‘Halloween’: 40 years of the Boogeyman

Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers (1995)

Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers left the series in limbo, creatively and financially. Executive producer Moustapha Akkad wanted to reevaluate the story and further potential for the franchise. In 1990, plans began for a new film, but legal drama soon cast the future of the Michael Myers character in doubt. Underneath the Dimension umbrella, Miramax eventually bought the rights for Halloween, but it wasn’t until 1994 that the film began to gain steam.

Several scripts were in contention, including one particularly hokey storyline from Phil Rosenberg (in his draft, Michael Myers was a homeless man), which caused Akkad to, allegedly, toss the script across the room. Daniel Farrands, who had originally met with Akkad about the project sometime in 1990, was hired soon after to take up the mantel. And he certaily had his work cut out for him.

“I still feel like almost a guardian of the series. I still post about it on my Facebook wall. I fly my ‘Halloween’ flag very proudly. I never look down on it or back with regret. It was a blast,” he says. “‘Halloween’ was the trailblazer, the trendsetter. It was scary because it was so moody and atmospheric and smart. It was the horror of the imagination, the revenge of the repressed, as John Carpenter called it. That’s what I wanted this movie to be.”

Donald Pleasence made his very last appearance not only in the Halloween franchise but in cinema. He passed away at the age of 75 right after principal photography wrapped. George P. Wilbur (from Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers) makes revisits the role of Michael Myers, offering up drastically more brutality and strength. Paul Rudd makes his silver screen debut as the beleaguered Tommy Doyle, one of the kids Laurie Strode babysat in the original movie, and Marianne Hagan delivers a poetically subtle performance as Kara Strode. The cast is rounded out by Devin Gardner (as Danny Strode, Kara’s son, who is plagued with nightmares of the Man in Black), JC Brandy (as a recast Jamie Lloyd), Mitchell Ryan (Dr. Wynn), Mariah O’Brien (Beth), Keith Bogart (Tim Strode), Kim Darby (Debra Strode) and Bradford English (playing the abusing patriarch, John Strode).

Filming began in the fall of 1994 in and around Salt Lake City. A massive, unexpected snow storm caused initial delays and production issues ⏤ with many outside scenes rescheduled for inside shoots. From start to finish on the set, Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers was marred with studio meddling and producers wanting an entirely different film altogether. Farrands and director Joe Chappelle (The Wire, CSI: Miami), who has put through the wringer over the years by fans, had to fight for as much creative control as possible. They won some battles; but lost still others. “When the fans watch this movie and go, ‘What the fuck?!’ I am, too,” says Farrands, only half-joking.

“Well, listen, it’s a time capsule for me in a way. I was 24 years old when I was hired to write the film. I felt like the luckiest guy on the planet. It truly was fulfilling a childhood wish,” says Farrands. “I can’t overstate how I obsessed I was over the ‘Halloween’ movies as a kid and through junior high and high school. ‘Halloween’ is by and away my favorite film of all time. It inspired me to want to be in the film business.”

“That being said, at the time, I was dismayed and shocked and very let down that I felt the movie was not really a reflection of what I intended it to be. I was pretty vocal about it. In time, opinions soften. It seems to me there’s a little bit of a cult following for this particular sequel, which really warms my heart,” he continues. “I get emails all the time from people all over the place who say it was the first one they saw in theatres, and it was the one that got them into the ‘Halloween’ series. That’s really touching.”

Director of photography Billy Dickson (One Tree Hill, Ally McBeal) aimed to evoke the true spirit of “middle of fall” as best he could. “I wanted the exterior days to reflect the warmth of fall like I did in my childhood growing up around Chicago,” he says of the cinematography, which has often been heralded as the best of the whole series. “With leaves falling in front of camera, I wanted to separate the exterior nights with more contrast and danger, using lightning and shadows. Contrasting my candlelit interiors with warmth and false sense of security.”

Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers opened September 29, 1995 with just over $7 million in ticket sales. It eventually grossed over $15 million and has earned a six percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Below, Daniel Farrands walks through his original plans for the sixth installment, what he wanted for the story arc of series favorite Jamie Lloyd and how too many cooks in the kitchen left the story a gnarled mess. Dickson provides further insight into his very stylized and gloomy approach to aesthetics, color palettes and tension.

Getting Involved

Dickson: I was asked to shoot the film when Matthew Patrick [Hider in the House, Tainted Blood] was directing the movie. We were set to go on location in Utah in the spring 1994. Producers fired Matthew days before we were to leave. I didn’t hear anything else till they hired Joe Chappelle and I re-interviewed with him and was rehired to shoot the film.

