Writing (pictured in 2012) In 1994,
Kevin Williamson was a novice and financially struggling screenwriter, having recently sold his first script,
Killing Mrs. Tingle (1999). While house-sitting, Williamson watched a
Turning Point documentary about serial killer
Danny Rolling which he said left him unsettled. Williamson later noticed an open window, armed himself with a knife, and called his friend for support. The pair began discussing horror characters that had resonated with them such as
Freddy Krueger and
Jason Voorhees. The following morning, Williamson was woken by a nightmare and used the experience as inspiration for the opening
home invasion of
Scream. He was also influenced by a
one-act play he wrote in college about an unknown caller taunting a young girl. Williamson spent the next three days writing a script for a slasher film he called
Scary Movie while listening to the
score to Halloween for further inspiration. He also drafted two five-page outlines for possible sequels. He developed much of the script around a single line of dialogue, "movies don't create psychos, movies make psychos more creative". This was his response to contemporary concerns about the influence of cinematic violence on audience, and he "thought it was a great line". Williamson's script drew upon many of his favorite horror films, such as
Halloween (1978),
Friday the 13th,
Prom Night (both 1980), and
A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984). At the time, the successful slasher films of the 1970s and 1980s had fallen out of favor, in part because of increasingly poorly received sequels to long-running horror franchises. His characters were intentionally designed to be knowledgeable about these horror films and their typical elements, with the intention of creating a unique killer who was not only aware of horror film
clichés but also exploited them for his own advantage. Williamson expressed his approach, "I thought if you could expose the rules and play with them, then the audience doesn't know what they're going to get. Suddenly they're on edge. I started playing with the tropes, and the 'rules' were part of that." The opening scene depicting Casey Becker's death emulates that of
Janet Leigh's character in
Psycho (1960) by
killing off a possible main character early on. Williamson believed it would hook studio executives and leave audiences unsure how the plot would progress. Williamson set the script in his hometown of
Bayboro, North Carolina, believing its quiet atmosphere would provide a strong contrast with a serial killer's actions. Williamson pursued
Scary Movie because it was the type of horror film he enjoyed as a child but believed were no longer being made. Even so, he did not believe studios would develop and intended to use it to garner attention and secure other work. Williamson's agent had him scale back the gore, removing descriptions such as "the insides are slowly rolling down her leg", because it would make it difficult to sell the script. Williamson refused to cut any dialogue, however, believing it set it apart from similar films.
Development (pictured in 2010) By 1995, there was competition to secure the rights to
Scary Movie, with early interest expressed by
Morgan Creek Entertainment,
Paramount Pictures,
Universal Pictures, and filmmaker
Oliver Stone. The script came to the attention of producer
Cathy Konrad of Woods Entertainment, which had a development deal with production studio
Miramax Films. She brought it to Richard Potter, the director of development for Miramax Films' genre-film-focused subsidiary
Dimension Films. Potter expected a "stupid spoof" but was drawn in by the opening scene and recommended Miramax Films chairman,
Bob Weinstein, pursue the rights. He agreed, considering it an opportunity to produce films instead of distributing those of others. Although others offered larger figures, Williamson's lawyer advised him take Weinstein's offer ($400,000–$500,000) because Dimension Films was willing to make the film immediately. Williamson revised the script based on studio input, removing some gorier content (such as exposed internal organs and severed limbs) and adding the murder of Principal Himbry because Weinstein said there was too long a period following the opening without any deaths. This solved a separate difficulty Williamson was having explaining why all but the core group of characters leave Stu's party in the finale, as they go to see Himbry's corpse. The
Scary Movie title was also changed to
Scream late in production because Weinstein was concerned
Scary Movie would lead audiences to believe it was a comedy instead of a horror. The search for a director was protracted, with
Danny Boyle,
Tom McLoughlin,
Sam Raimi,
George A. Romero,
Bryan Singer,
Quentin Tarantino,
Robert Rodriguez, and
