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[Interview] Bruce Campbell Talks ‘Ash vs Evil Dead,’ Hanging Up the Chainsaw and the Franchise’s Future

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The third and final season of Ash vs Evil Dead arrives on Blu-ray this Tuesday, August 21, and with it the final bow from Bruce Campbell as Ash Williams. The actor has portrayed the reluctant hero for nearly 40 years, taking Ash from innocuous bystander to wisecracking deadite slayer to finally a man with a deadite fighting family of his own. For thirty episodes, Starz let Campbell and team loose on screen, unleashing torrents of blood, gore, humor, and heart, culminating in one epic finale that serves as Ash’s swan song. Or is it?

Ahead of the season three Blu-ray release, we chatted with Campbell about Ash vs Evil Dead, the future, and his retirement of one of horror’s most beloved characters, Ash Williams.

The final two episodes of Ash vs Evil Dead proved to be the biggest and the most divisive of the series. Written and directed by Rick Jacobson, Ash finally steps up to embrace and fulfill his prophesied role in one epic battle with the largest deadite the series had seen yet. It also brought the series full circle, with Jacobson tying up loose ends from the beginning of season one while also incorporating the entire franchise’s larger mythology. For major fans, the homages and level of detail are gratifying.

Of the ending and Jacobson’s work, Campbell explains, “Not all directors think like that. And he’s a very story thinking director, and he wrote the last two. He’s like, ‘You know what? Screw this, give me that script,’ and we let him do it because he was so possessed with how this should have ended. And we all agreed. We were in total agreement with what should happen, how we should wrap this up. Because you know, TV business is a fickle business. We didn’t know if we’re going to be canceled or not. So, we wanted to not leave fans in the lurch. If we got picked up, could we continue it? Yeah, of course. But we wanted to be ready, and we were.”

Despite closure for all the characters, the final moments have become a point of contention for some fans. To those bothered by it, Campbell responds, “Some people are pissed. They’re like, ‘Oh, you can’t leave us like that.’ It is an ending though. Ash’s destiny has been fulfilled. He’s not just a guy who lives in a trailer home with a lot of bad habits. There’s something else to the guy, and you know what? Let him go on his next great adventure.

Though Army of Darkness was released in theaters in 1993, principal photography took place two years prior, which meant a much longer length of time passed before Campbell donned the chainsaw again. Coming back into the role, with the creative leeway granted by Starz, meant exploring Ash in new, unexpected ways that Campbell looks on fondly.

“That’s the beauty of coming back 25 years later. I hadn’t played Ash since 1991. That’s a long time. So, I’ve actually had two decades of experience of acting that I could finally go, ‘Okay, let’s take that cookie cutter character, and try and-‘ because we tried to evolve him. He was just sort of innocuous in the first one, tried to become a rogue in the second one, was the ugly American in the third one, sort of getting his Ash sea legs, and then now we can just let him loose.”

It wasn’t just the evolution of Ash from middle-aged loser to caring father and team player that Campbell enjoyed exploring, but the creativity of the series as well. When asked if he had any favorite episodes, he cites season 2 episode 7, “The loony bin is my favorite of that season for sure. I could pick one, probably. The pilot from the first one, from the first season, because Sam Raimi set the bar,” then adds, “and the finale, the two-parter from season three.”

Ash vs Evil Dead

But along with the heartfelt evolution of Ash’s character also came the gory splatstick moments that fans loved so much. As great as they are on screen to watch, they’re difficult for the actors to endure. This season’s newcomer, Arielle Carver-O’Neill as Ash’s daughter Brandy, discovered what fellow actors Ray Santiago and Dana DeLorenzo had already learned about the Evil Dead universe; it’s physically tough work. Campbell shares of the first time Carver-O’Neill felt the force of the blood cannon, “When she got her first blast of blood, we’re all there to watch because it’s important to watch them being initiated. To see the look on her face, the reaction was not acting. Her reaction was, ‘Oh my God.’ And it was cold, because we’re in those warehouses in the middle of the New Zealand winter. “

That physical aspect, and the gory nature of the series, leads into why Campbell decided to retire the character. “These are long, tedious [shoots] … you’re lying on cellar floors, in the cold damp floor, covered in blood.” He explains, It’s part of the reason too, for hanging up the chain saw. There’s physical stuff that you have to do that I don’t really either feel like doing anymore, or I can’t do anymore. Or I shouldn’t do, anymore because I’ve actually escaped from these movies relatively unscathed. Beside a hamstring this, and a stubbed toe here, not too bad. But that’s part of the reason.”

