But what about the people behind our favorutie horror films? Are they as excited as we are to grab the popcorn and scare ourselves senseless? Turns out… yep, they pretty much are, and there’s no better way to get a glimpse at what goes into making horror films than with The Horror Crowd.

Directed by actor and horror aficionado Ruben Pla, this documentary goes to the very heart of genre; giving a rare insight into the industry we love. We spoke to Ruben about making the documentary, the unexpected answers and his favourite horror films…

How did you first get involved in the horror community?

My gateway has to be Mike Mendez. I met him working on his promotional video for Overkill, a film he was trying to get off the ground. People came in and helped out, acted and produced, whatever. I did that and I met James Wan there. He was on the set because he was a friend of Mike’s and we hit it off. He saw how I was on set, how I behaved, saw I was a professional, he liked my work and then James goes to me: “So do you want to be in Insidious?” [and I was like] “haha okay!”

How did The Horror Crowd documentary start for you?

I started travelling in those horror circles in Hollywood, Los Angeles and I started thinking: ‘Why don’t I start talking to some people and interview them, see what they say?’ Just like on my phone or something. Just to see what comes out, no big deal. Then I met with my buddy Hank Braxtan (who ended up being co-producer), we had lunch and I pitched him my idea. He said: “I like the idea, why don’t I throw in some cameras for you?” and I go “okay…” and he goes “and a lighting kit, and good sound recorder…” I said “sounds great man, thank you!” and he goes “and you know we can shoot some of the scenes at our studio…” Awesome! Later we approached his wife, who’s also a good friend of mine, Arielle Brachfeld and she came on as a producing partner with me.

So that’s how it started. I started asking some people: “Hey you want to do a little interview…?” and then they all said yeah! They all wanted to do it. They all wanted to reveal their innermost feelings and what scared them as a kid and all their passions and love for the audience!

Some of the interviews became very personal, did you expect that?

No! I had general ideas about what I was going to be talking about but then things started coming up, like about their parents, and “oh they supported me when I was a kid” to be in horror and others who didn’t support them. So I started [thinking] ‘okay parents are a big influence, let’s do a segment on parents’ and then that led to other segments.

Parents are parents – some are supportive, some aren’t. I luckily had parents (they’ve both passed away) who were always very supportive of me, and as did several others. [In the documentary], Cyrus Voris, who wrote Demon Night, says how his parents were so supportive of whatever he did. Mike Mendez, on the other hand, said there was a big rift in the family; that they were not supportive and they wanted [him] to be an electrician or a plumber! I think either one of those can lead you to be successful and lead you to have a passion for your future work.

What is the ‘horror crowd’?

It’s a group of filmmakers, directors, writers, producers, actors and the like. We also have several journalists in it who specialise in horror. They love horror movies. Some of them, like Lombardo Boyar and myself, do other things besides horror. But we all love horror, sci-fi and fantasy. We love that across the board. I think that’s what ties us together. Our love of horror trivia and also, more importantly, helping each other and each others’ projects. I’ll act in his film; he’ll act in mine. He’ll direct me in this, you know. We’ll just go back and forth and help each other any way we can.

Why do you think the horror crowd all get on so well together?

I think our mutual respect for the genre is part of it. The other part is the fact that we just like each other and enjoy being with each other. We [go] to parties together, invite each other to Christmas parties, Halloween parties… [We] dress up together and go out, go to screenings together. So that kind keeps the crowd a tight unit.

What is it about horror that creates such a friendly vibe?

Because it scares us and we like that. Seriously, I think horror films scare us in a safe way. It feels like you can go in there safely, have the crap scared out of you safely and you can go home safe and alive. Or in these times you’re home already, watching it. Quarantine times, you’re going to have to check the closet! When I acted in Insidious, I got scared that night and I thought: ‘Is that red lipstick demon in my closet?!’ Haha! I’m not joking! I was in the movie, I acted on the set, I was there and when I got home I checked the closet to make sure Joseph Bishara – who played the demon (and also composed the music) – was not hiding in my closet. Which actually would be very scary, even without his make up haha!

As a horror fan, does being in horror films take away any of the magic?

Well not in the case of Insidious! I think in other cases, yes it has. The film has to be super effective and moody and just right. The writing has to be super tight, the scare factor has to be there for it to affect you that way. I think most of the time no, it’s not ruined. You’re inside, so you’re experiencing it. You know the inner workings but I still love movies and TV shows. I love them so much that it doesn’t matter to me. I’ll just watch them and enjoy them!

