MOVIES SHOULD BE MYSTERIES

Elvis and a black John F. Kennedy fight an ancient Egyptian mummy in a nursing home. It's the plot of BUBBA HO-TEP, Don Coscarelli’s ninth feature (four of those belong to his PHANTASM series) which he presented at the Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival in March of 2003. The first miracle is that Coscarelli made the movie to begin with. The second is that it’s actually a strangely poignant picture. In Brussels Mike Lebbing and Roel Haanen met with the director for an interview.

It takes a lot of balls to even attempt to make a movie like BUBBA HO-TEP.

Yeah, nobody in Hollywood wanted to make a film like that. We shopped the script around and they were like: Elvis? Mummy? We were lucky it was a simple movie to make in a lot of respects. It’s a simple story, about two guys talking in a room for most of the film. There are only a few action sequences. It was a perfect movie to do on a modest budget.

Did you write the hilarious dialogue?

No, most of the dialogue is Joe Lansdale’s. It was based on his short story. He is a brilliant man. It was a privilege to be the first to make one of his stories into a feature film. Joe has a large body of work and many great movie directors have tried to get one off the ground, but his stories are so strange, they can’t get the studios to fund them. David Lynch has an option on one of his books, Ridley Scott has one, Kathryn Bigalow. But on a studio basis they can’t get it made. Joe was so surprised that the first story to become a movie would be BUBBA HO-TEP, because he never thought that one could be filmed.

Was it hard to turn a short story into a feature film? Did you have to add a lot of stuff?

Well, I say BUBBA HO-TEP was based on a short story, because that is what it was. But it was quite long for a short story, about fifty pages. Basically, it’s a short novel. And that’s a perfect size for a movie. Because it’s always difficult to take a three hundred page novel and narrow it down. I could take Joe’s story, put it into my word processor, format it as a screenplay and it was almost there. It was just a matter of adding what was needed. I wanted to add a little more action to the film. We needed at least one good fight scene. Also, all the stuff about the young Elvis was only alluded to in the story. So I created the flashbacks, how he had switched places with the impersonator. I thought everyone would enjoy that stuff. And they do. They like the Prince and the Pauper idea of Elvis living in a trailer park. It’s almost like an opportunity for Elvis to enjoy a real life, because he could never do anything like that. You know, eat some hot dogs and drink some beers with trailer park people.

What did Joe Lansdale think of the film?

That is the great part. Joe is a real Southern guy, a Texan. He shoots from the hip. He’ll tell you what he thinks. If he didn’t like it, he would have told me. He’s so happy with the film that he has given me access to any story he has written. I really want to do another one of his stories. There’s a great one which is a horror western.

You’ve given Bruce Campbell a really great opportunity to do some serious acting.

You know what? Bruce’s fans have always known he’s a great actor. Everybody in Hollywood just sees him has this clownish character. But here he gets to be really subtle. His best moments in this film are not showy at all, they are simple. And you can almost hear his fans think: I knew he was a great actor! I knew it!

I’m glad that the film also appeals to his fans. Because it’s a story about age and death and friendship. It might apply more to someone in their forties or fifties or sixties. But to have the EVIL DEAD fans enjoying it, brings me so much satisfaction.

What a lot of people also don’t realize about Bruce, is what a hard working actor he is. I’ve worked with many actors who, as soon as the camera is turned off, run off to their trailer or take out their cell phone. When I walked passed Bruce’s trailer, he would be there in his Elvis wig, his huge glasses, with the script in his hands, making notes. Very dedicated. That’s the kind of artist he is.

Bruce Campbell is so believable as an old man, even if we as the audience know that the actor isn’t really old at all. Was that a concern for you?

Well, the old age makeup was a challenge. I saw some footage I wasn’t too happy with. We would start filming and I would always stop and walk around and grab Bruce’s head and look at it. And then Bruce turned to the cameraman and said: You know, just treat the makeup like an aging starlet. She was glorious once and now she needs to be lit properly. She needs soft light. So he did. And we also started using the higher speed film stock, which is a bit grainier. It took the edge off the makeup.

I noticed that you didn’t use any Elvis songs in the movie. But what was that footage for the Elvis movie marathon? Did you recreate it from existing material?

