All roads lead to “Evil Dead”

September 13, 2010 7:33 AM

"Whenever filmmakers ask, “Hey, how can I get my first feature going?” I’m like, “Find two partners and get ready to flush four years down the toilet.” It can be done, but you’ve got to work."

A new interview with Bruce Campbell on the Evil Dead franchise.
posted by quin (62 comments total)

This has nothing to do with the above, but it was a memorable story I must share.

Bruce came to speak at my college, and he gave us a passioned condemnation of the production world and why it was going to get worse (this is 2003, mind you).

He said that because studios want a bigger return, they are cutting corners wherever possible. Simply, the push for CG is to cut SFX out of the budget, with CG gradually becoming cheaper (at least, that's the idea). "Reality TV" is to cut the writers out and actors out of the budget, this is also why there are a lot of "here's your chance, Average Joe, to be famous." The reasoning is, with the expansion of the indie market and cable tv, the revenue has become less centralized to the major players (I guess he forgot what happened after the Federal Comm. act of 1996, but whatever... he worked hard and he has a chin you don't want to argue with).

He said that the quality of programming and the intelligence of major films will experience a sharp downturn, as these studio heads push for more profits and less overhead. Original plot ideas will be replaced with rehashed ones (old TV shows, and whatnot), sequels will become more prevalent than they are in the horror film realm, as with the rehashing and sequels, you don’t have to have an original idea, you just have to get a writer desperate enough to wanna break into the business.

Again, he wasn’t entirely wrong, it was just that some of his arguments were a little weak. This was especially apparent to those of my college as half the students in the audience were in communications, so they knew about the centralization of media ownership, and the other half were film students, well aware of what was going on in Hollywood.

Mr. Campbell really took issue with sequels, and why it takes away from original and creative endeavors. Anticipating the argument, he justified Evil Dead 2 as an attempt to make Evil Dead with the effects they really wanted, as they now had a substantial budget. It was a valid rebuttal, but then he made the mistake of continuing his hatred of sequels and unoriginal work. If he would have just let that go, the following never would have occurred:

My friend A, stood up:
A – Bruce, first of all, you’re the freakin’ man! I just gotta say that.
Bruce – Thank you…A – As for sequels, where does “Lovebug 2” fit into this?
[hush falls over the audience]
Bruce – You see, with Lovebug 2, it was… Well… uh... What’s your name?
A – Al
Bruce – Shut up, Al
posted by Bathtub Bobsled at 8:01 AM on September 13, 2010 [46 favorites]

Hey, everyone's gotta eat.
posted by nomadicink at 8:07 AM on September 13, 2010 [1 favorite]

As Michael Caine said about Jaws: The Revenge, "I have never seen it, but by all accounts it is terrible. However, I have seen the house that it built, and it is terrific."
posted by kmz at 8:19 AM on September 13, 2010 [33 favorites]

While we're telling peripherally-related stories: I never saw Evil Dead [1|2] nor did I even know they existed. But when Army of Darkness came out, it looked like a good movie so I saw it. From all the audience participation (to put it mildly) and pauses for laughs actually in the movie, I inferred that at least one previous sequel existed.

It was a good time. But I still haven't seen them.
posted by DU at 8:24 AM on September 13, 2010

That's right. Who's laughing now?
posted by shakespeherian at 8:25 AM on September 13, 2010

Good old Bruce. His guest stint on the X-Files as the/a devil was an under-appreciated masterpiece.
posted by Gator at 8:33 AM on September 13, 2010 [2 favorites]

/swoon
posted by cavalier at 8:41 AM on September 13, 2010

I interviewed him once. He was on a reading tour with his book. I had gotten the book the previous day, and had not had time to read it, so the whole interview went like this:

ME: I understand you have had some interesting experiences with your fans.

BRUCE: Yeah. It's in the book! I write about all that in the book!

ME: I haven't had time to read the book! I just got it yesterday!

BRUCE: Read it man! It's a good book!

ME: All right, now, about the fans ...

BRUCE: IT'S ALL RIGHT THERE IN THE BOOK!

I couldn't tell if he was cranky or was fucking with me.
posted by Astro Zombie at 8:44 AM on September 13, 2010 [1 favorite]

His guest stint on the X-Files as the/a devil was an under-appreciated masterpiece.

