Hail to the King: Macabre Daily talks to Sandy King about “John Carpenter’s Suburban Screams” and more at NYCC!

Sandy King, possibly an inspiration for Sutter Cane?

You might not know the name Sandy King, but she’s been a crucial part of some of the best genre films of the past 40 years.  She’s worked with her husband, John Carpenter for almost as long as a script supervisor, producer, and the first woman founder of a comic publishing house.  In its 10th year of operations, Storm King Productions puts out horror comics of all kinds along with a slew of writers and artists, including Carpenter, Steve Niles, and Duane Swiercyznski.

King is also the executive producer, along with Carpenter, on “Suburban Screams,” a new series on Peacock about the evil at your front door.  Each of the 6 episodes features an interview subject intercut with the scripted reenactment of their true horror story.  Here, King discusses a range of topics, including Storm King, working on set, and the true-life horror of “Suburban Screams,” as well as the fictional horrors of Carpenter classics like “In the Mouth of Madness” and “They Live.”  It still counts as fiction, right..?

Macabre Daily: You’ve brought some props with you from some of your films.

Sandy King: Yes, the alien baby [from “Village of the Damned"] and one of the original reconstructed masks from “They Live.” We were very lucky to have an art restoration.  It felt like dead autumn leaves, so it had to be rehydrated.  It’s the same thing with Meatball from “In the Mouth of Madness,” [points to the big Meatball monster behind us].  Latex and foam deteriorate, so we've been very lucky that he's made it this long. Greg Nicotero was kind enough to do a real revamp on him for us for San Diego [Comic Con] and for here, but then he's gonna have to retire to a climate-controlled museum. He has to go to the old monster home [Laughs].  

I saw Greg Nicotero here on Thursday, and  I was wondering if he was coming to check on Meatball.

He was doing stuff for “Creepshow,” which returned to television last night at the same time as our “Suburban Screams.” His son Deven is working for us at the booth here.  We're like a long-time extended family.

Congratulations on the premiere of “Suburban Screams.”

Thank you.

It was surprising to see a full narrative intercut with real testimonials as a horror show.  We haven’t seen that format much lately.  How did you come to that decision?

Out now on Peacock. That poster is an all-timer.

It was presented to us as a hybrid [of] scripted and unscripted. The taking-off point was when I looked at the pre-interviews.  There are lots of true crime television shows, but they all deal with crime and the murderer.  We all know about Ted Bundy and B2K.  “Dahmer” was so great, but how many people know about the woman that knew what was happening? What happened to the Niecy Nash character afterward? Everybody says there's closure once the police catch the culprit and it's all over. Is there ever closure for the victims or the witnesses of trauma? I realized when we were doing the interviews that these people are forever affected.  That became the difference between our show and other similar shows. We focus on those left behind or the victims who are never the same.  

We have an episode about an escaped serial killer.  While we were putting the show together, there was an escaped serial killer [Danilo Cavalcante] in [a town in]  Pennsylvania.  That town was terrorized for two weeks knowing there was a murderer among them.  Those people will never look at their town the same way again.  That's our focus. The scripted sections are meant to be more immersive and the unscripted interviews are intended as touchpoints to remind you that yes, this really happened. So you have 42 minutes of entertainment and story, the way you would watch a movie, but you're immersed in someone's real-life experience.  We don't fictionalize stuff in the scripted part, but we want to immerse you in the experiences they lived through and explain the way they are today.

When you were on the recent “Creating Modern Horror” panel, you mentioned an episode where a woman is interviewed.  She’s been stalked for 6 years six years, and she still shakes because they never found her stalker.  Watching the episode, you can clearly see she has tremors.  It’s terrifying.

We were interviewing her all day, and it never came out. So I thought we should ask her if she's always had a palsy.  She said no, this started when the phone calls started.  As you can imagine, it's only gotten worse, since she’s still being stalked.  They've never been able to track down the stalker.  It would be one thing if it was from a distance, but he would send her pictures of her front door so they knew he was nearby. But the FBI and all the other agencies have never been able to find him.

