I love all three of those."
Of course, Crampton’s own filmography features tragedy, horribleness, and the fantastical aplenty.
Below, the actress talks about some of her own horror highlights.
Credit: Everett Collection
She was offered the part, her mother read the script, and said “Oh, no.
You’re not doing this.”
Jeffrey Combs already had the part and I was brought in to read, and Bruce was there.
Barbara Crampton
I spent three hours at that audition.
I remember thinking that Jeffrey and Bruce were so good that I hoped they got the parts.
Not knowing that Jeffrey actually had the film and he was auditioning me too in a way.
BC:you could tell by watching that film, we had a lot of fun.
I made friends with all the people on the set and we all loved each other so much.
It was so fun.
BC:We went to Italy to doFrom Beyond.
I kind of switched roles with Jeffrey Combs.
I became the doctor and he became a more pseudo-reasonable person.
Stuart really molded everybodys characters.
Jeffrey and I would always say, More is not enough for you.
He just wanted that fullness to his movies.
Theres an intensity, an operatic feel to it.
Stuart always wanted to be big and impressive and bold.
BC:By the time we got toCastle Freak, we had a great shorthand with one another.
And that was me, I was the lucky one!Castle Freakis a different tone.
More real, darker, more intense, sad.
There was basically no levity inCastle Freakat all.
It was a really dark film.
So, that was interesting.
Stuart always wanted to do something different.
He didnt want to just capitalize on what he had done before.
All of his films have a different feel to them.
I hadnt talked to my agent in six years.
He said, “No.
In fact, I have an offer for you to be the matriarch-mom in this horror movie.”
I said, “Well, dont they want me to audition?”
He said, “No, they just want to hire you.”
To me, that just seemed unreal.
I dont understand this!"
My agent said, “Look, do you want the part or not?”
Why dont I just go and have a good time?
I thought, this film will go nowhere probably but Ill have a good time.
I showed up on set and every person was more incredible than the next.
AJ Bowen, you couldnt tell where the acting began and real-life stopped, because he was so real.
Joe Swanberg was a master at improv and Amy Seimetz was crying these real tears.
I had the best time of my life.
It was really just like an epiphany.
I said, Oh, I just love acting and I really want to get back into it.
BC: I met Ted Geoghegan when we were doing publicity onYoure Next.
He was part of that team and he and I became friends.
He sent me the script forWe Are Still Here, just to ask my opinion of the material.
And I said, “Yeah of course!”
I said, “This is meaningful to me.”
So get on a plane."
It was freezing the whole time.
It was a hard show.
BC: I had met Jackson through Stuart Gordon atReanimator: The Musical.
Jackson and I just hit it off.
So, I read the script, and I loved it.
I though, Hmm, I could play Evelyn.
He said, “Oh, no, no, I have somebody else in mind for that.”
I said, “Oh, okay, well, thats fine.”
The actress doesnt live in Los Angeles, she lives in Atlanta, she had gone back.
We had a very low budget, so we couldnt fly her back to redo it.
Jackson said, “You have to come in and do the role.
Because we have to reshoot all this stuff!”
I was like, “Holy s—, oh my god, okay.”
So I quickly learned the lines and then shot it the next day.
We did it really on the fly and it just worked.
The movie did very well and we sold it to IFC!
We need to makeBeyond the Gates II.
Im actually trying to make that happen.
So much time has gone by, but I think we could still do it.
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