He had this great guest spot on Homicide: Life on the Street, where from the very first moment you know... Someone with eyes that crazy is gonna do some revenge murderin'.
posted by muddgirl at 8:44 AM on September 13, 2010

Wait... wait... Army of Darkness was a "flat-out bomb" when it was released? I can't fathom that. Are we talking "Studio hid the money from the filmmakers" bomb or Mallrats bomb? Hmmm...

My wife, the wonderful woman she is, found him doing a book signing years ago while I was in another city. She didn't know who he was but she knew I thought he was awesome so she waited in line to get it signed. When she gets up to him she asks to take a picture and he decides to direct a scene where they're both earnestly looking for something out on the horizon. Cut to today where on my desk is a very serious and earnest looking Bruce Campbell looking out over the "horizon" with my wife. Dude's cool.
posted by cavalier at 8:53 AM on September 13, 2010 [27 favorites]

Cut to today where on my desk is a very serious and earnest looking Bruce Campbell looking out over the "horizon" with my wife.

I demand to see this amazing photograph.
posted by shakespeherian at 8:56 AM on September 13, 2010 [6 favorites]

Cite?! Meh.. will get to a scanner today...
posted by cavalier at 8:57 AM on September 13, 2010

Not a call for citation, I just like seeing cool shit.
posted by shakespeherian at 9:01 AM on September 13, 2010 [2 favorites]

I know.. I keed..
posted by cavalier at 9:01 AM on September 13, 2010

Not a call for citation, I just like seeing cool shit.

I got a friend who has a photo of his mom hanging out with a young Johnny Cash. I could let you see it for a nominal fee.
posted by komara at 9:17 AM on September 13, 2010

> I got a friend who has a photo of his mom hanging out with a young Johnny Cash. I could let you see it for a nominal fee.

How much to... touch it? Not that I want to, heh, I'm asking for... a friend. Yeah.
posted by ardgedee at 9:26 AM on September 13, 2010

Well, I demand to see both those photos, and after that, I demand that Bruce come over to my house and look out at the horizon with me.
posted by FelliniBlank at 9:31 AM on September 13, 2010

While thinking of Johnny Cash.
posted by FelliniBlank at 9:32 AM on September 13, 2010 [1 favorite]

My story about Bruce:

When I got his book (If Chins Could Kill: Confessions of a B Movie Actor), I read that when he moved to the LA area, he moved into a house on Delight Street (or could have been Newhouse, can't remember now) in Canyon Country. That house was 4 (or 3 if it was Newhouse) streets up from the very spot I was reading the book. In fact, we were practically neighbors. Depending on the house, I would have walked by it on the way to school in the mornings during the time he lived there.
posted by sideshow at 9:43 AM on September 13, 2010

I also demand to see a photograph of an adorable puppy balancing a cupcake on its nose.
posted by shakespeherian at 9:48 AM on September 13, 2010 [8 favorites]

I'll up the ante: Bruce Campbell balancing a puppy on his nose, which is balancing a cupcake on his (or her) nose, whilst in the horizon Johnny Cash sets slowly in the west.
posted by cottoncandybeard at 10:08 AM on September 13, 2010 [1 favorite]

Here's my Bruce Campbell story:

During his book tour for If Chins Could Kill, he stopped for a reading here in Seattle. It was packed. I mean packed. The only reading I've seen with more people was when Jackie Chan was signing copies of his autobiography a few years back. Anyway, he read portions of the book and then had a lengthy, generous Q&A session. Several minutes in, a guy wearing the standard fanboy outfit of trench coat, long hair, and black t-shirt approaches the mic.

FB: Could you say "work shed"?

A little background here. TLDR: that line was looped in post for a scene in Evil Dead II where Ash heads to the work shed, to explain where he was going. It sounds weird and canned. It has since turned into an fan boy byword. Bruce pauses for a moment, then leans into the mic.

BC: What's your name?
FB: Paul.
BC: Paul, let me ask you a question. Am I your little monkey?

The timing was perfect. It absolutely killed. And it cut down on Q&A shenanigans by about 1000%. Bruce Campbell is awesome.
posted by ga$money at 10:09 AM on September 13, 2010 [13 favorites]

Could you say "work shed"?