First Day of Filming

Farrands: The first shot of the movie was in front of the Myers house when the dad sees the kids putting up the “Michael is coming home” sign. That was the first day of production. The kids on the street were all actually wearing their real Halloween costumes. I will give ‘Halloween 6’ props for having the best atmosphere. Billy Dickson was the DP and such a great guy. Again, he was another person who wanted it to be really good. He was really pushing for the scares and that dripping atmosphere that the first movie had.

I think ours had a little bit more because they filmed the original in March. There were a lot of visually cool things about our movie. I’m still very proud of the scene with Kara in the window. It’s my homage to Hitchcock’s ‘Rear Window’ and also ‘When a Stranger Calls.’ Those moments made me feel like we got it. “This is Halloween.”

Dickson: It helped with production not trying to shoot around green trees and keep the bareness and starkness of the environment without issue. Shooting fall for fall was nice. However, nights were colder, and we had a couple of snow days.

Tied to Halloween 5

Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers introduced several plot points without rhyme or reason. Michael Myers’ Thorn tattoo, the mysterious Man in Black and the cliffhanger ending all trapped Farrands into the corner, story-wise.

Farrands: I was not only tied down, but it was a requirement of the job. It was an absolute necessity that we figure out or explain to the audience who this mystery man in black was that showed up and decimated the entire sheriff’s department in Haddonfield. [laughs] There was no answer to that in ‘Halloween 5,’ so it fell to whoever the guy that did ‘Halloween 6.’ For better or worse, that was me. [laughs]

There were some ideas thrown around, but I was always a purist who said, “Let’s take it back to the original movie as much as we can.” There was always that strange bit of dialogue between Sam Loomis and Dr. Wynn leaving the hospital after Michael had escaped in the original movie. Wynn says, “He couldn’t drive a car.” Loomis says, “He was doing very well last night. Maybe someone around here gave him lessons.” I thought that was always odd. So, that’s where the idea was born, out of that piece of dialogue. We built it from there.

I remember the original treatment very well. In the reveal of ‘Halloween 6,’ it was almost like a Shirley Jackson’s ‘The Lottery,’ where we found out the people of Haddonfield had been so tormented and terrorized by the specter of Michael that they had formed this cult as a way of warding off pure evil. This was going back to the origins of the holiday itself.

Moustapha felt like that was too big for this particular movie, but he loved the idea. He said, “Let’s do that for ‘Halloween 7.’ We’ll find out there’s a bigger picture here.” So, we started a little more self-contained and made it the principals and the people that reared Michael within the confines of Smith’s Grove Sanitarium.

A lot of things happened along the way with a lot of cooks in the kitchen. I think it all ended up a little hokey, and they didn’t quite capture what I had envisioned, which was totally more

‘Rosemary’s Baby.’ It was more about people in everyday life rather than coven robes and things that ended up in the first cut. Later, Dimension decided they wanted to jazz the movie up and get rid of that hokey ending. They ordered reshoots, and it became a debacle, to say the least.

“They should ban Halloween in this town.”

In Halloween 5, Tina Williams (Wendy Kaplan) tells her friend Samantha Thomas (Tamara Glynn) that Halloween should be banned in Haddonfield. Here, in Farrands’ story, Halloween has been banned for the last five or so years.

Farrands: That felt like the next logical step. After all these mass murders in this town, you would think the townsfolk would pass a referendum or something against Halloween. I imagine it in this big town hall in the fall of 1990 saying “No more!” That was what I envisioned. In the original draft of ‘Halloween 6,’ we actually met the mayor of Haddonfield, and he was set up as a red herring for who this mysterious man in black would be.

He was this enigmatic mayor from ‘Jaws,’ and he’s the one that said, “No more of this,” and was talked out of it. He was very conservative and old school. We were going to find out he had lost someone to Michael many years ago. There was this subplot in the movie. He was designed to be the voice of the town. I remember writing in the script that he wore all white to draw contrast. He was a little like Colonel Sanders. [laughs]

Early Ideas for Halloween 6

Farrands: I went in there for the meeting in 1990 with this book. I’ll call it a bible of what I had created of ‘Halloween’ lore ⏤ not only of the movie series that had developed up to that point but also the origins of the holiday, the pagan rituals and the things that influenced John Carpenter. He used all that stuff in ‘Halloween II.’ I also thought the novelizations were interesting, as well. There’s this whole backstory of Michael Myers that’s in the book written by Curtis Richards, which is a pseudonym for someone else. I love that idea of tying it back to Samhain and that this was the night when the veil between the living and dead vanishes.

