Creepshow Season 3, Episode 5 postmortem with star Danielle Harris

Danielle Harris is a horror legend and a scream queen renowned for her many roles in a range of projects, including the Halloween and Hatchet series. Her latest venture is in a voice acting role as part of the most recent episode of Creepshow Season 3.

In this season’s fifth episode, “The Things In Oakwood’s Past,” Danielle Harris voices a local librarian named Marnie, who discovers a dark secret regarding the town’s past. Fearing that history could repeat, Marnie races to stop the mayor from opening an ancient box and unleashing what lies within.

SPOILER WARNING: The following article contains some mild spoilers for Creepshow Season 3, Episode 5. 

1428 Elm spoke with Danielle Harris about her work on this show, how animation differs most from live-action work, what franchises Danielle would love to be part of, and some of her upcoming projects.

Creepshow Season 3, Episode 5 postmortem chat with Danielle Harris

1428 ELM: I was looking to see if you had done previous voice work before this Creepshow episode, and I had no idea that you voiced Debbie Thornberry on The Wild Thornberrys! I remember watching that show. Do you like doing voiceover work? Apart from the fact you’re not on-screen, what are the biggest challenges between voicing an animated character versus live-action work? 

DANIELLE HARRIS: I love animated stuff. It’s an hour and a half or two hours in a room in your comfy clothes, and you get to see the whole thing play out. On film, you’re filming stuff out of sequence, so it’s a little bit difficult sometimes to remember where you’ve come from and know where you’re going as an actor and have to piece all of that together emotionally.

In a voiceover booth, there is no one watching, so you have this amazing freedom to be as crazy and as big, and thank God the show calls for it too. I can do whatever, and it works. I love doing voiceover work. I always have. I feel like I give myself more freedom because you’re not as aware of cameras and people watching because there are none. You can kind of do anything because it’s not really you. I loved that process.

I mean, I would have loved to have it be live. I’ve never done anything with monsters, it’s always mostly been slasher, horror, thriller stuff and my first time doing creature stuff, it was animated! I’m hoping they’ll bring me back in a follow-up to this story because I make it to the end. To get to do it live-action would be awesome.

1428 ELM: The premise of this episode revolves around a town with a dark secret and a rediscovered time capsule. Did you ever bury a time capsule as a kid? Or find one? 

DANIELLE: No, I have keepsake boxes of stuff from over the last 20-30 years. My kids have keepsake boxes of all kinds of stuff. I keep having more and more stuff, and they’re all in my safe, so when I die, my kids can look back on the times. But I have not buried a time capsule. I think in school, not my grade, but they talked about digging something up.

Time is changing so fast. It’s like I can bury something now, and in five years, the kids would be like, “What is that?” I think my son didn’t understand holding the phone to his ear because he’s so used to FaceTime or looking at messages that he doesn’t understand that this goes to your ear and you hear things out of it. Things are changing very fast, faster than they were 20 years ago, that’s for sure.

1428 ELM: Mark Hamill plays your character’s dad in this episode. What was that experience like? Did you get the chance to meet him, or had you met him before? 

DANIELLE: No, I have not, and I did not get the chance to work with him or meet him. I was the very first one who came in to do the recordings. Everybody else came after. That’s the good thing and the bad thing about voiceover stuff. It’s a surprise when you watch it because you don’t know what anyone else is going to do and how it pieces together is fascinating because you’re never in the room with anybody else. You’re usually just by yourself.

I was on The Wild Thornberrys for seven years, and I think Tim Curry and I worked together one time. Otherwise, it was always me by myself. It’s pretty cool how that is able to work, but yeah, it would have been awesome to actually have scenes with these guys, like have a real face-to-face actor look you in the eyes and get to play it out. But at least I can say I worked with Mark Hamill!

1428 ELM: How did you get involved with this episode of Creepshow? Did they reach out to you?

DANIELLE: I’ve known Greg Nicotero since I was 10. We worked on Halloween 5 together, he did the makeup effects, and we have been like family ever since then. Greg taught me how to drive in his big Cadillac convertible in the parking lot of a bank in Sherman Oaks; when my mom would not take me driving, I was like, “Please somebody take me for lessons!”

I’ve just kept in touch with Greg over the years constantly, and it was apropos he messaged me randomly a couple of months ago like, “Hey, what’s up?” It’s like, “Hey, what’s up? What are you up to?” He was like, “Oh, just blowing s**t up.” He was on set blowing up monsters or something, doing explosions, and he sent me the video, like, “Of course you are!” Then he asked if I wanted to do an episode of Creepshow and I was like, “Yes! Finally we get to do something together!”

Then he said, “And it’s animated,” and I was like, “Oh man! We don’t get to do anything together! But yes, of course, I want do it.” I was excited to do it. It was as simple as that. Greg, all of those guys, you’re creating your own shows because you want to work with your friends and your family. I think that it’s awesome that he’s able to do that and bring everybody into the room together.

Which horror franchises would Danielle Harris love to be part of next?

DANIELLE: I’m super into the Chucky series right now. It’s got a little bit of a different tone. I don’t want to do another slasher franchise. I just think it’s not necessary, so I think something with Child’s Play would be super fun, and it scared the crap out of me as a kid. I mean, unless they want to make another Gremlins, I’m down for that, of course.

But I like all of that stuff. I would gear toward Child’s Play, also Brad Dourif, I have a long history with Brad, and I love him and everyone involved in that. Jennifer Tilly, I played her young in a movie quite a few years ago called Goosed. There’s just some history; Alex Vincent is a good friend of mine. I’ve not met Don Mancini, which would be really cool. So that’s one I’m happy they brought back and is doing so well.

What does Danielle Harris love most about the horror genre?

DANIELLE: The community. There is nothing like it anywhere else, the support and the love and the clique. It’s just so inclusive. There is no judgment. There is really is something fantastic about the horror community that is unlike any other. I mean, maybe sci-fi and fantasy, but it all kind of goes hand-in-hand.

But horror is a sub-culture. It is a little bit different than the others. There is fierceness and loyalty and a love for it. And an intelligence, these movies are very smart and very hard to make. I think they are underappreciated, and I think we are just starting to get to a place where they are seen for what they are. Thank God. It’s only taken a long time, but I think we’re getting there.

1428 ELM: What’s next for you, Danielle? I saw on IMDb you’re filming and doing a few different projects right now, but I know those aren’t always accurate, so I figured I’d ask!

DANIELLE: I’m going to soon be in pre-production on a movie that I’m directing called Sequel that actually Joe Dante, director of Gremlins, has optioned the script for me and is producing with his company Renfield Productions. It’s about seven final girls and one final night, and I’m excited to get behind the camera. I love directing. I actually like directing more than I like acting, so we’re working on that.

COVID really put a stop to a lot of things that were going forward, so now that we’re getting better with the vaccinations and getting a clearer grasp on how to handle this stuff, I think production will pick back up and move forward. Hopefully, we get to do that at the beginning of the year.

I am about to start a movie called Flesh that I am excited about on Monday. Chris McGowan has written and is producing and directing. I’m executive producing and was able to cast a couple of my friends that I can’t say yet because it hasn’t been announced but will be coming soon! It’s just nice to still be working and getting to do what I love to do.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

You can follow Danielle Harris via her official website, Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. New episodes of Creepshow Season 3 stream Thursdays on Shudder.