He took on Ghostface in the Scream franchise, fought spiders in Eight Legged Freaks, and even put together an intense documentary about his return to wrestling! David Arquette’s career is diverse and legendary, and ahead of his upcoming appearance at Horror Rock and Wrestle Fest in Manchester this weekend, STARBURST MAGAZINE caught up with him to take a look at some of his most significant moments in entertainment!
STARBURST: Taking it way back to the first Scream movie, what do you remember the most about reading the script for the first time, and what stood out to you?
I really loved it. I loved the self-aware aspect of the writing, referring to the horror genre. That it wasn’t taking itself too seriously, but it was serious nonetheless. I was reading it to see the different characters at first, because they were interested in me for different characters, but when I read the Dewey role, I was like, “Oh!” I really connected with that, and I felt like I could bring something really unique and interesting to it. Then, when I went and met with Wes Craven, I told him that, and he said, “Wow, that’s interesting, I never considered that.” Dewey was originally written as this big jock character, a kind of meathead. And he was like, “That’s interesting”, and luckily, they took a chance with me.
And looking back at the franchise, why do you think that Dewey stands out so much?
Wes and I had a lot of really fun stuff. Kevin Williamson wrote an incredible script, but we also found these little moments, like these really interesting moments. I love the fact that he was a person of authority who didn’t get any respect. That was just really funny to me, and then it just kept building, where he tried to be tough, and reality would come crashing down on him. So yeah, we found all of these little comedic moments. Wes had a really funny sense of humour, really sly. A little different than mine, but we just found this common ground, and he had a really sweet side to him as well. Which I think we also found in the character.
What was the most rewarding sequence to work on while playing Dewey?
There are so many. I loved all of the stuff with Rose McGowan’s character – Tatum Riley, my sister – and Neve Campbell as Sidney Prescott as well. Those scenes were really fun and really sweet to show, like a cop who has a bullying sister. It was really funny, and she was so wonderful in that role.
But I’d say the most impactful of all of the films was two-fold, definitely, with the Gale Weathers character and Courteney Cox. There’s a scene where a car is coming, and we roll off. I remember Wes coming up to me and saying, “Just look at her like you’ve been searching for a person like this your whole life.” And so when she says, “Is that what you’re looking for?” And you say, “My whole life.” It’s just such a sweet moment of direction, and I think we kissed there for the first time, and I said that line. It was just really impactful. In my real life, it led to us co-parenting a daughter named Coco. It had a real, important impact on my life.
But also, during Scream 2, I was going through a really hard time because my mum was sick and dying. Wes sat me down after one of these scenes at the college. We were at UCLA, and he gave me such an incredible father-and-son-like mentor talk. He said that I should really focus and that I have a lot to give to the world. He was such a great guy, and he knew that Courteney liked me, but I had to get my stuff together. He had such a gentlemanly way of looking out. It’s something that you don’t run into a lot, someone like Wes Craven who really showed such kindness and caring beyond the film and my role in it.
What was it like to return to the franchise after so long with the fifth film?
It was hard because they had given me the script, and I read it, but they hadn’t told me anything about it. So I was reading it and I was like, “Oh wow, Dewey’s got a really good role in this one”, and then that part came, and I was like “Oh, that’s why.” But it was great, I loved playing the role, and working with all of the people on the film, and being able to have that final scene with Gale Weathers, it was really powerful, and important. There was a lot of backstory. It was a role that lasted 25 years of my life, at least. It was very impactful, and it meant a lot to me. I think the directors, Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, did a really great job in giving Dewey a real hero moment at the end before he blows it again! I think they had done it well. It was still a really difficult film to be a part of; it was really sad. I know that fans felt that way too. I still feel like they didn’t honour Wes in a sense. Like, Wes kept me alive for the first one! So for them not to do that, I did get it because they had to re-launch the brand, but it did feel kind of sad.
Dewey has his own theme tune; how did that happen?
It was Wes, and the amazing composer, Marco Beltrami! I remember Wes coming up to me, saying, “Dewey has his own theme music now!” I was like, “What! That’s so incredible! Thank you!” It’s just so sweet for him to think that way. He was a really thoughtful person. He thought in a very complex way. Like chess moves down the line, he really thought of the impact of it, and how important it was, even before I even knew really what he was telling me.
In the late ’90s, you got to work on Muppets from Space. Can you tell us about what it’s like to act opposite the Muppets?
What a turn! It was incredible, I’ve always been a fan of the Muppets, especially The Muppet Movie and The Muppet Show. So to then be able to work with them was really one of the greatest days on a set. You get to see behind the curtain and meet all the people behind the voices. You see all of the technical stuff that goes into bringing them to life, and when you have scenes with Kermit, for instance, it becomes alive, and it becomes Kermit, this character that I’ve loved my whole life. Then being able to act opposite him was just so fun. It really was, I was in awe. I got to do press with Frank Oz, Dave Goelz, and a bunch of the original voice people, and that was really fun, it was really surreal. It was a highlight, for sure.
