're
gonna be a happy family."

1798
01:28:38,745 --> 01:28:42,916
As she's saying that, she turns
to the camera, and smiles.

1799
01:28:42,949 --> 01:28:44,984
The way King wrote it, when she smiled,

1800
01:28:45,018 --> 01:28:47,687
her teeth were all distorted
and gross and rotting.

1801
01:28:47,720 --> 01:28:50,456
There's a freeze frame, and
that's the end of the film.

1802
01:28:50,490 --> 01:28:53,793
The second ending, which was
shot on location in Maine,

1803
01:28:53,826 --> 01:28:56,229
has Rachel Creed coming
home, finding Louis,

1804
01:28:56,262 --> 01:28:59,832
and when she enters the
kitchen she extends her hand,

1805
01:28:59,866 --> 01:29:02,068
her dirty hand onto his shoulder.

1806
01:29:02,101 --> 01:29:05,605
He turns around, and the camera goes black

1807
01:29:05,638 --> 01:29:07,974
and you hear Louis scream.

1808
01:29:08,007 --> 01:29:12,378
It just was felt, in general,
by the studio executives

1809
01:29:12,412 --> 01:29:17,116
that we needed one more hit
at the end of the movie,

1810
01:29:17,150 --> 01:29:21,387
one more little dark,
scary, outrageous moment.

1811
01:29:21,421 --> 01:29:23,289
We needed something graphic

1812
01:29:23,323 --> 01:29:26,059
that would sell the end of the movie,

1813
01:29:26,092 --> 01:29:30,029
that she was decomposed,
that she had been attacked.

1814
01:29:30,063 --> 01:29:32,999
So I'm like, well let's
just bring Denise back

1815
01:29:33,032 --> 01:29:35,435
with a bug crawling out of her ear.

1816
01:29:35,468 --> 01:29:38,071
I get a call, "You've
gotta come in to Paramount.

1817
01:29:38,104 --> 01:29:39,505
"We're gonna re-shoot the ending.

1818
01:29:39,539 --> 01:29:41,641
"We're gonna make it more bloody."

1819
01:29:41,674 --> 01:29:43,743
I think I may have seen sketches

1820
01:29:43,776 --> 01:29:46,179
of what it was going to look like,

1821
01:29:46,212 --> 01:29:50,350
but until I sat there
and had Lance Anderson

1822
01:29:50,383 --> 01:29:55,121
start to begin to build this, this thing,

1823
01:29:55,154 --> 01:29:58,458
I just remember putting on the clothing,

1824
01:29:58,491 --> 01:30:03,162
the shredded stockings,
and bloodied stockings,

1825
01:30:03,196 --> 01:30:06,132
and it began to come together.

1826
01:30:06,165 --> 01:30:09,435
Well this is kinda the
damage that Gage did, to her,

1827
01:30:09,469 --> 01:30:12,939
so that reveal, and the
goo coming out of it.

1828
01:30:12,972 --> 01:30:17,610
There was like a little
wire running through it

1829
01:30:17,644 --> 01:30:23,883
that someone was working, and
leaking goop out of.

1830
01:30:23,916 --> 01:30:30,189
It was disgusting.

1831
01:30:30,223 --> 01:30:31,691
It was the big premiere night

1832
01:30:31,724 --> 01:30:35,294
for the film in New York City,
and I enjoyed the first part

1833
01:30:35,328 --> 01:30:37,130
of the movie, but I
knew all the scary parts

1834
01:30:37,163 --> 01:30:38,898
were coming up in the second half,

1835
01:30:38,931 --> 01:30:42,969
and so I just politely excused
myself to the ladies room,

1836
01:30:43,002 --> 01:30:44,904
and I probably hung out in the ladies room

1837
01:30:44,937 --> 01:30:47,206
for a good 20 minutes,
just 'cause I wanted

1838
01:30:47,240 --> 01:30:49,042
to make sure I missed
all the scary scenes.

1839
01:30:49,075 --> 01:30:52,512
I remember my mother coming
in and freaking out on me

1840
01:30:52,545 --> 01:30:54,714
and saying, "You're
missing the whole movie!

1841
01:30:54,747 --> 01:30:56,215
"This is your big night!"

1842
01:30:56,249 --> 01:30:58,651
So the Bangor premiere,
I was invited to it.

1843
01:30:58,685 --> 01:31:01,754
It was an early showing,
and again, as a fifth grader

1844
01:31:01,788 --> 01:31:02,955
it was kind of a big deal.

1845
01:31:02,989 --> 01:31:05,958
It was the first time I put on a tuxedo

1846
01:31:05,992 --> 01:31:09,162
and I actually got a limo,
and my father and I went.

1847
01:31:09,195 --> 01:31:12,231
Stephen King was there, and he got up

1848
01:31:12,265 --> 01:31:14,167
and he spoke at the beginning

1849
01:31:14,200 --> 01:31:16,202
I mean, so cool.

1850
01:31:16,235 --> 01:31:19,739
Then the movie started, and keep in mind,

1851
01:31:19,772 --> 01:31:26,345
all I knew about the movie
was the five pages I was on.

1852
01:31:26,379 --> 01:31:29,148
And the movie is horrifying.