What do you think is the scariest thing about suburbia? 

You go to what you consider your safe place.  Anybody is scared of a dark alley or going to the river alone at night.  We all run a little faster.  You know the threatening places, but when you're in your familiar neighborhood, perhaps one you grew up in, and you think you know everybody, you relax.  You let your kids play after dark in the front yard or build forts in the nearby forest. It’s all okay.  Until it’s not.  When kids are in their familiar, safe homes, what's gonna get them?  They’re afraid of the monster under the bed or what's in the closet. As adults, we quit worrying about that shadow until that shadow’s on the front lawn.

It seems like the shadow is everywhere now.

I always say nothing we can create is as scary as reality, and right now we're living through one of the scariest things that could be happening in our country: the rise of fascism and authoritarianism.  Book burnings?  If you told me we’d be burning books and banning science being taught?  It’s ridiculous. That’s something I fear more than anything.  I will give you chopped-off heads ‘till the cows come home, but that will never be as frightening as losing ourselves.  Who are we when we look in the mirror, and when we stop looking in the mirror? The stories I write are usually about “who are?” 

My wife is a teacher and she always says that quote, “If you don't use your brain, someone else will.” 

You bet.  Horror is an allegorical medium for facing our fears. Inner fears, societal fears, existential fears, issues of faith, and issues of loss.  Those are the things we deal with in horror that make it such an important and timeless genre.

The Storm King booth is showing off props from “In the Mouth of Madness,” which I believe is your first theatrical film as a producer, is that right?

No, I did certain things that were credited like “Prince of Darkness.” I have a main title single card credit as a script supervisor because of a practical joke. Jodie Tillen, a famous costume designer and a good friend of mine from when we did “Thief” together, [moved up the ranks to be] a Costume Designer. She was saying she got a single credit.  I said “When I grow up, I want that! [Laughs].”  She said a script supervisor would never have that, so when I was allowed to choose my credit as a producer, I said “Script Supervisor - main title single card.” The studio said they don’t do that and all hell broke loose.  I said no, I have it in my contract that I will be called what I want.  That was largely just a joke back to Judie Tillen. So yes, I did produce “Prince of Darkness” and “They Live” before “In the Mouth of Madness.” I was [also] an Associate Producer on a CBS movie, “Key Tortuga”  

Ah, so IMDB lied again.

I've never been able to get the credit right [on IMDB] and I don't care. [Laughs].

But you started out as a Script Supervisor…

I actually started in animation first, and then I became a Script Supervisor.  I loved doing it and I kept doing it while I was producing.  Larry Franco was the Producer and I would be the Associate Producer.  He would stay First A.D. and I would stay Script Supervisor, and we worked our jobs on the set.  Then things got bigger and harder to handle that way, so when he left, I was the sole producer and I had to hand off the role.  But I kept being Script Supervisor on the second unit. The action unit.

The life of a producer. “You see, Roddy? Putting on the glasses is easy. Now go back to that alley. No whining.” (Photo: Voyage LA)

Having worked on film and TV sets, that sounds exhausting.

It's fun. I liked being on set. There’s generally a production office on set in a trailer, and I would sleep there if it's a night shoot and work there during the day.  I'd essentially work around the clock, but it worked. 

I’m breaking out in hives just thinking about doing that because I used to be a PA.

So you know the deal.

Well, not at your level. 

Same thing. It's the same job, just more people around and more problems. That's why you really have to be there.

So when you’re producing “They Live,” and John Carpenter wants to shoot a 6-minute fistfight, are you the one who has to tell him he can only make it 3 minutes due to budget or time constraints? 

Fuck no.

That’s just wonderful.