You were in Big Ass Spider! – a film with a crazy premise that balances that brilliant line between horror and comedy. What’s the secret behind that balance?

It’s funny you should bring up Big Ass Spider! because Mike Mendez, my good friend, directed that and he’s a master at horror/comedy. There are different kinds of horrors, as we go into in the documentary. You can do horror/science fiction. You can do horror/film noir and then you can do horror with comedy. I think if you have a great comic sensibility as Mike Mendez does and [Big Ass Spider! co-star] Greg Grunberg does, you can make that work.

As Greg says in the documentary, it needed to have some comedic elements, it can’t just be all serious, I tune out, I’ve got to infuse [horror] with comedy. That’s what he does for most of his roles. I think what makes it work is having a twist on it. In this case with Big Ass Spider!, it scares you and then you laugh!

I guess any film that provokes emotion is a good film…

Very true, a lot of the filmmakers talk about it [in The Horror Crowd]; they say they want to get emotions out of the audiences. Comedians want to get audiences to laugh and we want to get them to scream and jump – induce the audience to have that visceral reaction, just jump like ‘oh my god I’m scared!’.

Whether it’s Insidious or Paranormal Activity or Final Destination as Jeffrey Reddick talks about [in the documentary], he loves that reaction from the audience – making them jump when they see a kill they haven’t seen before. I love that.

What was it like directing directors for the documentary?

So as far as me being the director and turning the tables, being an actor I knew exactly how to illicit things from these people, whether they were actors or filmmakers. I knew how to talk to them. I would ask questions that aren’t normally asked. I wasn’t asking “how did you first start acting?” I’m “tell me about your dark side, what about your parents? Did they support you?” and that’s what I tried to do. As an actor that’s what I would want to be asked. I want to be asked different kinds of questions!

What do you think the secret behind a successful horror is?

A great script. To me, a great script just crosses over. No matter what the genre, it could be an adventure, sci-fi, fantasy, rom-com, I don’t care as long as the script is great. People like James Cameron [with Aliens] and Spielberg with Jaws; these are all horror movies. These are incredibly tight scripts in addition to the horrible monster; the Alien Queen or Bruce the shark (they called it Bruce because Spielberg’s lawyer was called Bruce haha).

What’s your favourite horror film that you’ve been part of?

Insidious. Not just because of James Wan and the success, it was such a tight script. The music by Joseph Bishara was so moody. The other actors, Patrick Wilson, Rose Byrne, Lin Shaye, Barbara Hershey they were just so great. I got to go up there and act with Rose Byrne, Patrick Wilson and Barbara Hershey – I mean come on! These people, especially Barbara Hershey, are people I watched growing up and I got to act with them. You’ve got that tight acting, with the script and the music and the mood and the colours – I don’t see how it could have failed!

What’s your favourite horror film that you haven’t been part of?

It’s going to be Alien, and I know people will say “no that’s a sci-fi movie” – no, it’s a sci-fi haunted house movie. It’s a haunted house movie in space and to me that’s horror. There were jump scares all over the place! You probably already know this but Ridley Scott never told the actors, Sigourney Weaver, Tom Skerritt all of them, where the alien was coming from, or when the alien was coming. When that (spoiler!) chest-burster comes out of John Hurt’s chest, they didn’t know what the heck was going to happen! Those reactions are real when Tom Skerritt is going through the tunnels and trying to find the Xenomorph and then it jumps out at him. He had no idea it was coming out then or there!

What’s it like being part of Grimmfest?

I want to thank Grimmfest for accepting The Horror Crowd into their festival – it’s coming up 7 October so I definitely need to shout out to them. They’ve been great. When I first presented the film, they wanted it right away and that really makes a filmmaker go ‘wow, they believe in it’. It’s a renowned film festival so I’m excited to be accepted.

What’s it like being part of a virtual festival?

I’ve been doing a lot of videos! I’ve been doing a few intros for a few festivals and I’m going through a cemetery saying “hello, this is…” so I do this intro from this lovely cemetery, it’s so appropriate! Then doing the virtual Q&A to me is fine. I would have flown to England to be in those festivals but you can’t right now, but as soon as I can, I’m flying everywhere!

What’s next for you?

