Misc
10 of the Most Important Women in Slasher History
While there are many, many runners-up on this list, and I’m certain there are just as many that I missed, in general I have focused on women whose work extends across multiple iconic entries in the genre, rather than more obscure titles or a single slasher work. Thus, we won’t be seeing directors like Home Sweet Home’s Nettie Peña and Rocktober Blood’s Beverly Sebastian, editors like The Texas Chain Saw Massacre’s Sallye Richardson, and so on. That would be its own separate list, which I would absolutely also like to compile someday. But one thing at a time.
As part of our celebration of Women’s History Month here at Horror Press, I thought it was high time to celebrate the women who helped shape my most favorite of horror subgenres: the slasher movie. Both in front of and behind the camera, women have been essential in creating some of the most iconic and well-respected slasher movies, and I shall attempt to highlight 10 (well, 11, but I won’t tell if you won’t) who have had the most impact over the decades.
While there are many, many runners-up on this list, and I’m certain there are just as many that I missed, in general I have focused on women whose work extends across multiple iconic entries in the genre, rather than more obscure titles or a single slasher work. Thus, we won’t be seeing directors like Home Sweet Home’s Nettie Peña and Rocktober Blood’s Beverly Sebastian, editors like The Texas Chain Saw Massacre’s Sallye Richardson, and so on. That would be its own separate list, which I would absolutely also like to compile someday. But one thing at a time.
Ranking this list would be both impossible and disrespectful, so I’m presenting each entry in loose chronological order, based on when their contributions to the development and continuation of the genre were most prominent.
10 of the Most Important Women in Slasher History
Stage and Screen, Personalities, pic: circa 1961, American film actress Janet Leigh in a scene from the film “Psycho” from Alfred Hitchcock (Photo by Haynes Archive/Popperfoto/Getty Images)
#1 Janet Leigh (Actor)
Besides a cameo in Halloween H20, Janet Leigh never made another proper slasher after starring in 1960’s Psycho. And yet that one appearance gave us so much. Without her agreeing to use her star power to sell the movie, only to have the rug pulled out from under the audience when she is murdered halfway through in one of the most memorably shocking scenes of the century, it is very probable that Psycho would not have been the hit that it was. Sure, Hitchcock’s name would have put butts in seats, but even he knew what he had with Leigh, to the point of employing William Castle-esque gimmickry around hiding that particular surprise.
If Leigh hadn’t had the humility to say yes to being murdered onscreen in what was – at the time – a reasonably grubby little horror picture, this seminal work would have been very different, and the entire slasher genre might have died on the vine as a result.
#2 Edwige Fenech (Actor)
Before the idea of a “scream queen” had really even been floated, Edwige Fenech brought audiences back to the giallo genre time and time again with her roles in titles like Five Dolls for an August Moon, The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh, The Case of the Bloody Iris, Strip Nude for Your Killer, and Your Vice is a Locked Room, and Only I Have the Key. She played a key part in the Italian genre’s domination throughout the 1970s, leading directly into the North American slasher boom of the 1980s.
#3 Debra Hill (Producer/Writer)
The unsung heroine of the Halloween franchise, Debra Hill co-wrote Halloween and Halloween II with John Carpenter, in addition to producing both films and the unrelated sequel Halloween III: Season of the Witch. In addition to being at the core of one of the most iconic slasher franchises, her work on the 1978 original cemented the rules of the slasher film in a way that early proto-slashers like Psycho, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, and Black Christmas simply didn’t. She helped set the template for nearly every slasher movie to come, particularly every slasher movie worth its salt released between 1979 and 1984, before Nightmare on Elm Street added a new flavor to the mix.
#4 Jamie Lee Curtis (Actor)
Unless you stumbled on this site by accident, you know Jamie Lee Curtis. She cemented the idea of the scream queen and, frankly, in my humble opinion, no actor since her has really been able to carry that torch properly. After leading 1978’s Halloween, she went on to star in a variety of other slashers, helping add powder to the keg right at the beginning of the slasher boom with titles including Prom Night, Terror Train, Halloween II, and the hopelessly underrated Roadgames. Showing the same humility as her mother, who you may remember from three entries above, she has returned to her Halloween role multiple times, resurrecting the iconic franchise no less than twice, in addition to paying homage in other projects such as the Ryan Murphy horror-comedy series titled, what else, Scream Queens.