Anthony Waller being considered. No agreements were secured because those approached for the role interpreted the script as a comedy instead of a horror satire. Wes Craven was discounted by the studio due to his lack of experience directing satires. Craven liked the script but he wanted to work on less gory and more mainstream content (including a film adaptation of the 1959 horror novel
The Haunting of Hill House) because of the negative public perception of him based on his previous films. Craven's assistant
Julie Plec and producer
Marianne Maddalena continued to push
Scream to Craven. His interest was renewed after
The Haunting of Hill House adaptation was cancelled and he experienced the personal disappointment of his failed horror comedy,
Vampire in Brooklyn (1995). After reading the script, Plec said Craven suggested the studio make him an offer he can't refuse.' And so Dimension did. And he took it." The deal also offered Craven his choice of other projects to direct after
Scream. Williamson met Craven to discuss the script, believing he would request substantial rewrites, but Craven's notes related mainly to typos and some minor additions including restoring some of the gorier content and refining the ending which was not yet fully realized. Williamson said "The story stayed pretty much intact, but we added some scares, and shortened it. Wes reworked some of the action sequences, and we would argue and go back and forth, but there's a point where I had to realize that Wes is more experienced than I am." Describing the script Craven said, "what it forces you to do is sort of look at the reality of things we typically look at as amusing, like the
Friday the 13th type of deaths where people have arrows through their heads and kids scream and laugh. But that suddenly starts happening in their actual lives."
Casting Atypical for the genre at the time,
Scream featured a cast of established stars, such as Drew Barrymore and Courteney Cox, as well as relatively unknown actors. Executive producer
Cary Woods used his friendship with Barrymore's agent to cast her in the lead role of Sidney Prescott, but she later requested the smaller role of Casey Becker. Maddalena suggested that Barrymore had wanted to leave the project entirely, but took the smaller role to avoid disappointing Bob Weinstein and his brother
Harvey. The filmmakers agreed to the change, believing it would be impactful to kill off their most well-known actor during
Screams opening and convince audiences that no character was safe.
Vinessa Shaw and
Reese Witherspoon were also considered for Sidney Prescott. Witherspoon was discounted because she looked too young compared to the other cast, and Williamson's choice,
Molly Ringwald, believed she was too old for the part. The final choices came down to
Alicia Witt,
Brittany Murphy, and Neve Campbell. According to Williamson, Campbell swiftly emerged as the favored choice among the principal crew and, to improve her chances, they filmed her
screen-test first, forcing the other contenders to try and surpass her performance. Beach and Maddalena said Campbell brought athleticism from her dancing background with a combination of strength and vulnerability. Describing what attracted her to the role, Campbell said Sidney was "a fantastic character for any kind of movie" who transitions from "tormented, traumatized, insecure young woman to overwhelmingly empowered and strong". Woods suggested Courteney Cox for the cold and calculating Gale Weathers, believing it would be interesting to play against her typical personable characters in series such as
Family Ties (1982–1989) and
Friends (1994–2004). Craven did not believe Cox could play the part and so she wrote a letter assuring him that "being 'a bitch' wouldn't be a stretch at all".
Brooke Shields and
Janeane Garofalo were considered but a more established actress was preferred. David Arquette auditioned for unspecified younger characters, but he was attracted to the role of Dewey and acting against Cox. The character was written as a "dumb
jock" but Arquette interpreted it as a "position of authority getting no respect... He wants to be
John Wayne... He wants to be this tough guy, but he's just got a heart of gold." Rose McGowan's agent jeopardized her chance to play Tatum by insisting on a payment of $250,000 instead of the offered $50,000, which was lower than the $100,000 received by some other principal actors. As a result, McGowan had to reaudition for the role twice. McGowan influenced Tatum's design, dying her hair blonde to avoid having two dark-haired main female characters, removing an
Indigo Girls poster from Tatum's bedroom (because she would not listen to the relatively older band), and rejecting costuming suggestions in favor of her self-bought outfits.