I felt that really explained the Boogeyman. He becomes active on this night of unholy terror and spirituality. The dead and the undead are confused. They don’t know they’re dead. So, maybe Michael’s dead, and he’s something more than human. Maybe he’s between human and the supernatural. He’s something we can’t explain. How do you explain someone who’s been shot 127 times and burned and keeps getting up? [laughs]

It certainly lent itself to some kind of supernatural origin. I didn’t want to go too far into that as a weird world. But that cult idea and the ‘Rosemary’s Baby’ aspect were very creepy. I think we were still coming out of the ‘80s and the satanic hysteria with the Nick Martin trial and people thinking their neighbors were satanic cult members. Well, I thought, “Let’s use that.” I thought it was creepy, especially in a town like Haddonfield where everything is sort of safe and normal and placid. Everyone seems normal, but maybe they’re not. In a way, ‘Halloween III’ did do that with that town of Santa Mira.

In my mind, that added another layer of tension and strangeness. I wanted to see it evolve a bit, just from a standard “oh, he’s out and escaped again and killing a bunch of people.” All of that is cool, but I felt like we’ve seen it. I wanted to do something different while keeping it within the confines of what the series had established. That was a challenge to weave all that together.

The Shape Returns

This iteration of Michael Myers is brutal, relentless and falls into the Jason Voorhees school of killing. His playfully macabre nature is exchanged for a more straightforward approach. Throughout his original script, Farrands peppered the story and its characters with essences of John Carpenter’s original, also drawing upon much of Carpenter’s other work.

Farrands: In the script, Michael Myers was always referred to as The Shape. I littered the script with references to the original movie ⏤ dialogue, characters, street names, locations. Hardin County was something that was referenced in the first two movies and had never been spoken off after, so I brought that back. People on the set were like, “What does that mean?” I said, “It’s in the movies. Fans will get it!” [laughs] I was just part of the universe that John Carpenter and Debra Hill had created so brilliantly.

I wanted to pay my respects to that. There are even references to other Carpenter movies. There’s a nod to ‘The Fog’ when Tim makes a morning stomach pounder for breakfast, and to ‘Halloween III’ with the old lady who lives across the street, her name is Minnie Blankenship and she was supposed to meet up with Ellie’s dad for dinner and he never showed up [in ‘Halloween III’].

I’m such a student of Carpenter’s work that it just meant a tremendous amount to me to tip the hat as much as I could ⏤ even putting the right address of the Myers house, which we knew to be 45 Lampkin Lane. None of the other movies put those kinds of details into the town. In a way, it just goes to show how much it all meant to me. I thought those references still snuck into the movie, even if the people who made the movie didn’t understand any of it. [laughs]

Who did understand it and where I was coming from was Moustapha. He got it. Even if he didn’t actually know half of what I was talking about, he understood that I knew. He always made a point to razzle me a bit. He’d say, “Nobody knows ‘Halloween’ better than Dan. He’s the expert, so we defer.” On one level, I was embarrassed, but also very touched and thrilled he would see my weird obsession was valuable.

Breaking Out

After the opening credits, the audience is reacquainted with pivotal character Jamie Lloyd, who has been held hostage by a satanic cult now for six years. A nurse (played by Susan Swift) helps her escape, and Michael Myers is soon hot on her trail in the dead of (rather stormy October) night.

Dickinson: Once Jamie escapes into the night, full man-made rain with lightning added to the cold bluestack exteriors. Keeping everything monotone, we did our best to minimize Michael in silhouette and keep him more mysterious. When Jamie escapes from the asylum, it was the coldest night we had on the production.

I believe it snowed all day. Jamie had to escape in only her hospital gown. I was concerned she would get hyperthermia in the below freezing temps. I know there were many conversations with producers to convince her to continue filming in this weather.

Jamie’s Original Story Arc

In the theatrical cut, Jamie, the hero of Halloween 4 and 5, meets her end within the film’s first 15 minutes. Michael Myers tracks her down to a farm on the outside of town, grabs her by the throat and slams her onto a wheat thresher. Myers turns it on, and Jamie is disemboweled, a rather unceremonious exit for one of the series’ major characters. To top it all off, there was a a huge debacle regarding Danielle Harris’ pay, and the studio recast Jamie with a newcomer named JC Brandy.

Farrands: I remember when I pitched the movie for the second time. I went into that first round table meeting with Moustapha, Paul Freeman and Malek Akkad. I remember saying, “Jamie…” They all looked at each other like, “Yeah…I think that’s played out.” I said, “Well, OK, why don’t we use her as a bridge into this movie. Make the first 15 minutes about her and wrap that up. But she’s also the hero, so we have to find a heroic way out for her.” When I pitched this ‘Rosemary’s Baby’ concept and the cult, Moustapha was like, “Oh my gosh, I get it. They abducted her and Michael and are keeping them hidden. And the baby has to be the ultimate sacrifice.” We went into all of that.