#5 Annette Benson (Casting Director)
I feel like casting directors get short shrift. Sure, directors and producers frequently have a hand in choosing who stars in what. However, even for roles where that is the case, casting directors are responsible for cutting the wheat from the chaff and putting those people in front of the directors and producers in the first place as well as – frequently – manipulating them into making the right decision and feeling like it was their own idea.
Thus, without the work of the great Annette Benson, whose best-known slasher project is the original A Nightmare on Elm Street, we wouldn’t have Robert England, Heather Langenkamp, or (for better or worse) Johnny Depp. She went on to cast the next four installments in the Elm Street franchise (hello, Patricia Arquette) as well as bringing us Viggo Mortensen in Leatherface: Texas Chainsaw Massacre III. And before all that, she cut her teeth as a casting assistant on the early parody National Lampoon’s Class Reunion.
#6 Rachel Talalay (Multi-Hyphenate)
Rachel Talalay is probably best known as the director of Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare, making her the first woman to helm an installment in a major slasher franchise. And still one of the only women. But she didn’t get that job out of nowhere. She rose through the ranks on previous installments, going from being an assistant production manager on the original Elm Street to production manager on Freddy’s Revenge to line producer on Dream Warriors to producer on Dream Master. After (wisely) skipping out on Dream Child, though she did receive special thanks, Talalay returned with a vengeance to make slasher history.
Her journey also extends into other iconic slashers far from Freddy’s reach. Her slow rise above the line included eclectic stints as a production accountant on New Line’s pre-Elm Street slasher Alone in the Dark, a script supervisor and apprentice editor on The House on Sorority Row, and a first assistant director on Return to Horror High.
#7 Fern Champion and Pamela Basker (Casting Directors)
This dynamic duo is to Friday the 13th, what Annette Benson is to A Nightmare on Elm Street. In addition to casting slashers including Fade to Black, Tobe Hooper’s The Funhouse, and April Fool’s Day, they collaborated on Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter, A New Beginning, and Jason Lives, bringing us every version of Tommy Jarvis (therefore, Corey Feldman) as well as handing out early roles to Crispin Glover and Tony Goldwyn.
They also handled the L.A. casting for Friday the 13th: The Series, which isn’t really a slasher project, but helped beef up the franchise, which counts! And Pet Sematary, which also isn’t a slasher, but brought Miko Hughes to the horror genre five years before New Nightmare.
#8 Carol J. Clover (Academic)
In her 1987 essay “Her Body, Himself: Gender in the Slasher Film,” which was later published as part of her 1992 compilation Men, Women, and Chainsaws: Gender in the Modern Horror Film, Carol J. Clover coined the term “final girl,” and discussion of the slasher genre was forever changed. I think it is entirely fair to say that, without her keen analysis of the slasher, a genre which few academics had the gumption to take on at the time, we wouldn’t have had 1996’s Scream and its further dissection of the final girl trope. And without Scream, we wouldn’t have I Know What You Did Last Summer, Urban Legend, Bride of Chucky, the latter-era Chucky franchise in general, and an untold number of post-millennium slasher works.
#9 Marianne Maddalena (Producer)
Wes Craven called this woman his “guardian angel,” what more evidence could you possibly need? Just to be thorough, though, I’ll share a little bit about iconic producer Marianne Maddalena, who founded the company Craven/Maddalena Films with the master of horror. After producing Craven’s unique but ultimately unsuccessful Shocker, she went on to collaborate with him on New Nightmare and the entire Scream franchise, which she continues to steward to this day.
