Practical prosthetics, pickles and a Pennywise origin story – oh my! These are just some of the new twisted scares you’ll see in HBO’s IT: Welcome to Derry.
This horror series created by siblings Andy and Barbara Muschietti, adapted from Stephen King’s iconic horror novel It, is set two decades before the events of 2017’s It and the sequel It Chapter Two. The prequel expands the lore of the shapeshifting murderous entity known as Pennywise (Bill Skarsgård) that feeds on children before returning to hibernation every 27 years. As he stalks the town of Derry, a group of children must find a way to put an end to his killing spree or at least quell his thirst until his next sleep.
Throughout the series Pennywise takes on the form of deep traumas to create new scares for the children of Derry. As a result of this, Ronnie (Amanda Christine) has to witness the gruesome body of her mother (Tenika Davis), who died giving birth to her, trying to murder her through an open gash with teeth in her abdomen.
During their interview with Deadline on The Process, the Muschiettis and VFX supervisor Daryl Sawchuk reveal the gnarly scene was mostly done practically.
“Amanda did an amazing job. There was a lot of endurance, a lot of energy [needed] at all times. But she endured a lot. You can see she’s covered in his terrible goop, and [between] that and the resetting of this was always tremendous because it’s all wet and very, very taxing,” Andy Muschietti says.
Barbara Muschietti adds: “When we started working with Tenika, Andy discovered what an amazing actor she was. Especially when it comes to the mother and how scary she was. [The scene] was extended because Tanika was so good and so incredible at making that character grow and [being] terrifying.”
Sawchuk, who worked with Rodeo FX Montreal behind the scenes, recalls the concept team’s painstaking dedication to making everything look authentic. “[They] did amazing paint-overs on top of the real photography to define what the look should be for the mummification of [that character]. And it’s always a good starting point for us to have great artwork to work off of and Andy holds us to a very high bar,” he says with a laugh. “There’s always one more note, one more thought.”
“But thanks to [the VFX team] she turns into that corpse, mummified version of her and it was a very successful moment. We were so heavily grounded in real practical effects, that old-school horror filmmaking.” Andy Muschietti says.
Another terror that went viral online was the pickle jar horrors. During a grocery shopping run, Lilly Bainbridge (Clara Stack) is plagued by Pennywise in the form of her father who was fatally sliced into pieces at a pickle canning company. As the individually jarred pieces of her father’s body jump off the shelves and crash onto the floor they form a pickle-based tentacle monster.
“The concept of the monster was basically the idea of a man that’s been sliced,” Andy Muschietti says. “I remember discussing this where it was like, ‘OK? How are we going to see it? Will it be a Rubik’s cube type thing made up of slices of a face?’ It was executed very well by the guys at Rodeo. Also, I wanted the entrails to be part of this creature. That’s when we said, ‘OK, let’s make it look like an octopus. And the intestines will be the tentacles of this creature and the means of propulsion.’ It’s disgusting.”
And what about the calamity of the crashing pickle jars? “We did use real pickles,” Barbara Muschietti says. “And real pickle juice. The stages smelt like pickles for about a week.”
Sawchuk adds: “[We were] big believers in trying to get as much real on camera as possible. Andy, thankfully, was like, ‘OK let’s do it,’ so the special effects team filled up hundreds of jars. I mean, it makes for a much more believable performance.”
To find out more about how the IT: Welcome to Derry crew grounded the horror series in reality, along with visually depicting Pennywise’s celestial origins, watch the video above.
Credits: Produced by HBO and Warner Bros. Television, developed for television by Andy Muschietti, Barbara Muschietti, and Jason Fuchs, IT: WELCOME TO DERRY is based on the novel “It” by Stephen King. Andy Muschietti and Barbara Muschietti (through their Double Dream production company), Jason Fuchs, Brad Caleb Kane, David Coatsworth, Bill Skarsgård, Shelley Meals, Roy Lee, and Dan Lin are executive producers. Fuchs, who wrote the teleplay for the first episode, and Kane serve as co-showrunners on the project.
