Scream (franchise)

• 1. Scary Movie

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  The Scream franchise began as an 18-page script called Scary Movie, written by Kevin Williamson. Two things fed that first draft. One was a news story about the murders committed by the Gainesville Ripper. The other was Williamson's own unease at being alone in a friend's house, after he found an open window he had never noticed before.

  The treatment covered only the scene that would open the finished film, the one starring Drew Barrymore. From it grew an American slasher series of seven films, a television show, merchandise and games.

  How did a story built on characters who know the rules of horror movies keep finding new killers? Why do so many of its installments have a near-collapse hiding behind them? And who was the voice behind the mask?

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• 2. Writing the Rules

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  In June 1995, Williamson carried a freshly finished screenplay to his agent, hoping to sell it. He had written it in only three days in Palm Springs. The rush came from frustration, because his earlier script, Teaching Mrs. Tingle, was stuck in development hell. He attached two 5-page outlines for possible sequels, hoping the promise of a franchise would tempt a buyer. He later said he wrote the film partly because he wanted to watch it and "nobody else is making it".

  Halloween, Friday the 13th, A Nightmare on Elm Street and Prom Night all received homages in the pages, and Williamson said each had inspired him. His characters watched horror films themselves. They knew the conventions of the genre and used that knowledge to stay alive.

  His agent, Rob Paris, warned him early that the amount of gore would make the script impossible to sell. After Miramax bought it, Williamson had to strip out much of the gorier material. Once Wes Craven was confirmed as director, a good deal of it came back. One scene set in the school bathroom struck Williamson as awkward, and he meant to cut it. Craven saved it, and Williamson later said he was glad.

  Principal Himbry's death was added at the request of producer Bob Weinstein, who had counted thirty pages, or thirty minutes of screen time, without a murder. The addition paid off later. When Williamson struggled to give the characters a reason to leave the party in the finale, the discovered body supplied one.

  The killers' motives divided the people working on the picture. Some felt the audience needed a reason for resolution, and others thought the film scarier without one. Williamson chose both. Billy Loomis received the motive of maternal abandonment. Stu Macher received none, and could only joke that it was "peer pressure".

  The warning from his agent was about to be proved wrong.

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• 3. The Deal and the Gamble

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  The script went on sale on a Friday, and by 8 a.m. the following Monday several studios were locked in a bidding war. Paramount Pictures, Universal Pictures and Morgan Creek were among them. Producer Cathy Konrad had brought it to the attention of Bob Weinstein. As the offers climbed, the choice narrowed to Oliver Stone, then working with Cinergi Pictures, and Weinstein at Miramax.

  Williamson agreed to $400,000 from Miramax, plus a contract for two sequels and a third, unrelated film. He expected the Dimension Films label to make Scream quickly and without heavy restriction.

  Wes Craven was approached early but was busy with a remake of The Haunting. Robert Rodriguez, Danny Boyle, George A. Romero and Sam Raimi were approached as well. Many of them read the script as a comedy, which worried Williamson and Weinstein, who felt those directors "didn't get it". Craven passed several times because he wanted to move away from horror. Barrymore's involvement changed his mind, since a star of her recognition might make the project different from his earlier work. When The Haunting fell through, he was free to direct.

  Late in production, the Weinstein brothers changed the title from Scary Movie to Scream, inspired by the Michael Jackson song of the same name. Bob Weinstein felt the old name did not suit a film that also carried satire and comedy. Williamson and Craven both thought the change "stupid" and later admitted it was an improvement.

  As takings grew, Sony Pictures sued Dimension Films, claiming the title was too close to its own film Screamers (1995). The case settled out of court with secret terms. Producer Marianne Maddalena confirmed that the production could use the current and potential future titles, Scream 2 and Scream 3.

  After a successful test screening, Williamson and Craven were each offered a two-picture contract for sequels. Bob Weinstein then set the release for the 20th of December 1996, a date others criticized because the Christmas season favored family films. He argued the opposite, since horror fans and teenagers would have nothing else to see. The film premiered on the 18th of December at the AMC Avco theater in Westwood, California.

  The first weekend brought in only $6 million, and the gamble looked lost. Then takings rose the following week instead of falling, and kept climbing. The film finished with a U.S. gross of over $100 million and became one of the highest-grossing films of 1996. It was also the highest-grossing slasher film in the world until Halloween (2018) passed it.

