PopHorror Let's Get Scared
Before horror word-master Stephen King brought to life iconically terrifying characters like Pennywise and Jack Torrance, there was Kurt Barlow, the main antagonist of his second-ever novel, Salem’s Lot. Ever since the book hit shelves in 1975, readers have considered it a page-turner as they devour the story of this ancient vampire who is hellbent on transforming the unsuspecting small-town residents of Jerusalem’s Lot into blood-sucking creatures of the night.
Salem’s Lot was twice made into a mini series for television, in 1979 and 2004. Now, a film version of King’s best-selling novel is streaming on Max. Released on Oct. 3, this modern-day adaptation of Salem’s Lot follows the classic King story that fans know and love. Bringing it to life is Lewis Pullman (Outer Range 2022) as Ben Mears, a writer who returns to his hometown of Jerusalem’s Lot seeking inspiration for his next novel; Makenzie Leigh (Gotham 2014) as his love interest Susan Norton; Spencer Treat Clark (Animal Kingdom 2016) as Mike Ryerson, a longtime Jerusalem’s Lot resident who works odd jobs around town, including at the graveyard; Jordan Preston Carter (Shaft 2019) as Mark Petrie, a young boy who shows bravery beyond his years; Alfre Woodard (Annabelle 2014) as Dr. Cody; among others.
PopHorror participated in a recent press day for Salem’s Lot with Pullman, Leigh and Carter, who discussed vampire transformations, filming on location near the residence of King and more.
Conversation with Spencer Treat Clark
PopHorror: Your character of Mike is one of the first to transform into a vampire. I feel like we don’t really get to know that much about him before that happens. Was there anything that you would’ve liked to have seen him do or experience before getting bitten?
Spencer Treat Clark: Yeah, there was one other scene that was, like, the briefest snippet of a scene that got cut out that I’m glad we got to do. It was just one little line where the character’s driving through the town and you see the milkman, you see the postman and you see neighbors talking to each other, and then you see a flash of a dead dog on a fence post. It’s a scene from the book and I would imagine maybe they cut it for time, or maybe it was just too gory or gave too much away. But that was one of the first things we shot, and I got to have a little sneak peak of the graveyard too, where, presumably, Mike spends a lot of his time and gets to work. So while it didn’t make it into the movie, it was a nice little thing to inhabit the character and to wear his costume for the first time.
But yeah, I would imagine that Mike grew up in this small town. Maybe at one point he had the potential to move out and just never did, and he probably hangs out with the people that he grew up with. Presumably, Matthew Burke (Bill Camp, Joker 2019) was his teacher at one point many years ago. I think the whole small-town vibe felt very familiar to me having grown up in New England myself, and it was one of the reasons why I felt more comfortable kind of slipping into that character.
PopHorror: This was filmed not too far from where Stephen King lives. Can you elaborate on the shooting location? Was it filmed in an actual small town or were sets built? Or a combo of both?
Spencer Treat Clark: Yes and yes, it was filmed in an actual small town. It was filmed sort of outside Concord, Massachusetts where it has so much Revolutionary War history. It’s interesting because I’m from Connecticut and I’ve been living in Los Angeles for basically all of my adulthood, so it was funny going back and saying, ‘Oh my God, I don’t think I realized how much history there was around this part of the country.’ But it really seeped into the movie for me.
And then the Marsten House was created in its entirety, the exterior, and then on a soundstage, the interior. And ultimately, it’s your job as an actor to create the world in your mind so that when you’re in front of a blue screen, that is the job. Not everything can be exactly as it is on the page, and once it hits the screen, that’s ultimately what the audience is seeing. But it really does make a difference when you get to step into the Marsten House. I never got to shoot in there, but I had a lot of time, so I got to sit there and watch and see all the sets and the staircase, and it just makes such a difference for you as an actor and the audience. It just had such cool sets. The basement of the Marsten House was all built, nooks and crannies of it that never even make it to the screen were there. And I think as actors, we were all really grateful that so much attention to detail was taken. It just makes our jobs that much easier.
Conversation with Makenzie Leigh and Lewis Pullman
PopHorror: Makenzie, what went into creating your vampire look at the very end? And what was your reaction to seeing yourself as that on screen?
Makenzie Leigh: Obviously the contacts are genuinely uncomfortable, but also great because then you don’t have to see other actors and whether they believe your vampire-ness. And so everyone was cloudy and I’d be like, ‘Just go for it.’ Lost my voice a couple of times, threw out my back, but yeah, anything for the art.
PopHorror: In the beginning, there are kind of two casts going on. You have the adults doing their thing, the kids doing theirs, and then at some point they unite to fight this evil force. What was it like working with the young cast, especially Jordan as Mark? I loved his character!
Makenzie Leigh: Kids make acting so easy because they’re fully invested and you just have to join them in the imaginative world.
Lewis Pullman: Yeah, completely. Jordan, he was so game for all of it. He had to do so much crazy stuff that I cannot imagine doing at his age, and he did it just so valiantly and always so positively. He was never complaining about anything, he was always just really excited to be continually stretching and imagining what he would be doing. We would always play these games in between takes where we’d come up with little tasks of like, ‘OK, you get to choose one person for your vampire team that you can see right now that’s in your visual plane. Who are you gonna choose? You have to choose in 10 seconds. Ten, nine…’ He’d be like, ‘I choose him,’ and I’d be like, ‘OK, why’d you choose him?,’ and he’s like, ‘He’s really strong.’ Jordan was just like Makenzie said, it really draws you into that sandbox mode.
Photos Courtesy of New Line Cinema/Max
Salem’s Lot (2024) is streaming now on MAX.