Then, we were back to the Jamie story to wrap it up. I wrote it, and it was very different. She did escape and gets caught by Michael. He delivers a pretty horrific stab wound. She ends up in the hospital where we revisit her again and has a horrible nightmare. We reveal to the audience how she came to be here, and she escapes from this hospital. We don’t see her until the end of the movie. In the end, she made her way back to Smith’s Grove where she is very wounded and very much ready to pass the mantel on.

But she enables Kara, Tommy and the children out of these catacombs. She stood in the way of The Shape, and it was supposed to be very much like the finale of ‘Escape from New York.’ Jamie delivered a huge battle against The Shape, a fight to end all fights. She lays it out completely. She dies in the end but dies victoriously. So, Jamie came back in every act. I wanted that, and I think the audience would have wanted that for her.

The studio saw something else. We were all very surprised that they didn’t offer Danielle Harris the role. I think it was because she was making movies with Sylvester Stallone at the time. I always felt maybe she out-priced us here or she’s not interested. I remember that they didn’t offer her the role. They went out in breakdowns with the part and had a picture of her in the breakdowns. I wasn’t there but I remember hearing that Danielle walked into the casting office and said, “Why are you going after someone else? This is me! Here I am!” I think everyone was like, “Oh, you want to do it?” She said, “Of course, I do.” She was taken by surprise. I remember everyone was thrilled that she was going to do the movie.

We were moving forward, and I remember going to the production office and seeing all the 8x10s of the cast on the wall. Her face was right there. It was there just days before we started shooting. No one had any idea she wasn’t going to be in the movie. As far as we all understood, people on my level, we thought it was a done deal. It turned out not to be the case.

My understanding, and having become good friends with Danielle over the years, is I guess what was going on was they were negotiating with her. The studio was nickel and diming her and saying, “No, she’s a day player. We’re going to pay her this measly amount of money, and that’s what she gets.” Danielle was like, “Wait, that’s less money than I got for the last movie.” I think she even said, “I’ll do it for the same money, but you can’t expect me to take less.” They were like, “Take it or leave it.” She said, “I guess I’ll leave it. If that’s what you think of me…”

I’m not kidding when I say I think it was two days before they started shooting this film. It was a mad dash to cast someone else. Lovely JC Brandy stepped in, and she was one of the sweetest people you could ever meet. I know she felt that pressure of “Oh god. How am I going to do this?! People are going to hate me…” But we were all terribly disappointed Danielle didn’t do the movie. To this day, and I’ve done movies with her, I get it. I get why she didn’t. It still sucks as a fan. It still sucks as the writer of the movie.

They cut the part of Jamie down so much. They wanted to kill her off halfway through the movie with a bullet in her head. She’s sleeping in a bed. That was freaking cruel. The mentality of the studio was just to get rid of that character. It just sucked.

A couple years ago, Danielle did a project as a favor to me called ‘Havenhurst.’ We were talking later. She said, “What we should do is get a red camera, and we’ll reshoot all those scenes from ‘Halloween 6’ just for fun.” [laughs] She’s a sweetheart. There’s no hard feelings. She even mentioned to me that she gets residuals off of ‘Halloween 6’ because they had originally put in a flashback to a scene from ‘Halloween 5’ at the end. She’s like, “I’m thrilled I didn’t get to do ‘Halloween 6’ because I get paid for nothing.” She was happily surprised that she at least got something out of it. We can kind of laugh about these things now.

The Return of Tommy Doyle

Tommy Doyle makes a long-awaited return to the series. Played by Paul Rudd, Tommy is a traumatized 20-something who has become obsessed with the Boogeyman, to an unhealthy degree. But he becomes a crucial character and a driver for the story in unexpected ways.

Farrands: In my original pitch, I did have the idea of Tommy Doyle coming back and being this younger version of Dr. Loomis, somebody who can do something. I thought Tommy was an interesting character. Here’s this guy who had been really traumatized by what he had experienced. He was the boy that cried wolf in the first movie. In a way, he was punished for believing in what was right there that nobody else had seen. He was very much like Laurie Strode and repressed. Tommy was the outsider kid and beat up by the other kids. It was like, well, what happened to him?

Paul had some interesting choices for Tommy that I didn’t necessarily think was in line with the character. But that was his interpretation. I thought it was cool.

He was a real champion of what the script was supposed to have been. He was really annoyed by the changes that were being forced upon us. He was not happy, nor were many people that were involved. Again, it felt like a scramble, and it was not very well thought out. They were pressed against the release date.

