McG interview: The Babysitter: Killer Queen, sequels and genre mashups

1428 Elm: I looked you up online, and your resume is all over the place. I have to ask you about a specific project that you were interested in, at least at one time. I read that you were planning a film adaptation of the musical Spring Awakening. Is that something you are still working on?

McG: It was something I was working on, and I just failed the creative team of Steven Sater and Duncan Sheik, I was never able to get the film made, and it’s the great heartbreak of my life.

1428 Elm: Oh, that’s too bad.

McG: I’ve seen the play all over the world, I saw it probably 10 times in New York, and I’ve seen it in England, I’ve seen it in LA, I’ve seen it in Miami, I’ve only ever seen it work. It’s a contemporary Romeo and Juliet, I think it’s the greatest thing in the world, and my understanding is they are going to get it made now, it’s just, it’ll sadly be without me.

But, I wish them every success. I’m such good friends with Steven Sater, who wrote it, and Duncan Sheik, who wrote all the music. I let them down, because for the time I was on the movie, I never pushed it over the edge at a studio to get it made.

1428 Elm: I’m a musical theater nerd as well as a horror nerd, so I am very familiar with the show just based on the soundtrack. I look forward to a film version of it, I’m sorry you’re not going to be involved in that.

McG: That’s the way the cookie crumbles. If you read Wikipedia, you know all about Superman. I’m sort of a recovering agoraphobic, and I couldn’t get on the plane to go down there, and they threw me off that movie.

I try to take the crunchy with the smooth, you know. Like you, I love horror and musicals, and I just love movies.

I just kept going, because I’m not really built to do anything else, and I think that’s why I’m attracted to The Babysitter universe, because it allows me to do all the things I love. There’s such a big musical component, obviously a big Grindhouse, a horror/thriller component.

1428 Elm: With some video games thrown in!

McG: Yeah, I mean Faust is the source material, and Mel Brooks’ style jokes are all over the place. It’s a bizarre mash-up.

1428 Elm: What projects do you have coming up in the future that we can look forward to?

McG: I’m working on a movie with Tiffany Haddish, called Mystery Girl, and I’m working on a movie with Joey King based on The Uglies, the book series.

1428 Elm: Oh, nice! You’re working with a lot of great actors out there. I was going to ask if you have a favorite film genre, but it seems like you kind of like to mix them up a little bit.

Of course, I love horror. I like a lot of other things as well, but I’m a longtime horror nerd, so I hope you stick with that.

McG: It’s such an important genre to me. I mean, I saw Halloween when I was entirely too young to see it, I saw it in a theater and it scarred me. The Shining changed my life, and even Nightmare on Elm Street, which is sort of your namesake, I appreciate what you’re up to.

I just love movies, and I love turning genres on their heads. Jenna Ortega is now one of the leads for the new Scream is my understanding, now her star’s on the up and up. I could never abandon my horror roots, it’s just not in me.

1428 Elm: Good, that makes me happy. My first horror that I remember falling in love with, I was about 11, and I was way too young, was the original Black Christmas.

That’s the movie that got me started on horror, and it stuck. Well, thank you so much for your time, McG. I hope all of the other fans enjoy Killer Queen as much as I did.

McG: It was nice talking to you too.

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