Posted in: Exclusive, Horror, Interview, Movies | Tagged: barbara crampton, Bruce Davison, exclusive, H.P. Lovecraft, heather graham, interview, joe lynch, johnathon schaech, judah lewis, rlje films, shudder, Suitable Flesh

Suitable Flesh Cast, Dir on Capturing Psychology on Lovecraft Thriller

Suitable Flesh stars Graham, Lewis, Crampton, and Schaech & director Joe Lynch talk to Bleeding Cool on Lovecraftian psychological thriller.

H.P. Lovecraft is one of the most pioneering science fiction and supernatural writers of our time despite his more controversial social stances as a 19th/20th-century figure. He continues to be a source of inspiration, tackling psychological and philosophical issues involving identity and control. Director Joe Lynch, along with writer Dennis Paoli, adapted his The Thing on the Doorstep into RLJE Films & Shudder's Suitable Flesh. The film follows psychiatrist Dr. Elizabeth Derby (Heather Graham), who is obsessed with helping a young patient (Judah Lewis) suffering from an extreme personality disorder. But it leads her into dark occult danger as she tries to escape a horrific fate. Graham, Smith, Johnathon Schaech, Lynch, and Barbara Crampton (who also serves as a producer) spoke to Bleeding Cool before the SAG-AFTRA strike as part of a roundtable about the mental and physical challenges playing multiple roles and whether the actors studied each other's character's mannerisms. The following contains minor spoilers.

How 'Suitable Flesh' Became a Devilishly Good Time

Bleeding Cool: Heather, how does a nuanced role like this challenge you as an actor compared to projects you've done in the past?
Graham: I was grateful when I read it. First, I've always wanted to play a therapist in a movie because I love therapy, and I'm obsessed with it. I could probably be a therapist, and I love that the characters were complex. My character certainly was, and then I got to play different characters. I got to play the entity and Barbara's character. It's super juicy for an actor. It's challenging and fun. It's a fleshed-out, thoughtful, and complicated character. I was grateful for that opportunity.

Judah, was there any specific scene or aspect of production that was more difficult than others?
Lewis: First, many scenes were incredibly physically demanding. There was lots of blood, prosthetics, and convulsions. Joe [Lynch] has this way of creating an environment where his enthusiasm is infectious, but for two, everybody feels so comfortable. It's a judgment-free zone, allowing you to take risks and push yourself. Some of the hardest scenes were what I enjoyed the most because there was never a fear of going there or committing to something that didn't work because he has this way of, like, if that take didn't work, we're moving on to the next one. As an artist, that's immensely freeing.

This question is for Heather, Judah, and Barbara: Was there anything you guys synchronized, like the ticks or mannerisms? It also applies if you talk with Bruce [Davison] to get the personalities properly in scenes like the entity and your characters. How did you work that out?
Crampton: Initially, when we were talking about it, we were trying to figure out how to do this, and we were wondering if we should have Bruce Davison read and record. He read and recorded all our dialog, and then we listened to it back, but we all felt like that wouldn't be as much of a free experience of the entity living its best life. When the entity goes inside Judah's character's body, the entity gets to experience life through Judah, and then the entity goes into Dr. Darby, Heather's character. The entity is experiencing life as Heather's character. When it came to my character, we felt like it would be more fun and freeing for us as actors and for the entity if the entity got to experience life in many ways. We all decided that we shouldn't try to mimic Bruce. It wouldn't be as dynamic a movie that way.
Graham: One of the things we all talked about was the hand because that was the visual we usually get; the giveaway that we were the entity is how we all have the same kind of twisted, gnarled hand gesture.
Crampton: That kept the consistency through it. That was our little "tell." This is the entity.
Lynch: If I ever lost my phone and someone went through it, they would see all these weird, twisted shots of everyone's hands as they're sent because everyone was so far away, and we didn't get the actors until right before we shot. There were a lot of discussions going back, a lot of chat-like group texts, but so many shots of weird, twisted mandibles, mangled hands, and shit. It was those things that, honestly, not just helped us be able to craft what ultimately is an antagonist that no one sees in the whole movie. It's not like the end of 'Howard the Duck' or whatever, where suddenly, this entity comes to life and is manifested. We never see it, so we were so honed in on making sure that we had all of these great actors embody the character enough so that hopefully, by the time you finish the movie, you still have a sense of it. At the same time, it bonded everybody because Heather said, "Barbara's third finger isn't quite twisted the right way. Do you think we should be twisted in the left way?" It was indeed a bonding experience for all of us.

Aside from that and the smoking part, right?
Lynch: Not just the smoke. The smoking part was always scripted. That was always…
Graham: Planned, right? It was also in the hair [runs hand through her hair].
Lynch: That was one of the things that, again, we all bonded over. It was like a simple gesture as Judah ran his hand through his hair once. I remember everyone going, "Oh, that's good." That became one of the little tells. I don't know if you guys remember this, but Judah did it first, and then Heather did it another time. Barbara, who's always present on set as a producer, also honed in on it. Everyone was still taking little beats from everyone else. It's part of the community that we created that AMP [International] and the producers created by ensuring everyone was in it together. If we didn't have that, we wouldn't have those little story moments and those little character bits that become part of who the entity is, which is excellent.

Barbara, how do you compare 'Suitable Flesh' to your other psychological horror thrillers? Does this is a present type of challenge that you haven't encountered before?
Crampton: Thank you for saying it's a psychological horror thriller because it is and many things. It's a lot of different tones in one movie. How do I compare it to anything else? I do love the fact that Lovecraft, at its heart, is about things that are outside of your control and a lot of fear in life. How do we feel internally about that fear? A lot of Lovecraft stories talk about the fear that you're feeling. With Dennis Paoli's scripts, I feel like better than anybody, he was able to put a structure, tell a story, and a narrative structure that had a beginning, middle, and end while coalescing those fears into a concrete story. I love the fact that every Lovecraft story that I've been involved with has had strong female characters, and those aren't normally in the stories. However, there is a female in [Lovecraft's] original 'Thing on the Doorstep,' the protagonist is switched in the screenplay. I got to work with some amazing actors and a fantastic director, not to mention one of my favorite writers. My world is completely full right now, let me tell you.

Compared to the other characters, Jonathan, you don't experience the same sandbox as the other characters.
Schaech: My character gets to experience the entity instead of having it. He gets to touch the cactus. He doesn't necessarily embrace the cactus. He gets the experience of a little bit, and he's attracted to it. In the way that Joe and I crafted the characters that he was. He was at a turning point in his life where he had lost his job; he was trying to find his new identity at this new age. He gets to explore this, and Heather's character presents this and brings on the entity. They had that experience of allowing her to dominate every part of the scene, basically. It was a thrill ride and a lot of fun.

Suitable Flesh is available in theaters, digital, and on-demand on October 27th.

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