It was a little hurtful. I felt like this was a thing that meant so much to me, and I know the series meant so much to fans. It had been so many years since ‘Halloween 5.’ We wanted to come out really strong. Yet, there were a lot of people behind the scenes that weren’t as concerned in making the fans happy as they were wanting to just appeal to the lowest common denominator out there. If 12-year-old boys get excited about exploding heads, then so be it!

I ran into Paul on a flight maybe 10 or more years ago. I was literally getting on a plane, and he was immediately like, “Oh my god, Danny! You wrote my first film!” He introduced me to his wife and had a nice little chat at baggage claim when we got back to LA. He couldn’t be nicer. We both came from that bad taste in our mouth from what the studio did to the movie we both felt passionately about. I will tell you this. When he found out that this wasn’t just a job for me, it changed everything for that guy. He went out of his way to turn to me in moments and go, “Is that good? Is that how you want it?” I think it really became more personal. Paul was and is still just a great guy.

It’s funny how people have made all these assumptions about how much he hates the movie. He hates what they did to the movie. He doesn’t hate that he was in it at all. He told me, “I sell more ‘Halloween 6’ DVDs than anything else.” When people ask for his autograph, that’s what they want him to sign.

Evoking Ritualistic Halloween

One of the most stunning sequences is the story Mrs. Blankenship (Janice Knickrehm) tells little Danny about the Boogey. It is cut with images of Tommy walking through the Halloween festivals where bonfires have been lit and the sky is eerily black.

Dickson: We shot Tommy walking through the festival at 48 frames per second, giving the bonfires a surreal effect. It is contrast with the Blankenship storytelling as we push in on the two of them telling the story.

Marianne’s Classic Approach

The main plot of the film centers around the Strode family, who now live in the Myers house. Marianne Hagan plays the oppressed and shy Karen, and she must wrestle with her family’s tragic past, her son Danny and her father’s abusive ways, all while surviving another night of mayhem.

Farrands: Marianne was so honored. That’s the word I think of when I think back on her quality when she was working. Every minute of it, I remember her drinking it all in. It meant something to her, not just because it was a job but this was ‘Halloween.’ She really understood that this meant something.

She embraced it fully and was such a trooper. She was game for everything and took it as more of a Shakespearean role than a part in a horror film. She took this character seriously to make Kara Strode relatable and sort of sad. That’s a great testament to her. She’s such a kind human being and someone I truly admire.

Beth’s Death

After the Halloween festivities die down for the evening, Beth and Tim make their way back to the Myers house. Michael Myers first strangles Tim as he gets out of the shower, steaming rising around his body, his muffled cries unheard. But it’s Beth’s death that is particularly unnerving. Kara bares witness to the slaughter, looking on from Tommy’s room in the boarding house across the street through his telescope.

Dickson: It was one of our first murders. We wanted it to be a little more frenzied and unsalted. We shot the murder with much more violent hand held camera usage.

Across the Street

Beth’s death is the impetus for the much-anticipated chase sequence. Upon discovering the bloody corpses of Beth and Tim, Danny and Kara make a beeline back to the boarding house. It’s a sequence that is absolutely soaked in tremendous mood and bone-chilling lighting.

Dickson: I loved how the timing of the lightning worked in our favor.  Being a low budget film, we didn’t have a lot of time to get things right sometimes. It feels like you don’t get a good sense of Michael till the lightning strikes.

Reshoots

In the summer of 1995, the film was tested screen, and the reaction was overwhelmingly negative. The studio immediately ordered reshoots, especially for the ending ⏤ which you can see in the producer’s cut involves Michael Myers being stopped by a handful of rune stones on the floor. Unfortunately, Donald Pleasence passed away several months prior, so many of his scenes were reused to fit the new outline.

Farrands: The ending was completely reshot. The reshoots were ordered in July, and the movie came out in September. It was all done within four days and the rest in post-production, just trying to get it to work, editorially. One of the biggest challenges was, you know, that we lost our beloved Donald. It was one of those horrific situations as filmmakers where your lead actor has passed away, and the movie is technically not in the can. So, that added even more challenge to write around him.

There was a double of Donald onset, and I remember seeing this man walking out of his trailer. I swear it was Donald Pleasence reborn. It was at a distance, so, of course, as you get closer, you realize it’s not him. But it was such an uncanny resemblance that made me step back. I was really startled. It was bizarre.