According to Campbell, Kurt Russell approached him on the set of Escape From L.A. and asked him the same question.
posted by EarBucket at 10:20 AM on September 13, 2010

I have actually met Bruce Campbell twice at work and failed to recognize him both times. It was the glasses and goatee, I guess.
posted by infinitewindow at 10:26 AM on September 13, 2010

Am I the only Mefi member never to have met Bruce Campbell?
posted by afx237vi at 10:38 AM on September 13, 2010 [5 favorites]

Yes; Bruce Campbell attends every meetup the world over, wearing a plastic Nixon mask painted to have a Snidely Whiplash mustache and carrying a bullhorn, through which he regales his fellow Mefites with non sequitur bon mots throughout the evening from a distance of fifty feet.
posted by shakespeherian at 10:45 AM on September 13, 2010 [2 favorites]

Am I the only Mefi member never to have met Bruce Campbell?

Clearly you don't know about the Army of Darkness Level MeFi membership. It costs more than $5.
posted by dry white toast at 10:46 AM on September 13, 2010 [1 favorite]

As promised, I am able to deliver a photo of my friend's mom with a young Johnny Cash.

I have never met Bruce Campbell. I think I am one of the few mid-30s white males who doesn't care about Bruce Campbell. I'm not even sure why I'm in this thread. Maybe it just seemed like the right place to talk about Johnny Cash.
posted by komara at 10:56 AM on September 13, 2010 [4 favorites]

PLEASE NOTE MY FRIEND'S DAD IS NOT JOHNNY CASH
AS MUCH AS HE WISHES THAT WERE THE CASE
posted by komara at 10:56 AM on September 13, 2010 [1 favorite]

Wait... wait... Army of Darkness was a "flat-out bomb" when it was released? I can't fathom that. Are we talking "Studio hid the money from the filmmakers" bomb or Mallrats bomb? Hmmm...

Bomb is unfair, but it barely made its budget back in the theater (I'm sure it's done just fine on video). I can't really imagine that anyone thought that it was going to be a major blockbuster, but it made just over $11 million which had to have been a little disappointing.
posted by It's Never Lurgi at 10:59 AM on September 13, 2010

"Whenever filmmakers ask, “Hey, how can I get my first feature going?” I’m like, “Find two partners and get ready to flush four years down the toilet.” It can be done, but you’ve got to work."

Hey, It's just like having a baby!!

Ha..ha...I kid...I kid...relax already willya...it's not that bad...sorta, but not exactly...
posted by Skygazer at 11:08 AM on September 13, 2010

I interviewed Bruce for AMC when My Name is Bruce came out. He commented that he was really grateful to his fans for indulging his caprices in weird films like Bubba Ho-Tep, and that he hoped that his new film would reward them with a more traditional horror story. He was soooo nice.

I was horrified when I saw my editors had slapped the headline "Bruce Campbell Atones for Bubba Ho-Tep With My Name Is Bruce" onto the interview. I lobbied hard for a chance, explaining that the headline made it sound like Bruce was regretful about Bubba, or that it was a bad movie. They either didn't get it or didn't care, and the headline stayed. I could barely bring myself to send the link back to the Dark Horse publicity team, and it definitely made me begin to rethink my job.
posted by hermitosis at 11:13 AM on September 13, 2010 [4 favorites]

Hey, It's just like having a baby!!

Wouldn't that be more 18+ years instead of just 4?

Not yet a parent. Somewhat scared at the prospect.

Bomb is unfair, but it barely made its budget back in the theater (I'm sure it's done just fine on video).

Nerdy/geeky films tend to do that at the box office. There's the occasional breakout, but then there's a gazillion Serenitys, Scott Pilgrims, etc out there.
posted by kmz at 11:15 AM on September 13, 2010

Komara: As promised, I am able to deliver a photo of my friend's mom with a young Johnny Cash.

Your friend's mom is a mannequin? Wow, what does that make your friend..Pinocchio?
posted by Skygazer at 11:15 AM on September 13, 2010

Wouldn't that be more 18+ years instead of just 4?