  Part of the draw was a cast unusually full of recognizable names, which was uncommon for slashers of the time.

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• 4. Familiar Faces

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  Craven's original plan was to hire talented actors who had not yet had a big break, as he had done with Johnny Depp in A Nightmare on Elm Street and Peter Berg in Shocker. That plan changed when Drew Barrymore approached the production herself after reading the script. She was signed to play Sidney Prescott. Her schedule then made the lead impossible, so she volunteered for the smaller part of Casey Becker, who dies early.

  The producers saw a risk in killing off an actress of her stature. They also expected the shock to convince viewers that no one else was safe. Craven believed the budget was too small for the actors they wanted, but Barrymore's presence made people eager to join and willing to accept lower pay.

  Alicia Witt and Brittany Murphy auditioned for the lead, and the production considered contacting Reese Witherspoon. The role went to Neve Campbell, whom Craven had seen in Party of Five. He thought she could play someone "innocent" who could still handle the physical and emotional demands. Campbell was reluctant to make another horror film so soon after The Craft. She agreed because it was her first leading role and she adored the character, saying "She's a fantastic character for any kind of movie."

  Brooke Shields and Janeane Garofalo were both offered the part of reporter Gale Weathers. Courteney Cox, then starring in the NBC sitcom Friends, was not considered, because she usually played softer, kinder characters. For that very reason she lobbied hard, wanting to play a "bitch" character, and she won the role.

  Melinda Clarke and Rebecca Gayheart auditioned for Tatum Riley before Rose McGowan was cast as the best fit for the "spunky" character. The production believed the strong female cast of Campbell, Barrymore, Cox and McGowan would draw a large female audience.

  Kevin Patrick Walls and Justin Whalin were among the final candidates for Billy Loomis before Skeet Ulrich won the part. Campbell and Ulrich had worked together on The Craft, which they believed helped their onscreen relationship. David Arquette was approached for Billy too, but he wanted to play Dewey. The role was written as "hunky" and Arquette's take was younger and "goofier", yet Craven liked the idea.

  Matthew Lillard won the role of Stu Macher by chance. He had accompanied his then-girlfriend to a different audition, where casting director Lisa Beach noticed him and asked him to read. Jamie Kennedy and Breckin Meyer competed for Randy Meeks. The studio wanted a more prominent actor than Kennedy, who had no major role before, but the production fought successfully to keep him.

  Roger L. Jackson was chosen as the voice of Ghostface after several weeks of local casting in Santa Rosa. The production first meant to use his voice only temporarily, then decided it was perfect. In the first three films he was kept away from most of the cast, on the theory that performances would improve if nobody could put a face to the menacing voice. The calls his character made were real phone calls placed from the set to the actors in the scene. Craven said, "I can't imagine Scream without Ghostface... Roger Jackson's voice is very remarkable, it's got an evil sophistication."

  Santa Rosa, where Jackson was found, would soon become the center of a local fight over the film itself.

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• 5. Filming and Sound

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  Filming began on the 15th of April 1996 and ended on the 8th of June 1996. North Carolina had been the intended setting, but scouts found nothing that did not need heavy building work. The search moved through Vancouver, Washington and Los Angeles before the production found Sonoma County, California, including Santa Rosa, Healdsburg and Tomales Bay. The house used for Barrymore's character stands on Sonoma Mountain Road, opposite the house used in the horror film Cujo (1983).

  Santa Rosa High School was the first choice to stand in for Woodsboro High School, but its school board demanded to see the script. Members objected to the dialog and to Principal Himbry, a foul-mouthed, aggressive character. Local newspapers joined the criticism. Students and residents backed the production, some for the economic benefits and others on First Amendment grounds. Opponents deplored violence against teenagers in a community that had seen the kidnap and murder of Polly Klaas three years before.

  A three-hour debate was set for the 16th of April, one day after filming was due to start. Craven refused to wait and began on the 15th of April. The opening scene with Barrymore took five days to shoot. The board denied permission, and the production found the Sonoma Community Center, which appears on screen as Woodsboro High School.

  The script described the killer only as a "masked killer", which left Craven's design team to create the Ghostface costume. While waiting for permission from Fun World, the creators of the mask design, the team at KNB Effects made a substitute that appeared in two scenes. Once permission came, the Fun World original replaced it. Bob Weinstein disliked the mask, believing it was not "scary". The studio reviewed footage of the opening scene, worried about its direction, and considered replacing Craven. To calm them, Craven compiled the first thirteen minutes into a workprint, a rough version of the finished film. The studio let him continue, and Weinstein accepted that the mask could be scary.

