Exclusive: David Arquette Talks Scream Reboot!
Exclusive: David Arquette Talks Scream Reboot!
This past May brought the exciting news that franchise veteran David Arquette would be returning to Paramount Pictures’ Scream reboot and while chatting with the 48-year-old actor and filmmaker for the horror-comedy Spree and his documentary You Cannot Kill David Arquette, ComingSoon.net discussed the next film in the hit slasher series.
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In looking at the forthcoming film, which is set to be helmed by Ready or Not directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, also known as Radio Silence, Arquette reflected on the fact it’ll be the first film in the franchise without horror icon Wes Craven at the helm, who passed away in 2015, feeling “it’ll definitely be said” and looking back fondly on his time with the Nightmare on Elm Street creator.
“I’ll definitely miss Wes, Wes was such an inspiration to me as a director and just a human being,” Arquette warmly expressed. “He was such a kind soul, very smart, I could ask him anything and he would have really incredible insight.”
Despite the lack of the late director at the helm, Arquette shone a bright light on Radio Silence being at the helm and that a number of key franchise talent, including himself, Courtney Cox and creator Kevin Williamson, feeling excitement for what’s to come in the fifth installment of the slasher series.
Click here to purchase the 1996 original film!
“The filmmakers that are doing Scream 5 are really big fans of Wes, so they want to carry on his traditions,” Arquette noted. “The fact that Kevin Williamson is involved and Courtney is back and we hope that we can get Neve to commit too, it’ll be really great to bring everybody back together and continue Wes’ legacy.”
Arquette became the first actor from the original franchise to sign on for the fifth film in the series, with Cox signing on at the end of July for the film and word coming earlier this year that lead heroine Neve Campbell is currently in talks to reprise her role of Sidney Prescott.
While plot details are currently scarce, it is being reported that the film will follow “a woman returning to her home town to try to find out who has been committing a series of vicious crimes.”
The new film will be produced by Project X Entertainment’s James Vanderbilt (Zodiac), who is also co-writing the screenplay with Guy Busick (Ready or Not), as well as Paul Neinstein and William Sherak for Spyglass, with original screenwriter Kevin Williamson executive producing with Radio Silence’s third member Chad Villella.
The first film, released in 1996, was a surprise smash upon its debut, helping to revive the horror genre for the decade and becoming the highest-grossing slasher movie of all-time until it was dethroned by last year’s Halloween reboot. The first’s success spawned a franchise that includes three sequels, the first of which remained equally as successful as the first while the previous two saw middling box office returns and mixed reviews.
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After years of struggling to get another film off the ground, MTV picked up a series adaptation that became a cult hit, with two well-received seasons from fans before it was passed off to VH1 for its rebooted third season, which saw mixed-to-negative reviews from critics and audiences alike, but was a minor improvement in the ratings from the second season.
The Scream revival marks the second major horror franchise reboot Spyglass is working on, with the studio developing a remake of the Clive Barker cult horror classic Hellraiser, with David S. Goyer (Terminator: Dark Fate) attached to pen the script.
Neve Campbell (Party of Five, The Craft) has played Sidney Prescott in the original blockbuster hit Scream way back in 1996. Since then, she became the face of the popular slasher franchise as she also starred in three follow-up sequels. The most recent entry, Scream 4, released in 2011 and grossed $97 million worldwide on a $40 million budget. Campbell recently appeared in Netflix’s House of Cards and the film Castle in the Ground.
The horror-comedy Spree is set to hit select theaters, VOD and digital platforms this Friday while You Cannot Kill David Arquette is slated to make its world premiere at the virtual Fantasia International Film Festival later this month!