Actually it's more like 2 years, I think ('m not sure, that's where I'm at) once they get past the "plant-like" phase you get your life back a little bit...I hope...

(Please no one crush this sad little illusion I have..it's the only thing keepin' me sorta goin...other than being continually overdosed with massive elephantine doses of unavoidable cuteness I have little to absolutely no defenses to fight off....)
posted by Skygazer at 11:21 AM on September 13, 2010

Bubba Ho-Tep was... something.

I think my favorite Bruce Campbell movie is Fargo.
posted by shakespeherian at 11:23 AM on September 13, 2010

I've mentioned it before, but the one time I met Bruce, my wife was kissing him.
posted by quin at 11:24 AM on September 13, 2010

My favorite Bruce Campbell role was in the Coens' Blood Simple.
posted by komara at 11:25 AM on September 13, 2010 [1 favorite]

...did ya'll know that to Coens, Raimi, and Campbell lived in the same apartment in Chicago for a while like some awesome version of Friends?
posted by The Whelk at 11:28 AM on September 13, 2010 [1 favorite]

For whatever reason, I actually watched this show.
posted by The Whelk at 11:30 AM on September 13, 2010

It's Shemp Eats Moon for me.
posted by Astro Zombie at 11:30 AM on September 13, 2010

Jack of All Trades seemed like a pretty good idea at the time.
posted by shakespeherian at 11:44 AM on September 13, 2010

like a facial tattoo!
posted by The Whelk at 11:46 AM on September 13, 2010

My favorite Bruce Campbell role was in the Coens' Blood Simple.

I dunno. If we're doing his Coen brothers work, liked him in Hudsucker Proxy. Actually, I think I just like his Wiley Coyote cartoon reaction everytime he got slapped by that one woman.
posted by Bathtub Bobsled at 11:46 AM on September 13, 2010

One of the co-producers of Napoleon Dynamite (made for $400,000) is an alum of the small university I used to work for and he came to speak. He said that what they did was to tell investors that they would use their money to make TWO features. The first filmwould be the one they WANTED to make (riskier commercially). Then, (assuming that bombed) the 2nd movie would be a formulatic horror flick, which is just about guaranteed to make a $1M of box office (enough to pay back the investors). As luck would have it, the first film sold to Sony after Sundance for $4M give or take. (if memory serves). It generated $44M boxoffice.
posted by spock at 11:46 AM on September 13, 2010

For whatever reason, I actually watched this show.

I actually own the DVD collection of this one.
posted by cottoncandybeard at 11:51 AM on September 13, 2010

I mean, the premise-- Geriatric Elvis, played by Bruce Campbell, and black JFK team up to defeat a cowboy mummy-- sounds like the best thing ever. Somehow the movie just seemed to do the bare minimum to encapsulate that premise but none of the spirit that the premise implies.
posted by shakespeherian at 11:52 AM on September 13, 2010 [1 favorite]

My favorite Bruce Campbell role was in the Coens' Blood Simple.

I dunno. If we're doing his Coen brothers work, liked him in Hudsucker Proxy.

That's the joke, see. He wasn't actually in the movie Blood Simple, just in the teaser trailer they cobbled together to get investors.
posted by komara at 12:12 PM on September 13, 2010

The only time I ever met Bruce Campbell was in the future.
posted by blue_beetle at 12:18 PM on September 13, 2010 [2 favorites]

Campbell may get the most recognition from the Evil Dead movies, but so long as he's the topic of conversation I'd like to raise my glass to some of his lesser known roles and awesome cameos: Renaldo in Crimewave, the evil cop in Intruder, Smitty in The Hudsucker Proxy, the sadistic dentist in Lunatics: A Love Story. His cameo at the end of Darkman is also totally awesome.

I never met Bruce Campbell, but about 15 years ago I did try to go see the cabin where they filmed Evil Dead. After a long dark drive into unknown territory and a fight with barbed wire, the path seemed to just go on forever. I was starting to think that the driver was having us on, and then I had the most uncanny feeling--I did know this place. I recognized the curve of the ground and the treeline ahead from the film. If there had been a swing banging into the porch in front of us, it would have been perfect. Except there wasn't even a porch. It turned out that the place had fallen victim to arson years previous. We were just in a clearing in the woods in the middle of the night. All that was left was part of the chimney at one end, including the tooth-like facade Bruce and his brother had put together, and scraps of rusty corrugated metal elsewhere: the roof from the work shed. I went home with pieces of both.
posted by heatvision at 12:53 PM on September 13, 2010 [5 favorites]

You went to visit the Evil Dead house in the middle of the night, and took home souvenirs?!