#10 Jennifer Tilly (Actor)
Without Jennifer Tilly, we simply wouldn’t have one of the best late-period slasher franchises in the business. Her character Tiffany Valentine, who was introduced in the fourth Child’s Play installment, Bride of Chucky, is a crackling inferno of charisma without whom the franchise would be hopelessly bereft. She has also been a fierce advocate for Chucky off-camera, unashamedly parading her association with the franchise around in other properties (including new promos for her appearance on Real Housewives). This fierce loyalty to Tiffany is likely the reason that half of the Chucky projects that followed were even allowed to be made in the first place. For that, and for everything, we must thank Jennifer Tilly from the bottom of our hearts.
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The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003) Limited Edition 4K UHD from Arrow Video
- 4K (2160p) Ultra HD Blu-ray presentation in Dolby Vision (HDR10 compatible)
- Original DTS-HD MA 7.1 and 5.1 surround audio and lossless stereo audio
- Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
- Brand new audio commentary with Dread Central co-founder Steve “Uncle Creepy” Barton and co-host of The Spooky Picture Show podcast Chris MacGibbon
- Archival audio commentary with director Marcus Nispel, producer Michael Bay, executive producers Brad Fuller and Andrew Form and New Line Cinema founder Robert Shaye
- Archival audio commentary with Marcus Nispel, director of photography Daniel Pearl, production designer Greg Blair, art director Scott Gallager, sound supervisor Trevor Jolly and composer Steve Jablonsky
- Archival audio commentary with Marcus Nispel, Michael Bay, writer Scott Kosar, Brad Fuller, Andrew Form and actors Jessica Biel, Erica Leerhsen, Eric Balfour Jonathan Tucker, Mike Vogel and Andrew Bryniarski
- Reimagining a Classic, a brand new interview with director Marcus Nispel
- Shadows of Yesteryear, a brand new interview with cinematographer Daniel Pearl
- The Lost Leatherface, a brand new interview with actor Brett Wagner
- Masks and Massacres, a brand new interview with makeup effects artist Scott Stoddard
- Chainsaw Symphony, a brand new interview with composer Steve Jablonsky
- Chainsaw Redux: Making A Massacre, a making-of documentary
- Ed Gein: The Ghoul of Plainfield, an in-depth look at the infamous killer who inspired the character of Leatherface
- Severed Parts, a look at the cutting room floor and some of the scenes excised from the final edit
- Deleted scenes including an alternate opening and ending
- Screen tests for Jessica Biel, Eric Balfour and Erica Leerhsen
- Behind-the-scenes featurette
- Cast and crew interviews
- Theatrical trailers and TV spots
- Concept art galleries
- Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Aaron Lea
- Double-sided foldout poster featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Aaron Lea
- Illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing on the film by Michael Gingold
Misc
NYCC 2025 Horror Highlights: A Sneak Peek at ‘The Lost Boys’ Musical, ‘Resident Evil: Requiem,’ and More!
As soon as New York Comic Con announced that its 2025 theme would be “haunted,” I started lacing up my comfy shoes and making a beeline for the Javitz Center! Horror has always been represented at the con, but it felt fitting that it should play a central role in this year’s event at a time when the genre seems more popular than ever.
From beloved family-friendly properties like The Nightmare Before Christmas to pants-dampening titles like the upcoming Resident Evil: Requiem, horror appeared in countless shapes and forms. Here are all the best and scariest insights I gleaned from the show floor, panel rooms, and pop-ups of New York Comic Con 2025!
Our NYCC 2025 Horror Highlights
Resident Evil: Requiem Is Going to Test Your Bladder Strength
Full disclaimer: I’m not a gamer. I’m honestly pretty bad at games, which made my Resident Evil: Requiem play session all the more frightening because I was convinced that everyone around me would realize I’m a fraud. But with easy-to-grasp controls, even for a newb like me, the latest installment in the iconic horror franchise quickly sucked me in and left me on edge for entirely different reasons.
During my 30-minute session, I was introduced to FBI analyst Grace Ashcroft, Requiem’s central character. She swims to consciousness to find herself strapped upside down on a gurney with a needle in her arm, siphoning her blood. After Grace managed to free herself, the controls were handed over to me to explore the creepy facility through Grace’s eyes, looking for a fuse. Some spaces were bathed in red light; others were lit only by flickering bulbs that left me white-knuckling the controller, waiting for something to emerge from the shadows and swallow me whole, not helped by Grace’s anxious, stuttering breathing in my ear.