  The final act, set at a house party, runs over forty minutes and was shot at a vacant property in Tomales over twenty-one nights. It was the hardest part to film. Everything happened in one location, yet several characters had their own stories and deaths, and work had to stop at daybreak.

  After filming ended in June, Craven spent two months editing and clashing with the MPAA over scene content. The board pushed him to tone down or obscure intense scenes to avoid an NC-17, a rating that made films hard to market. Dimension Films had released NC-17 films before and was desperate for an R. To keep the death of Casey Becker, Craven told the board he had only one take and could not swap in anything milder.

  In total, he sent the MPAA eight different cuts. The fight made him consider leaving the horror genre. He said, "I'm a director who can do something very well but am not allowed to put it on screen. And they ultimately get you, as they did on this one, on intensity. They say, "it's not a specific shot, it's not blood, it's just too intense"." Bob Weinstein finally phoned the board himself, arguing that it misunderstood the genre. He told them the film was intense but also comic, a satire rather than a celebration of violence. The MPAA reviewed its decision and granted an R rating.

  Marco Beltrami scored Scream in his feature film debut. He came to the project because Craven's assistant, Julie Plec, posted on a now defunct site called Hollywood Cafe, asking who was new, fresh and wonderful. Several people suggested Beltrami. Craven requested samples and liked them. He brought the composer to the set to watch the opening featuring the murder of Casey Becker. Beltrami wrote music for it, and Craven hired him.

  Beltrami had never written a horror score, so Craven and editor Patrick Lussier advised him on how to deliver the scary moments. He avoided conventional horror styles and approached the film as a western, influenced by the composer Ennio Morricone. His theme for Dewey treated the character as both a sheriff and a "quirky" figure, with Morricone-style guitar. In a joke on horror conventions, the music deliberately built tension in moments when the audience expected a killer to appear, and then none did.

  An acoustic cover of Blue Öyster Cult's "Don't Fear the Reaper" plays softly beneath Sidney and Billy's conversation about their relationship. Analyst Jeff Smith reads it as an ironic comment on the brutality of the opening sequence. He points out that Billy, one of the two killers, proves to be the Reaper to fear. Sidney's own theme, "Sidney's Lament", became a signature track of the series.

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• 6. Leaks and Lockdowns

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  In January 1997, Scream had earned more than $50 million in its first month, and a sequel came under discussion. Dimension Films agreed in May 1997 to pursue it, by which point Williamson had already written 42 pages. The budget was $24 million, and the film reached cinemas before the first film's anniversary. His idea sent Sidney to college, where a copycat killer begins to stalk her. Titles considered along the way included Scream Again, Scream Louder and Scream: The Sequel.

  Sarah Michelle Gellar signed on without reading the script, having just finished another Williamson film, I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997). Laurie Metcalf joined after a nine-year run on the sitcom Roseanne. Timothy Olyphant took what was his first leading role in a feature film. Jerry O'Connell and other candidates for Derek had to audition by performing a scene in which the character sings "I Think I Love You".

  During production, Williamson's completed script leaked onto the Internet, exposing the finale and the identity of the killers. Filming carried on with only a partial script while he rewrote the ending, the victims and the killer's identity, although the motivation stayed the same. Actors received the last pages weeks before shooting, and the pages naming the killer arrived only on the day of the scene. Craven recalled a schedule that began in July 1997 with a December release date, so many scenes arrived as loose outlines that he built on set.

  Security tightened to closed sets, signed non-disclosure agreements and script pages printed on specialty paper that resisted photocopying. Filming wrapped on the 30th of October 1997. Atlanta stood in for much of the story, with Agnes Scott College and UCLA together representing the fictional Windsor College.

  After his struggle with the MPAA over Scream, Craven tried a trick. He sent a cut that was deliberately more violent than the one planned for release, with Omar Epps' character stabbed in the ear three times and a long death for Randy Meeks. The hope was that the board would force out the material the crew already did not want. Instead it granted an R rating, saying the message of the film was significant.

  Scream 2 broke box-office records of its time, and some critics rated it above the original. Scream 3, with a budget of $40 million, was a different story. In early 1999, Bob and Harvey Weinstein asked Williamson to write it, but he was busy with the short-lived television series Wasteland and with writing and directing Teaching Mrs. Tingle. He supplied an outline built around a film within a film called Stab 3, set in Woodsboro. Ehren Kruger, writer of Arlington Road, developed the script from those notes.