.. Are you actually Ash?
posted by No-sword at 3:12 PM on September 13, 2010 [1 favorite]

You went to visit the Evil Dead house in the middle of the night, and took home souvenirs?!

I found this really neat reel-to-reel tape recorder when I visited. You gotta hear it!
posted by Spatch at 3:36 PM on September 13, 2010 [2 favorites]

I really liked bubba hotep, i've seen it 3 times..
posted by empath at 4:53 PM on September 13, 2010

Bruce Campbell's house
posted by sammyo at 7:41 PM on September 13, 2010

That's a different Bruce Campbell. Still cool, though.
posted by stoneegg21 at 8:04 PM on September 13, 2010

I've mentioned this before, but I woke, half-delirious from too-extended travel, on a ferry travelling from Singapore to Sumatra... and Army of Darkness was starting on the deck's main screen. At first I thought it was part of my delirium. Then I realized it was actually on, and I settled in to enjoy this absolutely wonderful bit of comfort food from home... and glanced around to see other passengers (largely Indonesian) wearing expressions largely conveying What the FUCK am I seeing???
posted by Durn Bronzefist at 8:53 PM on September 13, 2010

I'm trying to imagine a circumstance where someone with decision making abilities would look at AoD and think "Yeah, this'll put people at there ease on a voyage..." what with the undead killing and the chainsaws, and the "Good? Bad? I'm the guy with the gun..."

And I want to party with that guy.
posted by quin at 9:03 PM on September 13, 2010 [1 favorite]

>> Cut to today where on my desk is a very serious and earnest looking Bruce Campbell looking out over the "horizon" with my wife.

> I demand to see this amazing photograph.

I know you weren't asking me, but as it happens, my friend and my then-girlfriend took this one with him at a book signing in 2001 and I thought it was worth sharing.
posted by churl at 10:53 PM on September 13, 2010 [1 favorite]

So, I'm gonna have to go all "Backordered" on getting that picture online. See, as you get older, your memory fades a bit, at least mine does, and with a desk as messy entropic as mine I figured I would just pull off a stack of papers and there it would be - wham! Well, imagine my surprise when it wasn't there. Now, I just moved desks recently, what with cavalier junior and all, but it's going to take me a little while to track down just what the hell I did with it. I just saw it, I swear!? So, hang tight, internet, and I'll be back to you in a bit.

"Honey! Have you seen that picture of you and Bruce Campbell?"
"Who??"
"The guy you went to the bookstore and took that picture looking out into the distance, you know, back in school"
"You mean the guy with the huge jaw?!"*

*-- did not really happen.
posted by cavalier at 7:49 AM on September 14, 2010

As promised, I am able to deliver a photo of my friend's mom with a young Johnny Cash.

I think I just got a big dose of second-hand coolness just from seeing that photo.
posted by It's Never Lurgi at 9:47 AM on September 14, 2010

I love me some Bruce Campbell, Burn Notice is some of the best shit on television, and Brisco County Jr. was required viewing in my youth.

However, can anyone who is a bigger Bruce fan than I am explain "Make Love! The Bruce Campbell Way"? I think there was some hint in the forward about how he wanted to write another auto-bio type book, but his publishers wanted him to write a book about love or something, so the only thing I can think is that he felt writing a book of bad Mary Sue fanfic would be a great 'fuck you' to his publishers. Otherwise it was just a huge disappointment. Thoughts?
posted by Uther Bentrazor at 7:05 AM on September 15, 2010

However, can anyone who is a bigger Bruce fan than I am explain "Make Love! The Bruce Campbell Way"?

Have you seen Man With the Screaming Brain? That was written by Bruce Campbell. He's just not a good writer. And that's okay—he can't be badass at everything.
posted by infinitewindow at 10:12 AM on September 15, 2010