How fun was it to play Cleaves in Ravenous, and can you tell us about some of the filming locations for it as well? They looked intense!
It was a wild movie! They had this original director, Milcho Manchevski, and he was really interesting, but he was going far out. I had dreadlocks in the beginning, almost like primitive man. I think something happened, and he got let go from the project. Antonia Bird came on, who is an amazing director, but we had been there in the Czech Republic for a couple of months. So it was random, and we were really there for a while, and then it all came back together. They had built these forts, and we also filmed in Slovakia. So yeah, it was a really wild experience. I got to work with really wonderful actors. It was fun, but it was also one of those things where when you’re in an ensemble like that, a lot of the time, you’re creating a backstory. Half the time, what you’re doing may not even be on camera. So there was a lot of character exploration on that. Finally, some of my stuff they did use, I didn’t even know they were filming certain parts. It was just interesting. It was another wonderful group of filmmakers to work with.
Eight Legged Freaks went on to become a cult classic. What was this world like to act in, and why do you think it still holds up to this day?
Wow! I love the creature features, which is what it was taken from in the ’50s. The idea of bringing that style of scary movie back was really interesting to me. There was all this discussion at the beginning about having some conflict or something to make fun of me about. It became my goatee in it! I don’t know how it ended up just being the goatee. Like, after all of this discussion about what this thing is going to be, it ended up being a goatee. It was just such a weird thing.
It was amazing. Dean Devlin is an incredible producer, and Ellory Elkayem [director], he did a great job. And he had these really strong producers. So, sometimes that’s tricky with the director and Dean Devlin’s partner, who was also a strong producer. They did Independence Day, Patriot, and all of these crazy films. So they had this whole system of how to make things look big, but we’re a smaller-budget movie. So they did things like making sure there was fog, but what it ends up doing, the reality of that, to have fog like that, is then there’s this crew of special FX guys, just running with these hoses all over this landscape. These poor guys, putting all of these hoses down, and then having to run them out before the mist leaves, getting the shot, and then having to run back and put it down. There were elements that were really strange about it. But it was a really fun movie to do. It was a lot of green screen. You have to use your imagination, obviously.
You know, the funny thing is, when it came out, you had no idea how many people were so scared of spiders that they might not even go to the movie theatre to see it. There’s this weird dynamic with them where they really hate spiders, and it’s a way bigger number than you might think. So I think that had an effect on it at the theatre, but I’m glad it caught on. I think it’s a really fun movie.
Tron: Uprising was a much-loved Tron animation show. What do you enjoy the most about working in animation?
Well, my friend Charlie Bean was a part of that, and that’s how I was invited on, and also, Paul Reubens was in it. So I remember those were my two most exciting aspects to it. It was a smaller role. The art and direction of it were cutting-edge and really beautiful. They spent a ton of time on it. I’d always been a fan of the original Tron when it first came out. So to then be a part of that universe was a really cool thing. And, just being able to see Paul Reubens, I think one day, he recorded right before me, so I saw him there, which was really fun, and working with my friend Charlie Bean.
How did you end up getting involved with Bone Tomahawk, and what do you remember the most from working on it?
The director S. Craig Zahler had called me up. It was really one of those things where sometimes a project just falls into your lap, and that happened on this. I think I only shot for two or three days, which is really quick, but I got to work with Sid Haig, which was such an honour because he’s a legend in the horror space. It was really wild, I liked that it opened up the movie.
I kept asking them to make sure they do something with my character’s death. I was like, “Do I just disappear? You never even see me! There’s no resolution to it?” And no, there wasn’t. I kept trying to fight it. I was like, “Even if you don’t use it, I’m here.” So, I kept trying to get some kind of resolution to it, but they never did. But it was a really fun thing to be a part of. I remember one time, I was helping Sid get up this hill as we were trying to run away, and he was an older guy, but then I lost my footing, fell down and pulled him with me.
How did the idea for You Cannot Kill David Arquette come about, and how rewarding was that whole experience for you?
I had this heart thing happen to me, and I had two stents put in. They put me under, and I had this big heart operation, and then when I came out, I said to my wife Christina, how I kept thinking about wrestling. She was like, “What are you talking about?” She might have known that I’d done Ready To Rumble or something way back then. I don’t think she knew about the title run and the intricacies of it. This funny thing happens when you’re facing possible death; you start reflecting on your life, you know, “If this is it, then what?” I have a wonderful family, and I love them, and they love me. I’m very fortunate that I have experienced that, so I’m not dying with all of these resentments or some unfinished business. So I started to go over all that stuff, and then, for some reason, I started thinking about wrestling.