  Kruger admitted he struggled to write characters he had not helped create. His early drafts made Sidney resemble "Linda Hamilton in Terminator 2", and Craven stepped in to pull her back toward the earlier films. Kruger removed one of the killers, added the death of Cotton Weary, and moved the story from Woodsboro to Hollywood. He reasoned that the characters were moving to bigger places, from high school to college to Hollywood.

  The Columbine High School massacre came less than a year before release, and scrutiny of violence in films grew sharply. The studio considered whether to continue and chose to go on, but with changes. It pressed for more humor and less violence. At one point it demanded no blood or on-screen violence at all. Craven replied that the film should either carry the violence of the earlier films or be called something other than Scream.

  Filming ran from the 6th of July 1999 to the 29th of September 1999 around Hollywood, Los Angeles. Campbell was available for only 20 days, so her role shrank and Cox and Arquette's characters gained ground. Carrie Fisher made a cameo at the suggestion of Bob Weinstein, and she helped write her own character. A scene in which Sidney is chased through replicas of locations from the first film was never scripted. Craven knew he wanted to revisit it, so the sets were built first and the scene written around them.

  Because the script kept changing, the crew shot several variants of key scenes. The opening had three versions, and a three-minute scene with Randy Meeks produced two hours of footage. In January 2000, three months after principal photography ended, the ending was refilmed. It added Patrick Dempsey as Mark Kincaid and had Ghostface beat and shoot Sidney, because she had defeated him too easily. The final scene was filmed three ways for Dempsey's character: absent, with a bandaged arm, and unharmed.

  Scream 3 fared worse than its predecessors. Commentators said it had become the kind of horror film the earlier two had parodied, and some disliked its shift toward humor. Others praised that shift and admired the way it completed a trilogy. After the MeToo movement, the film and its themes were re-evaluated and its reputation improved.

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• 7. Fourth Film Troubles

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  The Weinstein Company announced a new sequel in July 2008, intending a fresh trilogy if the fourth film succeeded. Williamson found his idea in late 2009, almost ten years after the previous installment, and pitched it to Bob Weinstein, who told him to start writing. The budget was $40 million. The principal cast signed in September 2009, and Craven followed as director in March 2010.

  Campbell at first refused to return, so early drafts were written around her absence, with Cox and Arquette's characters at the center. One version killed Sidney in the opening, and Weinstein had that removed. Another made Cox and Arquette's characters parents, an idea dropped as unworkable. Campbell, Cox and Arquette were all confirmed in September 2009, and Jackson's return followed in July 2010.

  The cast again leaned on established names, including Hayden Panettiere, Rory Culkin, Anna Paquin, Kristen Bell and Emma Roberts. Roberts won the part of Sidney's cousin Jill over Ashley Greene. Lake Bell and Lauren Graham were cast but dropped out early, Bell citing scheduling conflicts. Nico Tortorella auditioned five times for the part of Trevor, once by reenacting the scene in which Billy Loomis reveals he is a killer.

  In May 2010, producer Cathy Konrad filed a $3 million lawsuit against The Weinstein Company. She claimed her company, Cat Entertainment, held first rights to produce all Scream films. She accused the Weinsteins of trying to hire a cheaper producer, Craven's wife Iya Labunka, who was not named in the suit. The case settled out of court in April 2011. A trade report said Konrad received a cash payment, a share of profits and an executive producer credit.

  Williamson left the production because of his commitments to The Vampire Diaries, under threat of legal action. In July 2010, Weinstein brought back Ehren Kruger for rewrites, and Craven spoke openly about "losing control" of the story. He later said, "it certainly is Kevin's script and concept and characters and themes." Weinstein described Kruger's role as a dialog "punch up". Williamson and Weinstein clashed repeatedly and stopped speaking, and Williamson had not seen the finished film before its release.

  To protect the killer's identity, the cast received only 75 of the 140 script pages. Filming ran from the 28th of June 2010 to the 24th of September 2010 in Michigan, around Ann Arbor, Dearborn, Livonia and Northville. After a test screening on the 6th of January 2011, the film returned for four days of reshoots on the opening scene and a parking garage scene with Alison Brie.

