NBC's new suspense and horror anthology series, "Fear Itself," is from the Emmy Award-winning creators of "Masters of Horror" and some of Hollywood's most acclaimed and provocative directors, writers, and stars.
01/08/2008 - Elisabeth Moss - "Mad Men" TV Series Cast Members Appear at New York Times Arts & Leisure Week in Times Center in New York - Times Center - New York City, NY, USA © Janet Mayer / PR Photos
A rookie's first night at the precinct becomes a living nightmare as she takes on a physically imposing serial killer with a taste for flesh.
The episode airs Thursday, July 3 at 10 pm, and is directed by Stuart Gordon ("Re-Animator") and written by Cemetery Dance Magazine publisher and editor Richard Chizmar & Johnathon Schaech.
When her fellow cops start acting bizarre, she quickly learns that no one is who they seem. Russell Hornsby, Pablo Schreiber and Stephen Lee also star.
Monsters and Critics got a chance to speak to Producers Keith Addis and Andrew Deane who joined Elisabeth Moss, star of the next installment, "Eater,” to discuss the series and the story.
Keith and Andrew both noted the similarities and the differences between the yesteryear anthologies like "Outer Limits" and the challenges of bringing an updated feel to the show for NBC.
"When we found our new partners at Lionsgate and NBC, we were anxious about this transition, as the filmmakers we work with on 'Masters of Horror' had such absolute freedom when it came to the content issues," shared Addis
But we were incredibly pleasantly surprised when we discovered how many of the filmmakers we had worked with before and had wanted to work with before but hadn't had the chance to really embraced this idea.
We discovered very quickly that a lot of the devices that have been used for the last couple of years particularly, the very graphic, gruesome violence, the sexually graphic and salacious devices that had been used in a lot of successful horror films were no longer available to them."
Addis continued, "And I think the notion of being much more imaginative about how they would entertain and terrify audiences in this medium turned out to be a great thing for the show. But it would be dishonest to say that we expected that to be the case. It was just a really pleasant surprise."
The latest episode "Eater" features actress Elisabeth Moss, a regular on "Mad Men."
Moss gave some insight to her character: "I play Danni Bannerman, who is a tough, sort of tomboy, Goth girl, and she's also a rookie cop at this police station. And it's kind of the classic story of the girl and the serial killer, kind of meeting her match or not.
FEAR ITSELF -- "Eater" Episode 101 -- Pictured: (l-r) Stephen R. Hart as
Mellor , Elisabeth Moss as Bannerman -- NBC Photo: Chris Large
And the serial killer, who is an Eater, is sort of self-explanatory. He comes to stay in the precinct on his way to a sort of high-security facility. And of course, there's a blizzard outside and --the whole thing. chaos ensues. It was great because she sort of is a huge horror fan and is very into that, reads all the magazines, does the whole thing. And she kind of becomes a part of her own story, which is not as fun as reading about it in a magazine or watching a movie.
Moss talked about working with director Stuart Gordon.
"Stuart was awesome, and you'll find that these directors and filmmakers who make these films that are absolutely terrifying and sometimes filled with horrible images are actually the sweetest, nicest guys and have families and are incredibly intelligent and well-versed and literate. Stuart is sort of the epitome of that.
He's like a big teddy bear and so sweet. And we had a lot of fun, actually. He became a buddy of mine while we were shooting because in my storyline it's a lot of just me. And if there are other people, they're either trying to kill me or not being helpful. So Stuart was kind of my only ally, although he was responsible for putting me in these situations," revealed Moss.
Moss gave details on the shooting of "Eater."
"You have eight days to shoot a movie basically. And as everyone knows, you don't shoot it in order. So when you're doing something that has such a definite arc from somebody who doesn't know that something's going to happen to them in the beginning to being completely terrified and running around, usually bleeding or something at the end, you really have to watch your step and be very aware of where you are in the story.
That's one of the most difficult things, is the different levels of fear. And it's not broad. It's very subtle and you have to really keep track of how scared you are, which is not actually as easy as you would think.
So for me, that was one of the most difficult things, is really just being on top of it and making sure the story was being told in the right order."
Her role for "Eater" is light years from her character on "Mad Men." Moss talked about the differences.
"My regular job is on "Mad Men" is as a secretary. So this was very different. Yeah, I've never done much stunt stuff. I've never played a cop. So I had to learn all of that, which was so much fun. I had to do some stunt things. I had a great stunt person too. Stunt double did most of it, obviously.
But I had to learn how to hold a gun and learn how to do cop things, like cover your back and how you would walk and things like that. And also I got to do things just that are classic kind of scary-movie stuff, like walking, breathing, looking scared, those kind of classic moments I had to learn how to do because I'd never really done that before.
That was really fun. And it was great being, because you have so little time that sometimes it was literally just like, 'Okay, here's your gun. You're going to run in that direction. He's chasing you. Go.' It was fun to do that kind of thing. It's very different from the sort of slow burn of 'Mad Men.' "
Elisabeth, you got to work with Stephen Hart, who plays the Eater. Can you talk about the first time you saw him?
courtesy of NBC
"The first time I saw him was actually in the lobby of the hotel at Edmonton. And I thought he was a visiting rock star because he's very tall. He's 7’2”, the man is huge, and big too. And he's got this incredibly interesting face and this black long hair.
I was like, 'Oh, interesting, weird.' And then I met him at rehearsal. And one of the great things about the episode and the casting is I'm 5'3," and every single other actor is tall or big or both. So everybody is constantly towering over her in the whole thing. Plus it's shot from down here, and you're looking up.
It's great. And he's like Stuart in the sense that he's actually really sweet, a nice guy, really smart, and has this incredible sort of low voice. And the way he looks kind of completely is the opposite of how kind of nice he is."
Andrew Deane noted that Stephen had previously worked in carnival side shows, swallowing glass and whatnot. “So he does have a dark side,” added Moss.
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