For years, I’d be the butt of the joke, like, “That’s a worse idea than making David Arquette a champion.” Even after this documentary, it still comes up, but it doesn’t hurt as much! I really wanted to go back and find out why they hate me so much. Like, what is it about wrestling, and what did I miss? I understood that I was an actor that hadn’t been trained. I always thought about it as wish fulfilment. Every fan’s dream is to be the champion. I didn’t put the pieces together, and you really have to earn it. It derogated the belt and all that kind of stuff. So then, going back, doing the documentary, and meeting all of the people. The funny thing about wrestling is you find out, once you’re there, the cameraman, the wardrobe, the makeup artist, the announcers, other wrestlers, the trainers, the reporters, everybody is a wrestling fan. In that whole world, everybody loves wrestling; they’ve loved it their whole lives, and it’s why they got into the business of wrestling.
It sounds like a relentless process…
The reality of driving, city to city. Getting injured all of the time. If you smash your elbow, or you twist your ankle, there’s a saying, like, “Don’t worry if your ankle hurts right now, your back is going to hurt much more.” In wrestling, you keep treating all of these injuries! Like, one thing hurts, and then another thing hurts even more, so then you start worrying about that, and then another thing takes over that pain. And then, sometimes, when it gets too intense, you have to have painkillers. There’s a lot to take in. There are all of these little lessons that the wrestlers are teaching you. Different personalities and different matches. Ego has a lot to do with it. Some people take their gimmicks seriously and don’t really get the performance element. There were all of these little things. Like a wrestler will say, “Oh, he does a piledriver”, and then I’ll ask the wrestler how is that, and they’ll say, “That sucks!” Wrestlers will never say, “That hurts so bad.” They’ll never say that because it’s a macho thing. So they’ll say, “It sucks.” Unless you know that “It sucks” means, “It hurts really bad, you shouldn’t let him do that to you”, then you’ll say, “OK, it sucks, but I’ll still try it.”
You’ll wrestle some people, and with the legends, you can wrestle them every day of the week; they’re so good at what they do, and they’ll make it look really great. You’ll be doing spectacular stuff and still, soft landings. It’s incredible when you wrestle with really great wrestlers. Then you work with someone who’s stiff, or you want them to prove themselves, or they’ve just had a bad day, or whatever it is, and then they’ll lay it in even more. They’ll drop you hard or try to hurt you. When you’re really put in a position to trust them. There’s a lot to learn. It was a really wonderful experience, and I loved that I went back.
Who else did you encounter along the way?
I learned so much from the legends that I worked with. I got to wrestle and tag team with Shane Helms, which was a highlight because he was my stunt double on Ready To Rumble. There’s an amazing wrestler named King Brian Anthony, up at Northeast Wrestling, who I had a bunch of really great matches with. I got to wrestle Jerry Lawler at one point, The Honky Tonk Man. There were some really memorable moments. Being in the same ring when the Mouth of the South came in with The Honky Tonk Man. Moments like that. With Greg Valentine, they wouldn’t let me in the same ring as him. RJ City and myself did a lot of tag teams together, and he was really wonderful, he was protective, and he pulled me out because Greg Valentine was going to teach me a lesson. There are some things that you don’t know until you do it. It’s tough. I see these guys that are doing it still, and they’re doing it every week, and I still have pains from doing it, from the little that I did over those two or three years. It’s really intense, and I have so much respect for it.
There are also other elements to it, like I learned a lot about acting. They say some of the gestures are really over the top – the gestures and the promos, but you’re selling to the back of the arena. Essentially, a lot of the time, it’s pantomime, and you don’t have a mic. You’re trying to sell the story with just the visuals. Some things you can hear, but then little things, to make moments where the audience feels throughout the place, and they really connect with it. The storytelling that you learn how to do when you do it right, you’re really getting the crowd. The one match I had with Nick Gage was when I went into that room, and they hated me. It was the personification of the internet within this room – all of the hatred, and all of the spite, and all of the anger. But then, when I left, because I bled for him and gave my body up, they were cheering. Nick Mondo, a famous death match wrestler, was like, “I’ve never really seen what I saw that day. Like, how they hated you so much, and then they were cheering at you when you left.” Even though some people frown on the death match wrestling style, there was something about it where I really kind of spoke to that crowd that hated me so bad.
How excited are you for Horror Rock and Wrestle Fest, and what can attending fans expect?
I’m really excited, I mean, I’m like a fan going there. There are going to be so many amazing wrestlers, horror icons, and rock n roll legends. I feel like it’s going to be a mixture of the best fan experience but a bit of a rowdy time! I don’t drink any more, but if I did, I have a feeling that the pubs near there are going to be rocking. The whole place is going to be a big party. The funny thing is, rock n roll, wrestling, and horror, and wrestling and horror in general, cross over quite a bit. It’s always been a part of what I talk to people about, it’s part of my calculations and a part of certain things that I do. It speaks to certain fan bases. So, to bring it all together is just amazing. I think it’s going to be a really fun time. I think there’s going to be some great shows and really great opportunities for fans to meet people they’ve been fans of for a long time.
Find out more about Horror Rock & Wrestle Fest here.
You can follow David Arquette on Instagram here.
