Friday the 13th news from Fangorias Weekend of Horror
Friday the 13th
Several screenwriters from the Jason saga gathered together to discuss the series.
Barney Cohen wrote Friday the 13th: the Final Chapter (1984) truly intending for it to be the last Jason movie. I was told it was going to be the final chapter! They were essentially out of money on the franchise and they just wanted to kill Jason. But as the dailies came in I started getting notes to change the ending. He noted that he was hired based on a CBS after-school special because the powers that be at Paramount liked the kids he wrote.
Dean Lorey co-wrote Jason Goes To Hell: The Final Friday (1993). We just thought it would be kinda cool to blow him up in the first five minutes. It would make people go “What the ****?” I never thought [we’d alienate fans] because it wasn’t my idea – I was brought on for a rewrite, it was pre-determined.
Todd Farmer wrote Jason X (2001). Originally it was Jason in the future, sort of a Bladerunner idea. Freddy Vs. Jason had been in development a couple years so we decided to do something that wouldn’t interfere and do Jason in Space. Plus, hot horror chicks.
Mark Swift co-wrote Freddy Vs. Jason (2003). He was asked why their (his and Damian Shannon’s) concept got made over all the other takes during the ten years the picture was in development. We didn’t want to change the mythology. We had the only take where we said we weren’t going to change the rules. Freddy won’t act differently, Jason won’t drive a car. If New Line just wanted to make money, they would have made it ten years earlier. We pitched to Mike Deluca, who really wanted to make the best movie.
He also said Horror movies are never going to go away and Jason’s a great example of why. He’s just a great character.
The next panel was Sean Cunningham, creator of the series and director of Friday the 13th, and Adrienne King, who played Alice.
Cunningham said I never imagined in a million years I’d be here today. Friday the 13th was intended as a way to pay the bills for a few months. We were all of us surprised, and very lucky. The movie was fun, and if you’ve seen it you know there’s a big surprise ending, which is now kind of a cliché but at the time it hadn’t been done much. There was a hand coming out of the grave at the end of Carrie. [So] people would see the movie and the ending was kind of a sucker punch so they’d bring their friends.
There will be more Fridays. We had an unprecedented amount of success with Freddy Vs. Jason. After that we went around and around with what we’d do next. We didn’t want to do Freddy Vs. Jason 2 and just remake Freddy Vs. Jason, we wanted something dramatic and original. At one point we were talking about Freddy Vs. Jason Vs. Ash, we were talking to Bruce Campbell... [The audience absolutely exploded with love for the idea] ...I don’t think that’s going to happen as we’d talked.
King said The first time I saw it was in a small screening room and my mom was sitting next to me. At the crucial scene she jumped out of her seat and screamed. I always said that if it hadn’t been sold that would have made the deal. Seeing the lines around the block [when it opened] was just surreal.
Asked if the films hate women, she said Who lived? It was a woman. Who killed the bad guy? It was a woman. And Cunningham added I would like to go on record and say I do not hate women. There are going to be people who don’t get it. That’s OK.
He also hinted that there may be a TV series in the works featuring Camp Crystal Lake, and, that he and Wes Craven have an unofficial deal for the remake of Last House on the Left and hope to start shooting by the end of the year.