Jason Goes to Hell: 10 things you didn’t know

Pamela Voorhees – Credit: Paramount Pictures

3. Betsy Palmer declined reprising her role as Pam Voorhees

As iconic as Mrs. Voorhees is for the Friday the 13th series, she’s not very present in it. I mean, it makes sense, considering she dies at the end of the first film. And I guess she does appear as a severed head or as a Chris Higgins hallucination. But the real Mrs. Voorhees, as in Betsy Palmer herself, is only in that very first film.

Apparently, there was a scene in the script for this movie featuring Mrs. Voorhees in a flashback. Producers had hopes of bringing in Palmer to reprise the role once again. It would have been a nice nod to the original film and that character. The details of this flashback are not currently known, but I am curious how they planned to insert the character into the story.

However, Palmer turned the role down. One can only assume she took a look at the script and wasn’t impressed. While I’d have loved to see another appearance of Palmer as Pamela, I can’t help but understand her decision here and respect it. I believe she’d have been open to reprising the part if a good enough idea was presented to her, but that moment never came.