In terms of reprising the beloved antihero on screen, Campbell says of the season three Blu-ray release, “This is it. After this drops, you’ve got the full package. This is all. It’s on the table. This is it. This Ash’s life story right here.”

Though Campbell has retired the character, that retirement doesn’t extend to the entire universe of Evil Dead, or certain iterations of the character. As previously reported, Campbell will be voicing Ash in an upcoming VR game. Moreover, Campbell is very interested in continuing the stories of Pablo (Ray Santiago), Kelly (Dana DeLorenzo), and especially that of Mia (Jane Levy),

I would. Oh my God. In two seconds I would continue the Mia story, because she’s a badass now. I would continue the Ghost Beaters, because Kelly and Pablo are badasses now. Pablo is a shaman, so those were his super spy skills. She’s just a pissed off revenge filled hussy. So, I think it’d be great. I would love it, you know, and I don’t even care if bring in a new Ash character. Let’s go.

As excited as he is to get Levy and director Fede Alvarez back on board for a follow up to 2013’s Evil Dead, nothing has clicked into place yet. Of Alvarez, in particular, Campbell shares, “Fede, his best is yet to come. This guy is going to be like Guillermo del Toro kind of big. I think he’s just immensely talented. So, hey, if we can get him back, great.” It’s clear that there’s still a lot of creative spark in the franchise, though maybe without Campbell on screen. When asked what’s next, Campbell simply says, “We’re just gonna wait and see what happens. This [series] is what we had focused all of our attention on, and now that this is over, now we’ll see what else comes down the pike.“

Whatever incarnation of Ash or the Evil Dead universe comes up next, at least Starz gave us three great seasons of Ash vs Evil Dead. Grab season 3 on Blu-ray on August 21.

Horror journalist, RT Top Critic, and Critics Choice Association member. Co-Host of the Bloody Disgusting Podcast. Has appeared on PBS series' Monstrum, served on the SXSW Midnighter shorts jury, and moderated horror panels for WonderCon and SeriesFest.

Interviews

“I Don’t See Retiring from This” – Joe Bob Briggs Talks New “Last Drive-In” Format and the Show’s Future [Interview]

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Hey everybody, have you heard the news? Joe Bob is back in town!

The Last Drive-In with Joe Bob Briggs has returned for its sixth season on Shudder. While the show’s format has been slightly revised adopting a new biweekly schedule with one film instead of a double feature the beloved horror host’s approach is much the same.

“It didn’t really change anything,” Briggs tells Bloody Disgusting. “We were crowding all of our movies into 10 weeks once a year and then having specials, and we found that people would rather have more weeks. It’s actually more movies than we had before.

“And some of the people on the East coast fall asleep in the second movie,” he laughs. “It’s about a five-hour show when it’s a double feature because we talk so much. Also, it’s hard to get thematic double features every single time. So our specials are still double features, but our regular episodes are single features.”

The season kicked off last week with The Last Drive-In Live: A Tribute to Roger Corman, celebrating the legendary filmmaker’s first 70 years in Hollywood with a double feature of 1959’s A Bucket of Blood and 1983’s Deathstalker. The special was filmed live in front of a fervent audience of Briggs’ fan base lovingly dubbed the Mutant Family at Joe Bob’s Drive-In Jamboree in Las Vegas last October.

In addition to his usual hosting duties, Briggs conducted a career-spanning interview with Corman and his wife, fellow producer Julie Corman. They were also joined by one of Corman’s oldest friends and collaborators, Bruce Dern. In a heartfelt moment of mutual admiration, Briggs and Corman exchanged lifetime achievement awards on hubcaps.

“I’ve known Roger for about 35 years, so I’ve only known him for half of his career,” Briggs chuckles. In his long history of reviewing, interviewing, and talking about Corman and his legendary work, one emblematic encounter sticks out to Briggs.

“I remember the very first time I went to the Corman studio, which was a lumber yard on Venice Boulevard. He had a standing set for a spaceship control room, a standing set for a strip club, and I think he had one other one, and then he had all of his editing facilities there, but it was still a lumber yard. They had not really changed any of the buildings or anything.

“He’s showing me around the studio, and we were walking past a pile of debris, and I said, ‘Roger, is that the mutant from Forbidden World?’ It had just been thrown over in a corner. And he just said, ‘Yes, Joe Bob, I believe that is. He was apparently no longer needed.’ I said, ‘Roger, you gotta get with it! That stuff is worth money.’ But he was like, ‘When the movie’s over, the movie’s over.’ That was Roget to a T.”

At least part of Corman’s longevity can be attributed to his shrewd business practices and pragmatic approach to the industry, which has included working in every conceivable genre of cinema. “I couldn’t think of a single genre he has not made,” Briggs says.