  Critics read the reshoots as a sign of trouble. Craven said, "They're not reshoots, we had a couple test screenings and we saw two scenes where they had moments you could add to and we just saw a spectacular opportunity." He added that the ending remained untouched.

  The film premiered on the 11th of April 2011 at Grauman's Chinese Theater and opened generally on the 15th. Eleven years after the third film, it follows Sidney back to Woodsboro on the last stop of a book tour. Reviews were mixed, mostly aimed at the film's use of horror cliches, and its domestic run was disappointing. Years later it was reappraised, and its killers' motives are now widely seen as ahead of their time.

  It was the last film Craven directed.

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• 8. Resurrection

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  In 2011, Craven confirmed he was contracted for a fifth and sixth film, to be made only if the fourth succeeded. By February 2012, Williamson said of a possible fifth film, "I'm not doing it." In June 2015, Bob Weinstein firmly denied any continuation, pointing to a television series as the right place for new life.

  That series had been reported on the 4th of June 2012, when MTV was said to be developing a weekly spinoff. David Arquette said he would not appear. MTV greenlit it in April 2013, and Jill Blotevogel wrote the version that centered on a viral YouTube video in the town of Lakewood. It premiered on the 30th of June 2015 with a re-imagined mask. Craven first approved the redesign, then criticized the network for abandoning the Ghostface mask.

  On the 30th of August 2015, Craven died of brain cancer. The first-season finale, "Revelations", paid tribute to him in its opening credits. The second season premiered on the 30th of May 2016. In April 2017, MTV announced a reboot with a new cast and setting. The Ghostface mask returned, and Roger L. Jackson replaced Mike Vaughn, who had voiced the show's own killers. After the second season the series moved to VH1, where the final season, subtitled "Resurrection", aired from the 8th to the 10th of July 2019.

  Craven's death and the sexual misconduct allegations against Harvey Weinstein, which shut down the Weinstein Company, left the film series in limbo. In early 2019, Blumhouse Productions was reported to be interested in reviving it. In November 2019, Spyglass Media Group acquired the rights. Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett were announced as directors in March 2020, with Williamson as an executive producer and James Vanderbilt and Guy Busick writing. Arquette signed on that same month, and Cox confirmed her return on the 31st of July 2020.

  Principal photography began on the 22nd of September 2020, after the COVID-19 pandemic pushed the release from 2021. Paramount Pictures released the film, titled simply Scream, on the 14th of January 2022. It was the first film in the series not directed by Craven.

  Scream VI was greenlit on the 3rd of February 2022, with production planned for Montreal and the same creative team returning. Panettiere agreed to reprise Kirby Reed. On the 6th of June 2022, Campbell announced she would not return as Sidney. She said her contract and salary negotiations with Paramount had stalled, adding, "As a woman I have had to work extremely hard in my career to establish my value, especially when it comes to Scream. I felt the offer that was presented to me did not equate to the value I have brought to the franchise." The film opened on the 10th of March 2023. Critics praised both it and its predecessor, and Scream VI won Best Movie at the MTV Movie & TV Awards, as the first film had in 1996. The site Collider said the series works because at heart it is a mystery.

  In August 2023, Christopher Landon was named director of a seventh film, but the 2023 SAG-AFTRA and Writers Guild strikes slowed production. On the 21st of November 2023, Melissa Barrera was fired over social media posts supporting Palestine during the Gaza war, which the producers interpreted as antisemitic. The next day Jenna Ortega was reported to be leaving over scheduling for the Netflix series Wednesday, though later sources cited a salary dispute. In 2025 Ortega said her exit "had nothing to do with pay or scheduling" but rather the loss of Barrera and the two directors.

  Landon left on the 23rd of December 2023. He said that, about a week after Barrera's firing, "there was no movie anymore", because the script centered on her character, Sam Carpenter. In March 2024, Campbell announced her return as Sidney, and Williamson was named director. Cox's return was confirmed in December, and Mason Gooding and Jasmin Savoy Brown also agreed to return. Arquette was announced in March 2025.

  Scream 7 opened in the U.S. on the 27th of February 2026, the first film in the series released in IMAX. Reviews were mostly negative, yet it became the highest-grossing film in the franchise. Cox and Jackson are the only cast members in all seven films, and Cox is the only actress to appear in seven consecutive films of a horror franchise.

  On the 31st of March 2026, Paramount and Spyglass announced they were moving ahead with an eighth film, with sisters Lilla and Nora Zuckerman writing the script.

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