We sat down with the cast of the new conversion camp slasher They/Them, which is out today, with one essential question on the docket: Why do so many queer people have an affinity for horror as a genre?
After all, horror has often not been kind to the queer community.
Think Buffalo Bill in Silence of the Lambs, a trans woman serial killing cis women and wearing their skin. This was many people’s first look at a trans character on screen, and what an unfortunate introduction it was.
“In the past, queerness has been built up to be a horror,” explains They/Them EP Scott Turner Schofield. “There’s this idea that there’s something so scary, especially about trans people, that for 60 years we’ve been [portrayed as] serial killers.”
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Thanks to general conventions like the queer-coding of villains and the “bury your gays” trope, many in the community were originally distrustful of a slasher set in a place with so many vulnerable queer characters.
“When we put the release out, there were a lot of LGBTQ folks who were like, ‘I don’t know about this,’ and I knew that they were just coming from where they’ve been set up to be by this genre,” Schofield recalls.
He emphasizes that the delight lies in the defiance of that expectation, saying, “it’s going to feel amazing to see what can happen when it comes from a queer point of view.”
Related: WATCH: Closeted ‘Psycho’ star Anthony Perkins’ son spills the tea in new queer horror doc
Austin Crute (“Toby”) argues that it’s these harmful tropes that have actually inadvertently drawn the queer community towards the darker side of media.
“Even beyond horror, you see a lot of the feminine characters being evil villains,” he says. “Dracula, Scar, Jafar, these characters that are considered straight; they have a tinge of queerness to them that makes them more intimidating, or scarier, or more predatory.”
Lead Theo Germaine (“Jordan”) attests that they’ve actually learned more about their identity through watching horror films.
“There’s just something about processing my experience through consuming this genre,” they state. “It just feels like I’m settling something in my psyche when I’m watching scary movies. Maybe because it’s cathartic; maybe because there are a lot of painful experiences that a lot of queer people have.”
This idea that the connection between LGBTQ people and horror is processing the horrors inflicted on queer folks by hetero/cis-normative society seems to be the most popular among the cast, and it’s certainly not unfounded.
“There is a real life horror that happens when you are who you are in a world that doesn’t want to accept that or is uncomfortable with that,” notes Carrie Preston (“Dr. Cora Whistler”).
“There’s a lot of freedoms, and there’s a lot of progress that’s been made, but then there’s also a backlash and a clamping down on that progress. That, in and of itself, is terrifying. So to use the horror genre to shed a light on that, it makes sense.”
“As queer people in this society, a lot of the time we’re seen as “other” or as outsiders,” Monique Kim (“Veronica”) offers. “I feel like in horror in general, that’s what we’re seeing, so it’s just a natural way to use those characters as a metaphor for queerness.”
Related: WATCH: A queer horror-comedy returns, “Espookier” than ever—and with a surprise Oscar nominee
Anna Lore (“Kim”) adds another perspective to the conversation, calling on one of the often overlooked aspects of the genre.
“There’s a little something to be said about camp, right?” she asks. “Horror is often kind of camp. It’s kind of larger than life, which I feel mirrors other queer art forms as well.”
Indeed, camp finds itself flirting with the macabre in works as light as Rocky Horror Picture Show or as wild as Multiple Maniacs. Queer figures like Vincent Price and Elvira exemplify the grandiose flair with which the dramatic and the horrific coexist.
Kevin Bacon (“Owen Whistler”), star of landmark camp slasher Friday the 13th, had never considered the connection between the queer community and the genre.
“This movie was John Logan’s idea about taking a very, very classic slasher structure, and then delivering a message about the horrors of conversion therapy,” he explains. “I thought that was a very brilliant combination of those things. There is a lot of intersection there, I just wasn’t aware.”
Thankfully, the queering of horror has become more and more blatant since the days of classics like Friday the 13th.
They/Them finds itself as an entry in an LGBTQification of horror well underway: Jennifer’s Body, the lesbian Fear Street leads, Misha Osherovich in Freaky, that little genderfluid child of Chucky’s, so on and so on.