“When we did this interview at the Jamboree, I said, ‘I’m gonna name the genre, and you tell me what you love about that genre,’ and every comment that he made involved money and box office performance,” he snickers. “None of it was involved with love of cinema, although I did get him to say that his favorite genre is a genre that he didn’t dabble in much other than his first movie [1954’s Highway Dragnet], and that was film noir.”

While the fourth annual Drive-In Jamboree is still in the planning stage, Briggs is delighted by the event’s continued success. “The Jamboree is something that we literally just threw together. We’ve had three of them now. It’s something where we just show up and try to come up with programming for each day.

But I really think the Jamboree is more about the mutant family meeting the mutant family. It’s more about people who know each other online gathering and partying with each other in person. It’s not so much about what movies we have. I mean, we always have an anniversary movie, and we always have some special guests and everything, but it’s more about the gathering of the mutants. It’s fun from that point of view. They’re exhausting, I can tell you that.”

The zeal among Briggs’ audience has only grown over the years, from hosting Joe Bob’s Drive-In Theater on The Movie Channel from 1986 to 1996, to MonsterVision on TNT from 1996 to 2000, and The Last-Drive-In on Shudder since 2018. “I’m amazed, having been in the business for this many years, that I still have a show at this time, because they say you can’t repeat TV,” Briggs notes.

“Nobody wants to see old TV, and yet I’ve done the same show three times on three different networks, and every time I try to change it everyone says, ‘No, no, don’t change it! That’s the part we love.’ I always want to do something new, and I’m always told, ‘No, you’re the CEO of Coca Cola who went to New Coke.’ You can’t do that. People will revolt. So we’re still doing it.

“It’s one of the few shows that I know of that’s just sort of grown organically over, gosh, almost 40 years. We’ve just added elements to the show. We try things. If something doesn’t work, we throw it away. If something works, we do it forever!”

The mutant family will be happy to know that Briggs plans to continue hosting and writing about movies for as long as he’s able to. “I don’t see retiring from this or retiring from writing. I’m primarily a writer, and the good thing about writing is long after they don’t wanna see you on TV anymore you can still write.

“The difference today, though, is I was pretty much the only guy doing genre films when I started. Now, there are academics that do it. There are entire books written about Dario Argento and Tobe Hooper and even lesser names than those, and there are, of course, a massive number of websites, including your own, so that when something comes out today, there’s immediately a hundred reviews of it; whereas in 1982, I was sort of the only guy, because the movies were considered disposable trash. So I have been surpassed in my deep knowledge, because who can keep up with all that? It’s impossible!”

Diana Prince, who serves as Briggs’ co-host Darcy the Mail Girl and was instrumental in getting him back in the hosting chair, has been promoted to an associate producer this season. “She was sort of always the associate producer, but I guess they finally gave her the title,” Briggs explains.

“Diana Prince is in on all the decisions about programming. I always listen to Austin Jennings, the director, and Diana Prince, the mail girl, because they come from opposite ends of the spectrum in terms of what kind of movies they wanna watch, and we try to strike a balance between. You know, she’s not gonna vote for Possession, and he’s not gonna vote for Mountaintop Motel Massacre,” he chortles.

“They’re probably the principal advisors, as far as what we show. Of course, [Diana] has a lot of social media clout, and she’s extremely knowledgeable about pop culture. Wow! She has seen everything. She’s seen more than I’ve seen!”

While surprises are part of the fun of The Last Drive-In, Briggs previews some of what’s in store this season. “The place we normally live is the neglected ’80 slasher, and we still live there,” he assures. “But we’re gonna pay a lot more attention to the ’70s especially. I’ve always thought the ’70s are more interesting than the ’80s anyway. And we’re gonna pay attention to some really recent stuff.”

He teases, “We’re gonna bring back Joe Bob’s Summer School, which is something that we used to do at MonsterVision. And we may have a marathon. There’s a possibility of that. But I’ll be digging this new format of being on every other week between now and at least up to Labor Day.”

While Briggs’ hosting format hasn’t changed much across four decades, the world around him certainly has and that’s why The Last Drive-In remains relevant. He points out, “In the era of streaming, where everything is menus and there are thousands and thousands and thousands of choices, we are that thing called a curator that can direct you to the fun places on the spectrum of streaming.

“Streaming is very confusing for people, and a lot of people don’t like it for that reason. I hope what we’re doing is cutting through the weeds and bringing things into perspective. And, you know, it’s just more fun to watch a movie with us!” he concludes with a Texas-sized grin.

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