Thora Birch and
Natasha Lyonne also auditioned for the role; Lyonne was the preferred choice but, as she was under 18, could not consent to joining without parental permission. Believing he was rising in popularity,
Vince Vaughn was the studio's preferred choice for Billy Loomis, but he was too ill to audition. Skeet Ulrich did not attend auditions because of scheduling conflicts but his girlfriend did and mentioned Ulrich brought her; Beach went out to meet him personally. Ulrich liked playing a serial killer after more innocent and naive previous roles. To develop his character, Ulrich researched serial murders, psychological profiles, and outfitted one of his hotel rooms to the Billy persona to help him get into character, outfitting it with
punk rock posters and blacklights. He said, "I was into punk music in my teens and really just trying to recapture that angst... I would sit in there and read about serial killers and watch
Faces of Death (1978)... anything to get into that gory mindset." Ulrich and Campbell starred together in
The Craft (1996), which they believed fostered a natural relationship between their characters. Matthew Lillard auditioned for Billy, but the casting directors did not consider him the right actor to "make out with [Campbell]" and had him audition as Stu for Craven, who immediately offered him the part.
Seth Green,
Jason Lee, and
Breckin Meyer were all preferred for Randy, the "lanky, gangly, opinionated fifth wheel, who really has a love and passion for movies", but Craven and Williamson appreciated the innocence and comedy that Jamie Kennedy brought to his portrayal. Kennedy credited Craven for supporting his casting. W. Earl Brown and Craven were friends and he was not required to audition but did have to gain about ; he originally wanted to portray Dewey. Roger L. Jackson was hired based on his voice work for
Mars Attacks! (1996). He recounted overhearing his competitors discussing the Ghostface as the "new Freddy Krueger", but Jackson interpreted it as a more subtle role which required charisma and sexiness to keep his target on the phone even though they want to hang up. Barrymore wanted someone to act against in her scene instead of the character's lines being read to her, and while the filmmakers intended to dub over Jackson's voice with
Tom Kane, Craven liked his performance. Henry Winkler shared an agent with Craven and made his cameo appearance as a favor. Lynn McCree, Sidney's mother, was a Sonoma local; she spent two hours taking pictures with Campbell for the role but had no knowledge of the character's backstory. Liev Schreiber took the part of Cotton Weary for $20,000 during an unrelated meeting with Bob Weinstein.
Extras were drawn from locals including the owners of a restaurant frequented by the cast and crew.
Pre-production served as the location of
Screams finale. It was determined early on that
Scream required too many different interior and exterior locations to be filmed on sets. Production designer Bruce Miller explained that it was important to portray the characters as vulnerable in their homes which made it essential that they could film inside and outside the properties. Scouts researched locations in the United States and Canada but struggled to locate a house for the opening scene which featured plentiful windows and visibility. Craven initially researched
Wilmington, North Carolina but it failed to meet his expectations: "I wanted to have very American looking houses... and a lot of the houses there were very dark brown, or brick, and that didn't look attractive to me." Locations near
Vancouver were discounted for similar reasons, as was
Napa County, California.
Santa Rosa in
Sonoma County, California offered most features the filmmakers required, but the Weinsteins rejected the additional $1 to 2million required to film there until the filmmakers convinced them that Craven's name would attract enough audiences to compensate for the added cost. The opening scene used a house in
Glen Ellen. Miller said, "We didn't want homes that looked like castles, or that you could really protect yourself in... so if somebody was going to be stalking them, they could get to them very quickly." Other Santa Rosa locations used in
Scream include Sidney's house at 1820 Calistoga Road, interiors of Tatum's house at 824 McDonald Avenue, and the Bradley Video store, where Randy works. The
Healdsburg, California town square appears as the location of the Woodsboro Town Square, the fountain, and the exterior of the town police station. Stu's home was an unoccupied property in
Tomales which offered a dark and isolated atmosphere for the finale. Cinematographer
Mark Irwin unsuccessfully argued against using the property because it was on top of a hill, introducing logistical challenges for accessing trailers and equipment. Miller built a facade of barns in front of the house so trailers could be sited closer while remaining concealed. The art department extensively modified the house, adding Gothic elements such as beams and stained-glass windows to give it a haunted feel, painting the walls red (although they realized later this made the blood stand out less), and adding a white picket fence. The farmhouse-style home offered a "convoluted" layout for a convincing setting where the murders could occur without the other characters realizing. The production crew also added a volleyball net to make it appear as if a teenager lived there.