First of all, he's very production savvy, so we just work it out. We look at our budget and ask “Where do we spend the dollars?”  We spent three weeks rehearsing that alley fight before we started to shoot. The biggest thing with any movie is your pre-production time.  Planning and rehearsing. You're foolish to try and solve those [kinds of] problems on a set. A lot of things are done in pre-production to save money during the shoot. You decide what your payoff points are in a movie, and what you simplify to get [them].  This is where the creative part of producing comes in. There’ve been times where he's willing to pair back some things and I say “No, this one's important.  Here are the touchstones in your script. What if we don’t give THAT up, but how do you feel about THIS being simplified?”  I usually have $5, $10, and $25 solutions.  He trusts me, and in that case, he trusted Larry Franco. You can't tell the difference between a John Carpenter movie produced by Debra Hill, Larry Franco, or myself.  That's because the throughline is John and his vision. Good producers and crews all implement the director's vision. That's our job and everybody should be working with that vision.  That’s why he's hired by the studio.  We make it happen.

Let’s touch on “Vampires'' for a second. Besides being a lot of fun, I’ve always posited it's the most indicative of John Carpenter’s style.  It's got horror, an antihero, corrupt authority, and it's an actual Western. What was that shoot like?

We were shooting nights in the New Mexico desert for “Vampires” and “Ghosts of Mars.”  The studio always chooses to move the shoot to whatever is the worst season to shoot during.  For both films, we wound up in monsoon season, which means lightning. Generators attract lightning, so we had to coordinate with the local weatherman and even the guys at the golf courses.  All so that we could get our guys out of the cherry pickers and lifts, so the lightning didn't hit them. We shut down the generators when the lightning was coming our way, but we had a guy radioing and calling us as the storms would head our way.

After surviving a few years of directing during monsoon season, John Carpenter opted to direct “Suburban Screams” from his couch (Photo: Trae Patton/Peacock).

Storm King Comics is always growing, and I noticed you have several different imprints, but I was surprised by Storm Kids, which is aimed at, of course, children.  How did that come about and why that demographic?

I noticed that people who were buying our “regular” adult comics had their kids with them, who were trying to go through the grown-up books. It’s not that they have a bunch of bad things, but they're over their heads and they're inappropriate for little kids. The parents would go “Oh, but he watches ‘The Walking Dead.’”  Now “The Walking Dead” is a soap with zombies.  It’s not particularly hard and it doesn’t go over their heads. I wouldn't have my little kids watching it, but that's they’re choice.  So I thought about it and I made one of my stories for “Tales for a Halloween Night” to be accessible to kids.  We also did a small print of it just to see if we could sell to kids, and they loved it. 

I thought we could start doing something for little kids, so we have [comics for ] 4 to 8-year-olds, where you don't scare them at all, like with ghost bunnies. Just something so they feel like they have something that all the big kids have. We have middle-grade books that are an entrée to loss and separation because bad things happen in the world. It's not that they won't, but it can make them feel empowered. How do we make them feel like they can stand up to what happens in the real world? What tools can we give them to feel strong? We've got “Fetch,” which is from a great writer, Mike Sizemore, about a little girl whose dog has died, and she wants to go get him back from death. We use Greek mythology, so she also has to take care of her little brother who follows her to the underworld. So suddenly, she has a new responsibility beyond her own wants.  So it’s gentle and fun, but the girl has to face something. It's gonna be a two-book saga so right now only part one is available. 

“The Grimms Town Terror” is a modern Hansel & Gretel.   These kids come home to see their house is covered in green goo and their parents are missing and aliens invaded.  It turns out to be Grubb, the booger troll, who's actually one of the heroes, who shows them how to be strong.  Then you hit the young adults who are ready for more.  A little bit of blood and some bigger problems. Like they find a monster in the forest, but is he really a monster? So you have to start discerning because things are not always what they seem.  Then they’ll be ready for the world of adult horror.

Me and Sandy down by the ghoul yard of NYCC (aka the Storm King booth)

Interview edited for length and clarity.  “John Carpenter’s Suburban Screams” is now streaming on Peacock.  For more on Storm King Comics, check out their official website.

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