ComingSoon Editor-in-Chief Tyler Treese spoke to The Strangers: Chapter 1 stars Madelaine Petsch and Froy Gutierrez about the first film in the horror trilogy. The two leads discussed the film’s small-town fears and the hectic shooting experience of shooting three films at once. The Renny Harlin-directed movie is now out in theaters.
“After their car breaks down in an eerie small town, a young couple (Madelaine Petsch and Froy Gutierrez) are forced to spend the night in a remote cabin. Panic ensues as they are terrorized by three masked strangers who strike with no mercy and seemingly no motive in The Strangers: Chapter 1, the chilling first entry of this upcoming horror feature film series,” says the synopsis.
Tyler Treese: Madelaine, I was really curious about what was most challenging about doing three films and shooting it simultaneously. How was it tracking where your character was logistically? Because I would go crazy trying to do that.
Madelaine Petsch: Yeah. I think I did initially go crazy trying to do it. I took a copious amount of notes, and I was lucky enough to be rewriting the films as we shot. So I think I was so woven within the fabric of the story by the time it came to shooting that I was able to remove any worry. But honestly, I have my bible book from when I was shooting of every single note, every single page, and basically, I went through before I shot and would write, “Scene 91,” and then I write on the page, “Before in scene 90 you did this and this was what happened.” And so I would be able to do a little crash course in what just happened at any given moment that really helped.
But also, you shoot TV out of order and I feel like Riverdale was such a bootcamp for something like this that I was able to kind of track my character at any given moment because of that experience.
Froy, one aspect that really impressed me was that you two really do feel like you’ve been together for five years. How was it building that chemistry and making the characters feel really close? Because if viewers don’t get that connection between the two characters, that would kind of ruin the whole trilogy.
Froy Gutierrez: Yeah, for sure. I mean, I think it was so easy to have chemistry with Mads because she’s so charming and so charismatic and…
Petsch: Are you taking my answer? That’s what I say about you.
Gutierrez: No, but it’s true. It’s very true. We hadn’t met before this movie. We met each other like two weeks into the job, and we filmed…
Petsch: What was our first scene?
Gutierrez: It was the one on the porch. Remember?
Petsch: Oh my God, that’s crazy.
Gutierrez: That’s like a very intimate scene that’s being with your partner and talking them out of a bad mood and transitioning it to a better one. We had to be able to influence each other and be present with each other and I think that’s a real challenge to kind of take off without a hitch. I think we both really applied ourselves and making sure that we both were on the same page about what this relationship looks like, how long they’ve been together, what their sense of humor is. Like, who do they gossip about when they leave the party? Things like that were all things that we were kind of talking about to try to make sure that they felt real.
Madelaine, your character is also a vegetarian. I was curious if that was like originally in the script or was that something you kind of brought to the character?
Petsch: No, that crazily enough was originally in the script. I’m not gonna force all creative forces to make my characters vegan or vegetarian for the rest of my life. But no, it just felt very natural. It was great.
Froy, I love the sense of small town danger that’s throughout the film. What did you like most about just everything feeling slightly off. Everybody’s a little rude rather than kind in this small town.
Gutierrez: It’s never enough to like tip the protagonist off to there being something terrible and dangerous afoot, but it’s always enough to like unnerve you slightly and it’s enough to make you feel claustrophobic even though you’re out in the open. I think it was important to kind of establish the town as a setting with a lot of character.