As soon as things open up I’ll still be acting, going for auditions. I’m going to be directing again; I have several scripts that I’ve written that are polished and ready to go! As I mentioned, I go across the board in terms of genre, so horror, sci-fi, fantasy, adventure, supernatural thriller… I have a rom-com… I don’t care, if the script works, it’s tight and it’s truthful I don’t care, I’m ready to direct it!

The Horror Crowd is showing at the Grimmfest festival. Find out more information here.

The post The Horror Crowd: Interview with Ruben Pla appeared first on Sci-Fi Tips.

“You would think that it’s like a ‘don’t meet your heroes’ kind of thing; that peeling back the onion or getting behind the curtain would ruin the experience, but it doesn’t,” Grunberg explains when we ask him if working on these iconic genre movies ruins the magic for him. “It gives me a whole new appreciation. Essentially I get to see five different versions of that movie. Because I get to see Harrison Ford say that same line – that you get to see on the DVD or watching the movie one time – I got to see him do it five times. So it’s so much better for me! Like ‘oh my god, I saw this movie a bunch of different ways!’ It’s really cool.”

From big productions like 2016’s Star Trek Beyond and that aforementioned role in the recent Star Wars saga, two of which were directed by his good friend J.J Abrams (“he’s brilliant. He’s so incredibly well prepared, he absolutely knows exactly what he wants…”) to cult classics like Big Ass Spider, Grunberg has certainly been able to geek out behind the scenes of many an iconic genre film.

Speaking of geeking out, we can’t help but do exactly that with Grunberg, who can give us a run for our money when it comes to geek points, especially when speaking about his newest role, that of Eugene Wylder in Max Reload and the Nether Blasters. “It’s amazing. It’s kind of a love letter to old vintage video games and new video games and horror and the whole genre. It’s such a blast.”

In fact, having such a blast and being part of a wider genre community is exactly the reason we’re here: to discuss the fabled group of horror actors and filmmakers known as The Horror Crowd. Highlighted in the new documentary – also called The Horror Crowd – veteran actor insider Ruben Pla has brought together the nightmare-creators that form Hollywood’s horror community. Covering wide-ranging topics such as ‘Being the Weird Kid’, ‘Women in Horror’, ‘Race Relations’, ‘The Dark Side’ and ‘Film Festivals’, this is a fascinating insight into horror industry by those within it.

“Reuben approached me – we worked on Big Ass Spider together, and he reached out to say ‘hey I’m doing this thing, would you be interested in just talking?’ Because I have a bunch of experience doing these kinds of projects,” Grunberg tells us. “So I said ‘yeah, I’d love to! Are you kidding me?!’ I’m a fan [and] I’ve been lucky to be a part of some of these things!”

Showing at this year’s FrightFest, the documentary really shows the friendly side of genre, with some of horror’s top filmmakers getting together to go in-depth about the industry they love. “I think people are going to really love [The Horror Crowd]. It’s one of those movies [where] we all have an opinion and we all have an experience – whether we’re part of making a project or just watching it and viewing it,” Grunberg continues. “We all take away something from it. That’s why I love what Reuben did. It doesn’t matter the size or the budget [of the project] so long as the story’s good and the characters are good and it’s going to engage the audience. That’s who I think The Horror Crowd are –  they’re just people that are passionate about these stories, these characters and we share a common appreciation for them.”

In the documentary, Grunberg and Ruben discuss their time on the set of 2013’s sleeper success monster movie Big Ass Spider: “It is amazing, I mean it really is. Big Ass Spider was the same kind of thing as a Sharknado – a low budget thing. But man we all had such a blast doing it!” he tells us. “There are these fun moments and little moments where I’m like ‘eugh it’s going kind of cheesy’, but it doesn’t last.”

Indeed, on paper Big Ass Spider looks like it should be a cheesy flop: following… well… a big ass spider, Grunberg plays the lead Alex Mathis in the movie – an exterminator who finds himself helping the US army take down a giant spider who has escaped from a secret lab. A fun romp, the passion behind the project really shines through, enabling it to stay firmly in the minds of genre fans for the past 17 years.

“The movie just looks great, the effects look great – it does not feel like a low budget film and again I’m just really happy. I think it’s going to be one of that cult classic kind of movies that last for a long time,” Grunberg agrees.

