He waves at her, beckons her closer to him, and then proceeds to devour her. The little girl finds herself alone in her backyard before hearing the giggles of Pennywise ( Tim Curry). A mother calls for her young daughter to get inside from the rain before leaving her unattended. A thousand-page horror epic that features an evil space entity who crashes to Earth, takes the form of a clown, and appears every 27 years to lure children into its sewer lair and feast on them.ĭirected by Tommy Lee Wallace, the film opens on a rainy day in a wholesome neighborhood in the town of Derry, Maine. The next thing that airs that night is ABC’s Movie of the Week, which happens to be part one of an adaptation of Stephen King’s novel, It. They continue watching ABC, because we’re on a roll at this point. A show that was like America’s Funniest Home Videos but with less hits to the groin and more people making weird faces into the camera. After that show, they leave it on the same station to watch America’s Funniest People, hosted by fellow Full House co-star, Dave Coulier. A person turns on the television to ABC to watch America’s Funniest Home Videos, hosted by Full House co-star, Bob Saget. We are in year ten of the Reagan-Bush dynasty and halfway through the Gulf War. Let’s set the stage: it’s Sunday evening, November 18, 1990. Many actors have had iconic roles in these adaptations, but there is one performance that received zero awards and little critical acclaim at the time, even though it may take up the biggest real estate in our collective nightmares and single-handedly made clowns go from unsettling to terrifying monsters in the cultural zeitgeist: Pennywise, the Dancing Clown. Starting with Sissy Spacek’s star-making role in Carrie, to Kathy Bates’s Oscar winning and foot-destroying Annie Wilkes in Misery, King’s gift for writing characters that are both salt-of-the-Earth and pure evil allows the right actor with the right part to put on an absolute clinic. The pantheon of great performances in Stephen King adaptations is as large as the author’s five-decade-long bibliography. This month, we ring in the release of It: Chapter Two by exploring the various adaptations of the master of horror, Stephen King. IT is currently playing in theaters everywhere with Chapter Two expected to hit theaters September 6th, 2019.For all its drawbacks, the 1990 miniseries boasted an instantly iconic rendition of Stephen King’s murderous clown.Įvery month, we at The Spool select a filmmaker to explore in greater depth - their themes, their deeper concerns, how their works chart the history of cinema and the filmmaker’s own biography. I was upset that people could see my face. I was him, but I was in the wrong setting, somehow. I went back to Stockholm after we wrapped, and every night for two weeks, I had these strange recurring Pennywise dreams. It was so bad, the actor was haunted by his own performance – after filming was over: Nothing much is going on in terms of what he’s thinking - he’s animalistic and instinctive.” My take was that Pennywise functions very simply. “In order for this movie to be as effective as the book and the series, I have to scare a whole generation. The cast and crew really went all out with this one, as Skarsgård has said before that it was his intention to scare an entire generation: That’s right, the character may be in a movie, but he’s looking directly at you. Go ahead, cover up his eye that appears to be crossed. What’s even more creepy about this is that it means Pennywise is actually looking at you, the viewer. In the storm drain when he goes limp with his eyes looking f**ked up, that’s all him.” So even in those moments when his eyes move, it was in. What are the chances? It’s one in a million and he was cast already. “I told Bill, ‘I want it in both directions, I want you to send your eyes looking away and give a really unsettling look’. Bill Skarsgård did that 100% on his own – according to Andy Muschietti: The character’s eyes look in different directions, something that actually isn’t a CGI effect. What you might not know, however, is part of the reason the character’s eyes look so strange. We already knew Bill Skarsgård’s Pennywise the Clown in the IT movie has a very unsettling look.
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