We didn’t use any songs, because they’re really expensive. It was just not possible. And that footage was actually stock footage. I believe it was some footage of old French music video type stuff. I’m not exactly sure where it came from. Elvis was in a car racing movie, so we took some footage of car racing. In reality, Elvis had some regrets about his movie choices. He was forced into this series of movies by his manager. I think he always felt that if he had ever had an opportunity like Frank Sinatra did, to get a good dramatic role, he probably could have made it work. That is not to say that an Elvis movie, like CLAMBAKE, can’t be fun to watch, for us.

So, you’re an Elvis fan yourself?

Of course I’m a fan of Elvis. Who isn’t? I was thinking about this: he could have been the greatest man there ever was. He had so much magnetism. What inspired me about the story, is that the public refused to allow Elvis to die the way he did. Just look at all the coverage after his death about him being seen here or there. Elvis could not die on the toilet, all drugged out. Reading Joe’s story struck me as a chance to offer Elvis some redemption in a weird way. This is the funny part: the only screenings we’ve had so far is at genre festivals, but I would love to show it at an Elvis convention. I think the fans will be responsive to the movie, because we tried to be true to Elvis. We didn’t go for the cheap jokes. We had a sense of humor about him, sure. But we tried to keep his integrity intact. It’s funny, because it takes Elvis, who’s such an icon, and puts him in a situation where he is truly the underdog. He is seen by others as just an old man. They treat him without any respect.

What I also love about the movie, is that you use practical effects.

We couldn’t afford a digital creature effect anyway, so we had to go for practical effects. Without criticizing other movies too much, there are digital mummies out there and I don’t like them very much. I don’t know if the fans necessarily do. I think there’s something classic and wonderful about having a monster on the set when you’re making the film. There’s a reality. They’re not looking at a wall and imagining a monster. It’s made out of rubber and something the actor can work with. It reminds me of the last day of shooting with Ossie Davis. Here’s this classically trained actor, a great man who has been involved with the civil rights movement for decades, who has really given back to the culture, who gave a eulogy at Malcolm X’s funeral, and he’s on the grass, battling with a soul sucking mummy. It was right out of a scene of ED WOOD. But the power of the actor can make the rubber come to life.

So, how did Ossie Davis feel about the role and the film?

Bruce would always tease him by asking: Ossie, what are you doing in this movie? We never really got a straight answer out of him. But it took me about a year to get him into the film. I submitted the project to his agent, his agent read the script, didn’t like it, said it reminded him of GRUMPY OLD MEN. If we could cut out the mummy maybe he’d be interested. I told him we couldn’t cut the mummy. It went back and forth like that for a while. But when you get to Ossie’s age, you don’t get that many offers to star in movies, you know? They’ll bring him in for two days to play or a grandfather or something. So, I knew this was a great opportunity for him. I kept calling his agent, badgering him. Finally, I get a call one day and the agent says: I really don’t like this script, but my client does. There must have been something in the script that appealed to Ossie, but to this day I don’t know what it was. He hasn’t seen the movie yet. We tried to show it to him, but he wasn’t available and I don’t want to send him a tape. He lives in New York City, I might have to go there and arrange a screening for him.

The mummy was done by KNB, right?

Yes, both Bruce Campbell and I had both worked with KNB before. Greg Nicotero and Bob Kurtzman had worked on PHANTASM II and all of them had worked on EVIL DEAD II. Bob is also a director who has done WISHMASTER. I like him a lot and I told him about the movie and he said: Oh, we’ll do the mummy for you. Now, that stuff is really expensive, but we only paid a little. Just the cost of some of the materials. Basically, they did the mummy for free. They were a great resource. But I always felt so guilty going over to the KNB shop, because there’s Bob Kurtzman, who’s a good director in his own right, and here he is, day after day, sculpting the mummy and putting the body together.

Also, we had this great collaborator named Bob Ivy who had worked on some of the PHANTASM movies, doing stunts. He’s one of the few stunt men in Hollywood who’s really into horror movies. When he learned he could actually play a Karloff like creature in BUBBA HO-TEP he was just so excited. He actually stopped eating, so he would be thin enough. Because once you have the rubber on top of the body, it all tends to get really thick.

When you made PHANTASM, in the seventies, American films were leaning towards realism. Even the horror films were trying to be as realistic as they could. Except for your movie, which had a really dreamlike quality, more akin to the European horror movies of that time. Did they influence you?