I took a moment to appreciate how detailed video games have become since my childhood experiences playing Evil Dead: Hail to the King on the original PlayStation (seriously, you can see the dust drifting in beams of light now?!), only for the sound of movement somewhere in the facility to yank me back to the present. I renewed my frantic search for the fuse, only to run blindly into a pitch-black room and encounter something enormous that dragged me into the darkness. Sorry, Grace!
You can find out what happens next when Resident Evil: Requiem releases for the PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, PC, and Nintendo Switch 2 on February 27, 2026.
Megan Fox Is Among the New Cast Members in Five Nights at Freddy’s 2—And Blumhouse Hasn’t Given Up on Its Other m3gan Yet
Blumhouse made several announcements at their NYCC panel, most notably that Megan Fox (Jennifer’s Body) is voicing Toy Chica in director Emma Tammi’s highly anticipated sequel Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, coming to theaters on December 5. Other new additions to the cast include YouTuber Matthew Patrick, aka MatPat, who cameoed in the first movie and will voice Toy Bonnie, and Kellen Goff, who has voiced multiple characters in the game series and will now lend his pipes to Toy Freddy.
I’m interested in Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, not least because my best friend is terrified of the franchise and makes a wildly entertaining moviegoing companion—but I’m more interested in the future of another Blumhouse franchise, M3GAN. After the sequel underperformed, likely due in part to its hard genre pivot away from horror and into action territory, the future of the killer doll is uncertain. But in a special industry presentation on “The Business of Fear,” Jason Blum revealed that “we’re all working to keep M3GAN alive,” adding that Blumhouse is exploring other potential mediums before trying to resurrect her on film.
Does that mean a M3GAN video game might come our way in the future, or perhaps a TV series? I don’t know, but I have a feeling this isn’t the last we’ve seen of the silicone diva.
Photo taken by Samantha McLaren.
The Lost Boys: A New Musical Will Feature Flying Stunts and a Live Vampire Band
My queer heart is a sucker for musical adaptations of horror films I love, so you can be certain that I’ll be heading down to the Santa Carla Boulevard—aka Broadway’s Palace Theater—for The Lost Boys: A New Musical, which begins previews on March 27, 2026. At their NYCC panel, producer Patrick Wilson (The Conjuring franchise), director Michael Arden (Maybe Happy Ending), and cast members LJ Benet, Ali Louis Bourzgui, and Maria Wirries revealed why they feel Joel Schumacher’s 1987 classic translates so well to the stage, and what audiences can look forward to.
“There’s something that I see with both horror movies, musicals, and superhero movies—there’s an element of melodrama that’s really rewarding,” says Wilson, who began his career in musical theater and worked with Schumacher on the director’s 2004 film adaptation of The Phantom of the Opera. “Some people view it as camp, but there’s a reality of it being heightened that felt like this story cemented itself so much to being a musical.”
“They’re a biker gang, after all, and there’s a level of theatricality to that in and of itself,” says Arden. “Our biker gang also happens to play instruments.”
That’s right: the vampires will be playing instruments live on stage, which made casting twice as hard. Ali Louis Bourzgui, who plays David, the character portrayed by Kiefer Sutherland in the film, reveals that he plays guitar. And that wasn’t the only unusual request in the casting call: auditions included a flying test. (Presumably wires were involved, unless Arden has found himself a real cabal of vampires in his cast.)
Other highlights that fans can look forward to include killer music from one of Arden’s favorite bands, The Rescues. You can listen to the song “Have to Have You” right now, featuring instrumentals from Slash. The director also teases that many fan-favorite moments from the film will feature in some way in the musical, including the bridge scene and, yes, even the sexy saxophone guy.