I felt like a lot of times the mentality of that particular studio and the people that ran it was more blood, more gore, more gruesome. They felt like these were ‘Friday the 13th’ movies. ‘Halloween’ always plays better on a level of a suspense movie rather than a slasher fest. But that’s not what they wanted it to be. They went in and did all those ridiculous inserts of heads exploding on fuse boxes and poor Jamie Lloyd getting gutted on a piece of farm machinery. There were a lot of things just arbitrarily thrown into the movie because the studio was demanding blood and guts. That’s how they intended to “save” the movie.

Learning His Place

Farrands: As a writer, you learn your place. It was certainly made clear to me at certain times to not overstep my bounds. I was the one I felt was protecting it more. I was really the one fighting to make it better, to make it more respectful of the original and less dumbed down, to make it really build these moments of tension. I realized I was only the writer. There was that mentality. Though, I was never uninvited to the set. But I do remember there was a sense in the air that I was way overstepping, in terms of my opinions about how things were being done. You have those groups of people where they think they know.

Fighting for the Story

Every inch of the way, Farrands was the voice of reason, trying to pull back studio demands of blood, guts and gore for suspense and tension. Even when it came to the Michael Myers mask, tone and scene-setting, his opinion was disregarded for smoke and mirrors.

Farrands: I’m glad I fought for the little things I did fight for that made it into the movie. I think it made it better. I really did care. The fans are so attached to this franchise, and I was attached to it. You feel a responsibility in a way. I was young and very naive about Hollywood politics. I was making all sorts of comments like, “That body in the tree looks absolutely ridiculous. You can’t be serious?” [laughs] I was saying things they didn’t necessarily want to hear. But I was certainly the voice of the fans when the movie came out. They echoed all of what I was saying during this movie. It’s not one of those “I told you so” moments…but kind of. [laughs]

I wanted this movie to be good and scary. I didn’t want that mask or the locations we ended up using. I wanted it to be very authentic. I was made aware of early in the process that it was the director’s medium. And that’s the way it was going to go.

I wanted to steer away from the obvious, like the way that they envisioned the cult. There were references in the script to people in black robes, but for me, it was all distorted vision. Jamie was drugged. What is she seeing? What is happening? It was more impressionistic, more eerie. I had hoped the movie was going to play on a darker, more sinister level, that we were going down a road that was uncomfortable. I never felt like the movie went there.

Tonally, it was a little off. Even the mask they had made for it, which was fine, I guess, but it was like, “Wait a minute. That’s not right.” I remember I walked into Don Post Studios, and I was one of those guys that just knocked on the door. I said, “Listen, we’re making ‘Halloween 6,’ and do you still have the Captain Kirk mold? Could you make us one…or two or three to show them?”

To my surprise, they were like, “Oh my god, come in. What do you want? What do you need? I’ll do it now.” The whole Don Post team was suddenly mobilized for this ⏤ not because they wanted money but because they understood. So, they made a bunch of masks, maybe six or seven. I brought them to the set. They’re like, “No. Don’t like it.” That was frustrating.

I felt like I was the odd man out. And I’ve always been the odd man out. Now, I embrace it. I’ll just be the one that does shit. [laughs] I remember feeling hurt that people weren’t taking it as seriously as I wanted them to. After awhile, they wouldn’t tell me certain things. They cut a whole sequence where the dad comes home from work, comes in and finds there’s no dinner and makes himself a microwave pot pie ⏤ and then he goes and puts the TV on and ‘Halloween III’ is on and he calls it a piece of shit and turns it off. Michael plays this game of cat and mouse with him through the house. They said, “Oh, we didn’t have time for that, so we just cut it.”

The scene [with Kim Darby’s character] got the audience screaming. I really felt the moments we nailed it, we actually kind of nailed it. It was just that the producers kind of let that go. It didn’t seap it up. If the rest of the movie had played like those two scenes, we would have had a really cool one.

There were a lot of scenes like that that were written but just not filmed for time. I get it. I’ve done movies, and I get time. But I’m also like, “Don’t cut the good shit that’s tension-building and creates the essence of who Michael Myers is…” He did these childlike things to fuck with this victims before he did them in. That was the brilliance of ‘Halloween’ ⏤ locking the car, unlocking the car, putting the sheet over his head with the glasses. He was a twisted little fuck that played games. We needed that, and it was written that way. It was just dismissed.

I think the movie could have been another 20 minutes longer. It’s not necessarily the length. It’s the cinematic real estate. How do you fill those minutes? How do you manipulate your audience and twist their expectations? That’s what is missing from this movie. It needed to be more clever.