Just like his character in Big Ass Spider, Grunberg is the master of playing the likable good guy. From hapless Matt Parkman in Heroes to poor old Seth Norris in Lost, Grunberg prides himself on getting to grips with a character and showing that character to their fullest on the big and small screen: “I look for something where the blueprint’s been laid out pretty solidly and I can embellish and really make [a character] my own. I just enjoy a character that’s very relatable, very real. [But] collaboration is really the most important thing. When I meet with a filmmaker [or] I meet with a writer, if they’re open-minded and they listen – I might not be right (a lot of times I’m wrong!) but at least it’s a collaboration. That’s the best. It’s so much fun when I can surprise a director or writer and say something that they never imagined. Or bring something to the role that they’re like ‘wow, this was two-dimensional on paper and it’s now three-dimensional’. So something to enhance it.”

That sense of realness that you see in Grunberg’s performances is no happy accident. He takes the time to boil down just what it is about that character that makes him real – and that’s all down to the preparation he undertakes before even stepping foot on set: “What’s interesting is that I will read something 20 times and memorise it. That’s my job. But on the 23^rd time I’ll hear something different or I’ll discover something in the character or in the words that I never anticipated. It has to do with where the character came from in the story, where the character’s going. My motivations. Sometimes the writers don’t even see that coming, it’s such a pleasant surprise. They’re like ‘of course that character would react that way or say that line that way. I never wrote it that way but yeah!’ That comes just from doing it over and over again. So I definitely do my homework before I get to set!”

That may be all well and fine on a TV set like Lost or Heroes where people may have spent a lot of time with each other, but what about on big-budget projects like Star Wars?

“You know you feel a sense of constraint when you first get on set with bigger projects because the budget’s there and you would hope they would have done much more preparation. But the best projects are the ones with… like with my friend J.J. Abrams. When we’re on set, he’s open-minded. I remember [on Star Wars that] John Boyega was so brilliant, Oscar Isaacs was so brilliant and Daisy Ridley… they’re just really smart, they really know their characters now. But they will come up with something. They’ll go: “What if I did this? How about this?” and J.J’s like “yeah let’s try that!”. It depends on the director and the situation. Certain things have to be exactly the way they were laid out in the script because they carry the story. You can’t deviate from that, it would change everything but I’m talking about little nuances once you get on set. You can’t predict everything before you get there and you have to be open-minded to adjust accordingly.”

A good director is obviously important when creating these memorable characters on set but the actor has to be willing also: “As an actor, if you plan, if you do your homework and if you’re super prepared it allows you to free yourself up to try new things. You know the dialogue, you know the words but now I can listen more. I can take in what the other actors say. Really good acting to me, is listening. You see it on actors’ faces – some actors when they’re new, they’ll just be sitting there waiting for their line. That’s not living. That’s not life. People don’t do that. You’re thinking about what you’re going to say to me right now, you’re listening to me, reacting. You’re going to say something depending on what I say. That shows in your face. You can’t just stand there waiting until it’s your turn to talk. That’s not what acting is. There’s just as much going on when you’re listening as when you’re projecting.”

These preparations are usually well-received, creating genre characters that become almost as famous as the movie themselves – especially in horror. “I think people appreciate a good story, good characters. Characters that move you. Genre stuff is hard to get right. It’s really the writing and the passion and it’s all on the page,” Grunberg tells us. “All the other elements just add to it and make it great.”

Plenty of those interviewed in The Horror Crowd have sure got that horror formula right, including Oren Peli (Paranormal Activity), Russel Mulcahy (Highlander, Razorback), Adam Robitel (Insidious: The Last Key, Escape Room), and Darren Lynn Bousman (Saw II). Not only does the documentary delve into the methods the filmmakers use while creating these movies, but it goes into their community as a whole (including numerous gatherings and quiz nights!), adding deeper insight into the master horror-makers and highlighting the real community spirit behind these scary passion projects.

Speaking of spirits, we couldn’t help but notice that Grunberg’s documentary interview takes place in what looks like his very own bar… “It’s actually my studio – we have events there and the bar was a set that we have. It’s a set but you know… a bar’s a bar! Haha! So we enjoy it. It’s a great setting to discuss stuff. You’re welcome any time!”

Well you don’t have to ask us twice!

FrightFest Digital Edition 2020 presents the world premiere of The Horror Crowd on 29 August on the Arrow Video Screen.

THE HORROR CROWD from FrightFest on Vimeo.

The post The Horror Crowd: Interview with Greg Grunberg appeared first on Sci-Fi Tips.