1853
01:31:29,182 --> 01:31:31,350
I think what sent me out of the theater

1854
01:31:31,384 --> 01:31:33,386
was after the woman committed suicide

1855
01:31:33,419 --> 01:31:36,122
after finding out that she had cancer,

1856
01:31:36,155 --> 01:31:40,193
and it was such a realistic moment,

1857
01:31:40,226 --> 01:31:43,896
not a crazy horror movie
with knives swinging,

1858
01:31:43,930 --> 01:31:48,801
but almost that some of
this could become reality.

1859
01:31:48,835 --> 01:31:53,005
Lisa Stathoplos, who went
to college with me at UMO,

1860
01:31:53,039 --> 01:31:55,374
we're sitting there watching her scene,

1861
01:31:55,408 --> 01:31:56,743
she goes, "Oh oh oh, here it comes!"

1862
01:31:56,776 --> 01:31:58,711
I see the first shot of the scene,

1863
01:31:58,744 --> 01:32:00,446
and I know I haven't shot it.

1864
01:32:00,480 --> 01:32:01,914
It's a picture of the clothesline

1865
01:32:01,948 --> 01:32:04,250
and there's this woman
bending over a wash basket

1866
01:32:04,283 --> 01:32:07,453
or something, and Carly and
her are sitting next to me,

1867
01:32:07,487 --> 01:32:10,957
leans over and she goes,
"That's not your ass."

1868
01:32:10,990 --> 01:32:13,326
It definitely wasn't her voice,

1869
01:32:13,359 --> 01:32:16,129
and she got a little bit
miffed at that, I think,

1870
01:32:16,162 --> 01:32:17,797
that they voiced over her voice,

1871
01:32:17,830 --> 01:32:19,599
because she has a beautiful voice.

1872
01:32:19,632 --> 01:32:21,767
They never asked me to
do anything different.

1873
01:32:21,801 --> 01:32:25,071
I think I actually originally
got hired 'cause of my voice,

1874
01:32:25,104 --> 01:32:26,806
so it was very odd.

1875
01:32:26,839 --> 01:32:30,776
My father came out of
the movie, was like, green,

1876
01:32:30,810 --> 01:32:35,214
chugged a bottle of Pepto Bismol
and had a couple of beers.

1877
01:32:35,248 --> 01:32:38,551
He was really traumatized by it.

1878
01:32:38,584 --> 01:32:40,186
Yeah, it was a scary movie,

1879
01:32:40,219 --> 01:32:42,221
and it took another year
or so before I was able

1880
01:32:42,255 --> 01:32:44,390
to watch it from the beginning to the end.

1881
01:32:44,423 --> 01:32:48,161
Pet Sematary is really,
it's really a timeless story,

1882
01:32:48,194 --> 01:32:51,664
and all the reasons that
people thought it wouldn't work

1883
01:32:51,697 --> 01:32:55,668
as a film, are what have made
it into such a timeless piece.

1884
01:32:55,701 --> 01:32:58,871
It's about something that
really never changes,

1885
01:32:58,905 --> 01:33:02,008
which is the dynamic within a family,

1886
01:33:02,041 --> 01:33:06,245
and the love that parents
have for their small children,

1887
01:33:06,279 --> 01:33:09,282
and the fear that people have of death,

1888
01:33:09,315 --> 01:33:11,984
and the desire through the ages

1889
01:33:12,018 --> 01:33:16,189
to confound death, to get around it,

1890
01:33:16,222 --> 01:33:19,258
and bring their loved
ones back in some form

1891
01:33:19,292 --> 01:33:21,027
to preserve their memory.

1892
01:33:21,060 --> 01:33:25,498
I just think that those
feelings and those desires,

1893
01:33:25,531 --> 01:33:29,535
even though they're in
many cases unhealthy,

1894
01:33:29,569 --> 01:33:31,437
are very relatable.

1895
01:34:38,137 --> 01:34:44,010
Dale and Fred were going
to the Micmac burial ground,

1896
01:34:44,043 --> 01:34:48,314
on that journey, and I
was hanging in a tree

1897
01:34:48,347 --> 01:34:52,318
and I don't remember what the lines were.

1898
01:34:52,351 --> 01:34:54,220
"Don't go there," or something like that,

1899
01:34:54,253 --> 01:34:56,889
just warning them not to go.

1900
01:34:56,922 --> 01:34:58,791
That was cut, for whatever reason,

1901
01:34:58,824 --> 01:35:01,560
but I had to hang in that tree for,

1902
01:35:01,594 --> 01:35:07,033
oh maybe an hour or two, with
all that makeup.

1903
01:35:07,066 --> 01:35:10,970
I was not on set for Missy's hanging

1904
01:35:11,003 --> 01:35:12,772
when they actually shot it.

1905
01:35:12,805 --> 01:35:15,641
I was there to, of course, tear it down.

1906
01:35:15,675 --> 01:35:19,378
They had the rigging
noose, and the clips on it

1907
01:35:19,412 --> 01:35:21,213
that were where she would be suspended,

1908
01:35:21,247 --> 01:35:23,115
and obviously not really hung.

1909
01:35:23,149 --> 01:35:27,119
That was something that I kept
as a memento, just for fun.

1910
01:37:04,950 --> 01:37:06,685
We're going to be doing
an interview in Maine

1911
01:37:06,719 --> 01:37:09,455
in a couple weeks with Donnie Green,

1912
01:37:09,488 --> 01:37:11,524
the guy who actually
was driving the truck.

1913
01:37:11,557 --> 01:37:15,261
Oh wow, so you guys
tracked down everybody.