Despite all those things, when I look back at the experience overall, it’s a huge feather in my cap and has been for 20 some odd years now. It literally opened doors in my career that may never have been opened. After that movie, I was pitching Dreamworks and Paramount and Disney. I suddenly had access to producers, companies and studios I would never have had without ‘Halloween 6.’ I can’t say it strongly enough that it changed my life for the better. I’m forever grateful for the experience, as frustrating at times as it could be and as disappointing as the results were. I saw my life changing.

I know people have written about me and said things like, “Oh, all he does is trash that movie.” I’m like, “No, actually, I don’t. I’m so grateful for ‘Halloween 6.’” I’d be blind if I didn’t point out the movie’s crater-like flaws.

Dickson: I believe Daniel knows what he’s talking about. There were a lot of discussions about the story and direction even after we wrapped. There were factions of people trying to divide us and take sides. It became very uncomfortable.

Donald’s Seal of Approval

Farrands: Donald Pleasence was royalty on the set for all of us. We were just so humbled and thrilled and in awe of him as a man and a performer. That’s what made it feel authentic to me ⏤ his presence on that set and joking with people and being so effusive about how he felt about my script. I remember he had an agent in London, who was this little old lady that had been representing him for years. She couldn’t sleep after she had read the script. [laughs] She was terrified. That legitimized all of it and made some of the crappy stuff not so crappy. That felt like a huge win.

Scrapped Dr. Loomis Scenes

In the theatrical cut, Dr. Loomis has a considerably smaller role in the film than he had had in previous installments. That came down to a studio wanting something completely different than what Farrands had envisioned for the character.

Farrands: There are so many cut Loomis scenes. Here’s the thing. The script was whittled down throughout the course of the film. I was on set in Salt Lake City for part of the time, maybe 10 days out of the 35-day schedule, whatever it was. So, I wasn’t there the whole time. I remember getting reports from Malek Akkad, who has always been a friend to me. We were both the young rookies still. He never got any special favors. Malek would make calls to me from the set saying things like, “Oh my god. You’re never going to believe this. They just cut this scene!” Sometimes, it would panic me, but in other times, I’d be like, “OK…” It did feel like I had my own microphone right from the set. [laughs]

There was this moment when Loomis was going to be flown to Haddonfield in a helicopter. He was going to land in this field where they had burned a crop circle that looked like the Thorn symbol. This is what ended up being a giant brand on a bunch of hay bales. That was going to be a big dramatic moment. The helicopter was going to return later in the movie when Wynn was going to make his escape, and little did he know, Tommy Doyle had planted some explosives in Wynn’s black satchel and detonated them. So, Wynn went boom in the helicopter. There was this much bigger, action movie feel to it. We were going to do it. I remember Malek had gotten a miniature for the explosion. It was all in process. All of a sudden, it wasn’t happening anymore.

There was much more of Loomis being who he was. He was with Wynn, and they were patrolling the streets. There was a moment that was very ‘Halloween II’ where he sees someone he thinks is The Shape. Also, of course, Donald was really not in good health. He couldn’t do the physical stuff as much. Part of it was to minimize the physical moments for him, but again, people in the production end of things cut and cut and cut. I think there is even a line in the trailer from the scene where he’s talking to Kim Darby’s character, and he says, “I knew what he was, and I never knew why.” That was a line from that scene that got cut.

There were also a couple scenes of him with the sheriff where they’re going toe-to-toe. This sheriff was the successor to Ben Meeker from ‘Halloween 4’ and ‘Halloween 5.’ They cut all of that. But we kind of knew who the sheriff was. He was a more badass type, a kind of John Wayne type. It was part of his whole thing to try and ban Halloween. He and the mayor had something going on in one of the drafts.

Loomis was exposing their dark secrets. Loomis was reduced to a bit player. Because it was his last performance, for me, it was such a letdown. We were all bowing to him when he was on set, and this is what is left of his contribution to the movie? Creatively, I wish we all would have had a big ole tree and tied ourselves to it until Bob Weinstein went away. [laughs]

The Lab

The third act of the film takes a hard left into bizarro land. After our cast of heros Kara, Danny, Tommy and Stephen make their way to Smith’s Grove, they come across a metallic, sterile laboratory. Kara glances over and sees test tube embryos and diagrams of human genes.

Farrands: People ask me all the time, “What does that ending mean when they go into this lab?” I have no idea. [laughs] I remember being on that set and asking, “What is this about?” I would be told, “It’ll all make sense when you see it.” OK, sure. This was all a concoction of studio heads and the director and the other writers who just threw shit to the wall and figured something would stick. ‘The X-Files’ was cool at the time, so I think they were trying to appeal to that.