Santa Rosa High School was selected to portray Woodsboro High School due to its gothic and castle-like imposing visuals. Ten days of filming were to take place there in early June at a cost of $30,000 to 50,000, but permission was revoked in March 1996 by the Santa Rosa school district. The change was ostensibly because of the disruption filming would cause during school hours and scheduled exams, but several school board members objected to the violent content in the script, and hundreds of locals attended a council meeting to debate against and for the production; the board ultimately voted against allowing filming. The Sonoma Community Center served as a replacement filming location, but scenes had to be rewritten to accommodate the new location and additional costs to transform the former elementary school into one appropriate for young adults, including larger desks and installing lockers. Craven estimated the disruption and location changes caused by the Santa Rosa district's decision cost the production $350,000, including the $27,000 the center was paid for three days of filming. The disruption to filming by the school was not forgotten, with the film's credits stating "No thanks whatsoever to the Santa Rosa city school district governing board." Williamson's script had not described the killer's appearance beyond wearing a "ghostly white mask". Special effects company
KNB EFX Group was commissioned to design a mask, but the filmmakers disliked their "gargoyle-ish", witch, and goblin-like masks designs. While
location scouting a house, Maddalena came across what would become the Ghostface mask. This mask, featuring a white shroud, was designed by Brigitte Sleiertin as "the Peanut-Eyed Ghost" for the novelty company Fun World in 1991, based on a design by makeup artist Loren Gitthens. However, Craven and the studio wanted to own the design used in the film and tasked KNB EFX with creating a similar but legally distinct design, stretching the nose and chin. Unhappy with the results, Craven eventually decided to pursue the original Fun World design. The killer's outfit was completed with a black shroud to avoid their clothing or movements hinting at their identity.
Filming Principal photography began on April 15, 1996, on a $14million budget. The first week was spent filming the Casey Becker scenes. To elicit the necessary emotions, Barrymore recalled a sad story developed with Craven and made herself hyperventilate. To enhance her performance, Jackson was situated outside the house so that he could see Barrymore while making the calls but she could not see him. Jackson was used similarly for other Ghostface call scenes, and never met the cast in person. He said "the scariest monsters are the monsters you don't see, but the monsters you make in your mind. So just having the voice to react to made it larger in their minds". For safety,
stunt performers portrayed the killer in costume, although Craven portrays the killer in parts of the opening. The first few days of filming used a custom mask designed for
Scream, but Craven did not like it and reshot various scenes with the Fun World design before it was licensed. Because the hung Casey was to appear gutted from chest to waist, effects artist
Howard Berger decided against applying prosthetics to Barrymore in favor of a mannequin that could be hollowed out, showing her spine holding her upper and lower parts together. The effect was enhanced with various rubber and vinyl guts. For Steve Orth's death, KNB created an open back chair allowing the actor to kneel behind a hollowed out anatomical mannequin torso cut open at the abdomen and filled with latex, rubber, and gelatin intestines. After viewing the
dailies raw footage, Bob criticized the quality of Craven's work as "workmanlike at best", believing it lacked tension and had an inconsistent tone. He was critical of the Fun World Mask—believing it was "flat" and not scary—and ordered that the opening scene be re-filmed with alternative masks to see which worked best. Barrymore was also criticized for lacking sex appeal because of the
pageboy hairstyle she had chosen. Williamson recounted Craven receiving a call from the brothers and seeing "his back slump. He just started sliding down the chair." The studio considered firing Craven, and sent him dailies from other films, such as
Nightwatch (1997), to demonstrate what they wanted for
Scream. Konrad defended Craven to the brothers, and in response Bob Weinstein sent Dimension executives
Cary Granat and
Andrew Rona to the set to directly intervene. Craven, Konrad, Maddalena, and line producer
Stuart M. Besser met with Granat, who wanted the opening reshot with each of the Weinstein's alternative mask suggestions. Instead, they offered to edit together the existing footage to prove the scene and mask worked and if it did not, then the project would be cancelled. Editor