Greg Nicotero’s Guts & Glory Marks a New Challenge for a Legend of the Business
If you like looking at gnarly practical effects in horror movies, chances are you’re familiar with Greg Nicotero’s work, whether you realize it or not. The legendary SFX artist has worked on everything from George Romero’s Day of the Dead and Sam Raimi’s Evil Dead II to Kill Bill and, more recently, The Walking Dead. The impressive extent of his resume was made clear at the panel “Shudder is Here to Scare the S*** Out of You,” in which almost any film mentioned by the other panelists was met by a small smile and a humble murmur of “worked on that” into the mic, often followed by a wild anecdote. Nicotero seems like the most interesting man in the world to grab a drink with, and his new horror competition show for Shudder—Guts & Glory—will let us see more of the man behind the makeup brush.
“Guts & Glory is one of the most fun times I’ve had on a show,” Nicotero says, teasing that the series is “part Sam Raimi, part Halloween Horror Nights, and part Survivor.”
In the six-episode first season, contestants are dropped into an Alabama swamp, where there’s an urban legend about an evil spirit. “One of the contestants gets possessed by the evil spirit, people start dying off, but in the meantime, they’re still competing and there’s a prize,” Nicotero explains.
Guts & Glory is effects-heavy, which was challenging to do in an unscripted series relying on real people’s real-time reactions. “You do a movie, you can cut and try it again,” Nicotero explains. “[This] was completely out of my wheelhouse and out of my comfort zone, but I’m really, really proud of it.”
Nicotero’s Creepshow was one of the first original shows to debut on Shudder, so he’s truly part of the DNA of the horror streamer, which celebrated its 10th anniversary this year. Guts & Glory premieres on October 14 as part of Shudder’s Season of Screams programming.
Horror Short The Littles Deserves the Big-Screen Feature Treatment
Some short films are perfectly suited to their bite-sized format, while others contain the seeds of something much bigger. At the New York Premiere of The Littles, a new short written and directed by American Horror Story producer Andrew Duplessie, I could immediately see the potential for the feature film that Duplessie hopes to make.
Equal parts charming and unsettling, The Littles stars M3GAN’s Violet McGraw as a little girl with a loose floorboard in her bedroom. One night, a scuffling sound and a crack of light between the boards lead the little girl to discover that her family isn’t alone in the house…
Duplessie says The Littles was inspired by his own experiences growing up in a creaky old house with a no-doubt overactive imagination. The short features creepy-cute stop-motion animation from Anthony Scott (The Nightmare Before Christmas), puppets by Katy Strutz (Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio), and some truly adorable miniature sets by Aiden Creates, all blended perfectly with the live-action scenes. Check it out if it’s playing at a festival near you, and watch this space for a (fingers-crossed) future feature!
Photo taken by Samantha McLaren.
Disney Publishing’s New The Nightmare Before Christmas Tie-in Novel Welcomes Younger Fans into the Scary Fun
NYCC’s horror happenings weren’t all geared toward an adult audience. Disney Publishing took over Daily Provisions Manhattan West for a pop-up experience inspired by The Nightmare Before Christmas, featuring themed food and drinks like a delectable Pumpkin Potion coffee that I could honestly drink all season long.
At a media and creator event in the space, I took a look at the newly released Hour of the Pumpkin Queen from New York Times best-selling author Megan Shepherd, who also wrote the official novelization of The Nightmare Before Christmas for the film’s 30th anniversary in 2023. In this new tie-in novel, Sally and her rag doll apprentice, Luna, embark on a time-bending adventure to save Jack Skellington and Halloween Town after falling through a mysterious portal.
I was gifted a copy of the book by Disney, but all opinions are my own here. I’m looking forward to giving it a read during the inevitable Halloween hangover that takes place in November, before likely passing it on to my young nieces when they’re old enough. It’s a full novel, not a picture book, so definitely geared more toward a YA audience, but between the beautiful artwork on the cover and the seasonal theme, it might just be the perfect gift for the budding horror lover in your life.
That’s a wrap on New York Comic Con 2025! Be sure to bookmark Horror Press if you haven’t already so you never miss our coverage of conventions, festivals, and more.
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