I think the powers that be wanted to add some weird subplot about genetic mutation. I can only glean from what I’ve seen in the movie ⏤ maybe they’re trying to harness some genetic source of evil and they’re using embryos to try to create it? I didn’t write it, so I have no idea what that was. I’m sure they were feeling the heat turning up on them and then cowing to these egotistical studio heads who are barking orders on the phone. I always thought we had to be better than this.

The ending changed so many times, I can’t remember all of them. But I swear there must have been 15 different endings. The one I remember that I was attached to, a producer said, “You can’t end the movie in a bathroom.” I’m like, “Why not? It’s scary.” The ending I recall was the heroes make their escape and end up at the same bus station that Jamie ended up the night before.

It’s empty. Kara takes the baby down into the restroom area. Tommy gets on the phone to try to call for help. He hears a scream and runs toward it. He sees Kara bleeding to death on the floor. The baby is missing, and Danny is holding the knife. The cops are coming, and it’s going to look like Danny did all of this. That was the weird ending that I really liked. But the producer said no.

Blowback on Director Joe Chappelle

Dickson: I remember having to defend him several times with the producers. We all tried to stand behind Joe and help him with his vision even. Though, in the end, he didn’t reciprocate or appreciate how we helped him.

Farrands: Joe Chappelle is an incredibly nice person. But I felt like he was a cog in a much bigger machine. I think they manipulated him into doing things maybe he didn’t agree with. I remember a lot of times he’d shake his head and go, “Oh my god…this isn’t what we were going to make…” He got the shit beaten out of him, critically and even from fans. I think it’s unfortunate.

They didn’t really know what he was up against. It was a studio that was pretty vicious. I think they baited him in a way. “Oh, do this for us, and we’ll make a career for you.” They invited him into their weird family. I’m not saying he sold out, but I think any young director would bat like that. These people were making Oscar-winning movies at the time.

He drank their kool-aid a little bit, and I don’t even blame him for it. Given that opportunity, anybody would. I get it. It’s kind of why some directors have a reputation of being difficult. It’s because they’re really fighting for the movie, and they’re saying “fuck you” to a lot of these people who just don’t care about what they’re making. I wish we had all been a little older and wiser, but that’s where we were. It was a whole start for all of us.

First Reaction to the Movie

Dickson: When I saw the film the first time, I was horrified of what the movie turned out to be with the added footage. I was not asked to be a part of the final color correction and felt they took what I had done and turned it upside down.

The Holy Trinity

By the time Halloween: Resurrection came out in 2002, a pattern had emerged in how the series and various creative teams handled their Final Girls. After Rachel Caruthers rises victorious over Michael Myers in ‘Halloween 4,’ she meets her end within the first few minutes of ‘Halloween 5.’ Jamie Lloyd’s fate follows a similar pattern from ‘Halloween 5’ to ‘Halloween 6,’ as well as Laurie Strode from ‘Halloween H20: Twenty Years Later’ to ‘Halloween: Resurrection.’

Farrands: I think some of it is contractual, as in the case of Jamie Lee Curtis and ‘Halloween Resurrection.’ It was literally built into her contract for ‘Halloween H20’ that she had to be in so many minutes of the next movie. So, they were like, “Yeah, we just gotta kill her off.” I think she was kind of like, “Ok…I guess I’ll just do that.” I don’t think it was a great passion of hers to be a part of that. It’s probably why she agreed to do the new one.

She’s probably like, “Well, that sucked.” [laughs] It’s the movie business. Sometimes, with these lower budget movies, producers get scared of actors wanting a lot more money when the previous one was a hit. So, I’m not saying that’s specifically the case with Danielle, but I do think there was, at one time, that sort of feeling of it being more of a cost-saving thing than a creative decision.

I can’t speak for the other writers or directors, but I had to fight to even get Jamie in this movie. I don’t think they quite had a handle on those movies and how these characters were to the fan base. Killing Rachel off in ‘Halloween 5’ was a terrible mistake. She’s the girl we came to love and cheer for in ‘Halloween 4.’ So, why would they kill her off like that?

Again, it was a bad move to write off Jamie in such a sloppy way. It was just not the way it was supposed to be. In my mind, she lived until the end, and she was a connective character. She wasn’t the focus of the movie as much this time, but she was the glue of it all.

Maybe Danielle wouldn’t have been cast in [Rob Zombie’s films] had she done ours. So, maybe everything worked out the way it was supposed to. You never know. We can always look back and wonder about the roads not taken, but I’m happy she was able to revisit the series with a totally different character. She’s such a talented actress, and she’s been nothing but sweet and understanding.

I remember originally approaching her after this movie. I said, “Oh my god. I’m so so so sorry.” For many years, I felt like I was walking on eggshells because I felt so bad about it. There just came a point where we were just laughing about it.