Patrick Lussier worked with Craven to piece together most of the opening, adding temporary music and sound effects. The Weinsteins barred Craven and the producers from attending screening of the footage. Afterward, Bob Weinstein told the filmmakers, "What do I know about dailies? Keep going", and provided additional financing. The producers suggested Weinstein had an "ulterior motive" to force the filmmakers to complete the footage – the upcoming
Milan Film Festival, as edited footage was not typically allowed to be screened until eight weeks after filming concluded. The next main scene filmed was of the central cast sitting around a fountain. Ulrich admitted he did not realize
Scream was intended to be a horror with comedic elements and was confused by Lillard's and Kennedy's "humorous moments", believing they were "ruining the movie... Like, 'This isn't funny. This isn't supposed to be funny.' And man, was I wrong." Craven encouraged improvisation throughout filming, much of it coming from Arquette and Lillard, with Williamson acknowledging that Lillard's ad-libs improved the script.
The finale The film's 42-minute end sequence set at Stu's party was filmed at night over three weeks. Issues filming at the location, including difficulties with providing proper lighting because of the uneven landscape, exacerbated tensions between Craven and Irwin regarding the quality of Irwin's footage.
Scream was filmed with an
anamorphic lens, which distorts and stretches the image to achieve a specific aspect ratio. However, neither Craven nor Irwin had much experience with this type of lens. The crew, including Lussier, had raised concerns about lens flares and out-of-focus images, partially blaming the
focus puller hired by Irwin. Lussier explained, "You can often tell your focus is supposed to be on somebody's eye usually, ... and the focus puller just hasn't moved with the actor". As a result, there were limited options during the editing process due to the inconsistent focus. Irwin said he was informed that all filmed footage was unusable and that 35 days of scenes needed to be reshot. After an argument with Maddalena, Irwin was immediately fired and replaced by
Peter Deming for the final three weeks of filming. Irwin believed he was made a scapegoat for the film's behind-schedule status, risking Craven forfeiting his salary, but Konrad denied this. Kennedy's horror rules scene was initially performed in a single take, but he requested additional takes, feeling he could enhance the performance (Craven ultimately chose the third take). During Tatum's death scene, McGowan had trouble staying in the pet door as the garage door rose. To address this, the crew nailed her shirt to the frame to hold her in place. Craven found it challenging managing the scene's tone, aiming to avoid trivializing Tatum's death while paying homage to other horror films. McGowan improvised the screams for her mother to give the character more humanity. When Gale drives a van with Kenny's corpse on top, Brown was on top of the van, but the unprepared stunt driver accelerated at full speed. When he hit the brakes, Brown fell off the side of the van and the stunt coordinator grabbed Brown's pants and ankle, saving him from harm. Five nights were spent on the kitchen confrontation between Billy, Stu, and Sidney. By the time they had filmed Gale returning with a gun, Ulrich said he and Lillard were "roaming around like caged animals" to keep the intensity of their performances high, to the point Craven asked them to relax because they were scaring Cox. Lillard described maintaining that level of adrenaline as exhausting. Campbell, Kennedy, Lillard, and Ulrich endured multiple nights covered in fake blood, and the costumes could not be washed to maintain continuity (they were dampened each night to make the blood appear fresh). When Ulrich stabs a sofa, the filmmakers were unaware it was stuffed with feathers which stuck to the fake blood; Maddalena considered Craven "nuts" for keeping the feathers in the scene. Lillard improvised lines such as "My mom and dad are going to be so mad at me" and "You fucking hit me with the phone, you dick", the latter taking place when Ulrich threw a phone near him as intended but the sticky blood caused it to veer off and inadvertently hit Lillard. Ulrich suggested Billy cracking his neck before shooting Gale, and the sound was added in post-production. Campbell's stuntwoman accidentally stabbed Ulrich with an umbrella tip, missing the protective vest he was wearing and hitting the site of an open heart surgery Ulrich had as a child. Filming
concluded on June 14, 1996. The cast spoke fondly of the "summer camp" atmosphere during filming and the camaraderie they formed. The main cast and select crew members, including Craven, often gathered together in the early mornings after filming for meals, activities, and socializing. Arquette's hotel room was transformed into a makeshift club where they would congregate. However, due to complaints from other residents, they eventually relocated their early morning gatherings to a nearby barn.