An honorable queer horror mention has to be made here for the entire Ryan Murphy-verse – not just for shows like American Horror Story and Scream Queens, but for going the extra mile in scenes like trapping the Glee gays in a gas-filled elevator with a Saw-style puppet of Jane Lynch.
They/Them stands on the shoulders of works like these and continues to build the legacy of queer horror.
On what ultimately makes ths coupling of queer folks and horror so successful, Cooper Koch (“Stu”) jokingly offers the most succinct explanation of all:
“Well, we are horrific.”
Diplomat
Trying to normalize they/them as singular when sex is known? Like “queer” being a positive descriptor?… the german derivative of “pervert”?
Really? Normalize this contra wish list for the masses?
Laughable.
Donston
Language is a constantly evolving thing. The way words are used and the way people communicate is always changing. You just come off like an old head by resenting it. I will admit that I’m not a big fan of the usage of them/they. It’s very impractical outside the world of social media. While too many people use it as a political statement than anything else. And many folks feel as if they can’t embrace their gender dimensions, gender fluidity or embrace both masculine and feminine attributes without embracing “them/they” (as Demi Lovato pretty much confessed). It’s not the greatest message to send to young people. But I’m also not about to be a bitter hater.
abfab
Well stated, Donston. The diplomat is a bully as are all the republican bigots and right wingers of this world.
Harley
They/them are plural meaning more than one person. Can’t figure out how to make it singular to indicate an individual. Just saying and not criticizing.
Kangol2
Harley, you really can’t figure it out?
Try this (from the Oxford Dictionaries of the English Language):
The word they (with its counterparts them, their, and themselves) as a singular pronoun to refer to a person of unspecified gender has been used since at least the 14th century. In the late 20th century, as the traditional use of he to refer to a person of either sex came under scrutiny on the grounds of sexism, this use of they has become more common. It is now generally accepted in contexts where it follows an indefinite pronoun such as anyone, no one, someone, or a person: anyone can join if they are a resident; each to their own. In other contexts, coming after singular nouns, the use of they is now common, although less widely accepted, especially in formal contexts. Sentences such as ask a friend if they could help are still criticized for being ungrammatical. Nevertheless, in view of the growing acceptance of they and its obvious practical advantages, they is used in this dictionary in many cases where he would have been used formerly.
So, since the 1300s in English “they” has been used to refer to single persons, but you still can’t figure out how to do it? Really?
Diplomat
Kongol2,
Your argument doesn’t hold water. They is used when the sex is unknown, only. Never has it been used to describe a person whose sex is known. Nowhere in history has this ever been done. And as far as one dictionary out of several using this baseless argument, it is quite alone. Only a very few dictionaries have signed off on this lie. The majority knows better.
Diplomat
Then there’s Donston,
Regarding your rude remark about coming off as an “old head”: you just knocked about 98% of the US population. Just bc the majority of US citizens prefer to keep the integrity of the English language in good standing and not run it off the rails for a thimble full of people, good for them.
Good going slugger.
Den
The Oxford is THE dictionary of note. It is not “one out of many”. The appearance of a word or usage of a word in the OED indicates it is accepted and no longer an outlier. And has been pointed out innumerable times in so many places (as well as many times on Queerty) language is not a static thing, even though there are people who obviously have static intellects.
The word Queer has only been widely used to indicate homosexuals since the 1920’s, though it was first used in that sense in print in 1894. But the word itself has been in use since the 15th century to indicate something peculiar or out of the ordinary.
And it has only been used as a non-pejorative since the 1990s.
LumpyPillows
Demi Lovato has gone back to she/her. The whole thing is hard to take seriously. It’s all a joke really.
bachy
I’ve long felt that people are drawn to media and fictions that affirm their own baseline emotional state. If your childhood was full of fear and dread, watching horror films will subconsciously feel “familiar.” I always loved horror until I started resolving some of my childhood pain through therapy. Nowadays I find it less captivating.
Den
I find it hard to believe that the percentage of LGBT people drawn to horror films is significantly different from that of the general population. I’d have to see statistics before I’d accept that notion as anything but speculation.