I think some of the influences on PHANTASM were definitely European. I had access to a lot of European films at the time and I watched them all, especially those that didn’t stick to traditional narratives. Other than that, I don’t know. That was the time and that was the movie we made. Most of the choices I made were probably unconscious. For better or for worse, I’m very proud of the fact that so much of PHANTASM is open to interpretation. It’s not the way standard Hollywood movies are. You could see it when we made PHANTASM II. That one was funded by Universal Studios and we actually received a directive during editing. We had a test screening and a few people had written things like: What happened in that scene? I didn’t understand what happened there. The executive said: We need to know what is happening at all times. That’s why it has a more linear narrative. I always liked it when there were some questions at the end of a PHANTASM movie. Actually, that is what life is anyway. It’s a big mystery. We don’t know why things happen. Our movies should be mysteries.

You’ve been making independent movies for decades now. Is it by choice?

I have total creative control, but at a price. I’m ready to sell out. [Laughs]

How about the genre? You’ve been doing genre movies for a long time, but you started out doing other movies.

Yes, my first movie was a drama. My second was a comedy. My third was PHANTASM. Up until that point I had never considered myself a genre director at all. I thought I would go off to do musicals and whatever. That’s why I set out to do a more epic movie like BEASTMASTER. I rejected the idea of ever doing a PHANTASM sequel. But the thing is: unless you’re lucky enough to make high grossing films, it takes many years to get a film funded. So, what I had, was a success in PHANTASM and that turned out to be a blessing and a curse. Whenever there was a lull in my career, the opportunity would present itself to do another one. Nevertheless, it took quite some time for me to make a sequel. Firstly, because I didn’t want to. Secondly, because I couldn’t get a handle on it anyway. If you look at the first PHANTASM, it’s designed as a single unit. It ended where it ended. It took a long time for me to realize that I could start PHANTASM II right where the first one ended. A lot of times in a sequel, we’ll meet the hero five years later, and for some reason the bad guy has returned. I couldn’t figure out a good way to do that with PHANTASM. Then it hit me: I just keep going. Seems simple, but for me it was a creative breakthrough.

Are you working on another PHANTASM right now?

I would love to do another PHANTASM, but it’s a question of finding the money for it. There’s a screenplay, but that’s it.

Will the next one wrap it up?

I don’t know if I ever want to wrap it up. You know what I’d like to do? I’d like to work with young directors and let them take it into different directions. I think with the world of PHANTASM that is definitely a possibility. Frequently I have been submitted story ideas for the PHANTASM series and I always enjoy reading them. There was a self published collection of these stories, put out by a fan.

So, you could imagine someone else directing the next PHANTASM?

Yeah sure. I think that would be good. The only thing I’m concerned about is that I would hate for it to become a typical Hollywood horror movie. You know, where you get three or four really beautiful teenagers and have them menaced by some new actor playing the Tall Man. That would be dissatisfying. But if there’s a way I could supervise, I wouldn’t mind someone else directing, no. We have to find a business model.

You said earlier that the success of PHANTASM was a blessing and a curse. It has certainly shaped your career. How do you look back on that?

You can’t really look at your career while you’re doing it, it’s only at the end that you can look back on it and see what it means. I’m really proud of the PHANTASM series and the fact that I’ve been making these movies with my friends for over twenty-five years. It’s very rare that you see anything like that done. Except for maybe the APU trilogy [by Satyajit Ray] where you follow the young boy into manhood. Within the means I was given I have tried to do my best.

Do you think BUBBA HO-TEP could become a series like PHANTASM?

Well, Elvis was very much into the occult. He had a big collection of books on the supernatural. He had a desire to be a hero. He met with the FBI. He was going to be a spy. Weird stuff if you think about it. Bruce has a lot of ideas that he would like to bring to a sequel, where Elvis and the boys are younger and they get involved in a voodoo cult. You know, with lots of karate stuff. If the movie is successful we might try something like that. [This sequel was announced years ago, with Paul Giamatti eventually being attached as Colonel Tom Parker. After Bruce Campbell exited the project, Ron Perlman was mentioned as Elvis. The film has yet to be made. – Ed.]

I have one last question: the scene with the Egyptian hieroglyphics in the bathroom, was that an homage to Polanski?

How so?

There’s a similar moment in THE TENANT.

Is there? With hieroglyphics? And they’re in the bathroom? Wow. I’d love to say that it was an homage, because I love Polanski’s films. But in all honesty, that is a coincidence.

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This interview first appeared in a shorter version in the Dutch fanzine Schokkend Nieuws. Above is the full version of this talk, edited only for clarity.