Post-production The
Scary Movie title remained late into production, appearing on the cast and crew gifts for completing filming. Harvey Weinstein suggested
Scream based on the
Michael and
Janet Jackson song "
Scream". Many of the cast and crew were initially unhappy with the change.
Sony Pictures filed a lawsuit against Dimension and Miramax, claiming
Scream infringed on their copyright of
Screamers (1995). The case was settled out of court with Dimension being able to use
Scream going forward. Although Arquette's and Kennedy's characters were killed in the script, alternate scenes were filmed showing them survive in case they proved popular with
test screening audiences. The successful screenings also resulted in Miramax asking Craven to direct two
Scream sequels.
Scream was rated
NC-17 by the
Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), restricting its audience to those over 17 years of age, which was considered "box-office suicide" by industry experts. The MPAA told Craven that
Scream would never receive a more commercial R-rating, allowing younger people to see the film when accompanied by an adult. Craven said, "I'm a director who can do something very well but am not allowed to put it on screen. And they ultimately get you, as they did on this one, on intensity. They say, 'it's not a specific shot, it's not blood, it's just too intense. The filmmakers eventually convinced the MPAA that
Scream was a spoof, believing they were too focused on the horror aspects. It took up to nine cuts to address the MPAA's complaints, including removing any movement of Steve Orth's internal organs, trimming Kenny's throat being slit (because the actor's pained expression was too "disturbing"), moving Billy and Stu stabbing each other off screen, and reducing scenes of Casey's hanging body and Tatum's crushed head. The slow motion stabbing of Casey was considered excessive but was allowed with only a few frames removed because there was no alternate footage to use. The final cut runs for 111minutes.
Music Despite having no background in film scoring or an interest in the
horror genre,
Marco Beltrami was recommended to Plec and Craven, who found his music samples original compared with Beltrami's contemporaries. Craven gave Beltrami a weekend to compose "The Cue from Hell", the score for the film's opening sequence, which secured his hiring. Beltrami wrote the piece from Casey's perspective and used an "operatic" style, employing a range of instruments, including piano and brass. Beltrami described himself as "bumbling" through the scoring process, acknowledging his limited knowledge of horror music styles. He incorporated elements of the
western genre, particularly for Dewey's theme, and took cues from composers including
Elliot Goldenthal,
Ennio Morricone,
Eric Serra,
Christopher Young, and
Hans Zimmer. Due to budget constraints, Beltrami had to work with a small orchestra of fewer than 50 performers. To compensate for the lack of string harmonics, he instructed the string players to whistle, and asked Craven, Lussier, Maddalena, and Woods to join and boost their numbers. Beltrami identified most with Sidney's character and considered her theme"Sidney's Lament"to be one of the score's crucial pieces. He chose not to assign a distinctive motif to Ghostface, to avoid hinting at the killer's identity. Licensed music for
Scream was provided by
TVT Records and includes covers of "
(Don't Fear) The Reaper" by
Gus Black and "
Birds Fly (Whisper to a Scream)" by
Soho, "
School's Out" by
Alice Cooper, "
First Cool Hive" by
Moby, and "
Drop Dead Gorgeous" by
Republica. Excerpts from the
Halloween score are also present. == Release ==