By ROB FREESE
Fay Wray, Hollywood’s original Scream Queen in KING KONG (1933)
The term “Scream Queen” was never meant to be derogatory. It was a perfectly fine term that was applied to describe the role, young female protagonists in a horror films. Most cite Fay Wray as the first Scream Queen, and scream she did, in the original 1933 production of King Kong.
Once I entered the world of horror movie journalism, I ran across the term frequently. Admittedly, it was usually in conjunction with low-budget drive-in creature features, and some critics used the term disparagingly. On the other hand, Janet Leigh was referred to as a Scream Queen for her turn in Psycho, as was Marilyn Burns for The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.
Jamie Lee Curtis, still the reigning queen?
After Halloween in 1978, Jamie Lee Curtis was christened horror’s new Scream Queen, and that’s when the term really started getting traction. For fans going to horror flicks in the ’80s, the hunt for the next big Scream Queen was on, and all these ladies were compared to Curtis. (“She’s good, but she’s no Jamie Lee Curtis.”) It was sort of like after Bruce Lee died, and producers scrambled for cinema’s next Kung Fu king.
As for the actresses in these films, they might have appreciated the attention, but the “Scream Queen” label probably felt limiting to their careers.
As the decade wore on, a solid group of actresses who were routinely identified as Scream Queens began owning the title, eventually promoting themselves as such. Brinke Stevens, Linnea Quigley and Michelle Bauer embraced the moniker and were touted as the “Holy Trinity of Scream Queens.” At fan conventions, a Scream Queen table with two or three horror actresses signing autographs and taking pictures with fans was (and is) common.
Linnea Quigley, Brinke Stevens and Michelle Bauer in NIGHTMARE SISTERS (1987)
Movies like David DeCoteau’s Nightmare Sisters and Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-A-Rama were the ultimate ’80’s Scream Queen flicks, featuring Stevens, Quigley and Bauer in one film! (They were the ’80s equivalent of Universal’s classic monster rallies like House of Frankenstein and House of Dracula, which pulled out all the studio’s monsters for one film.)
By the early ’90s, we had Scream Queen Hot Tub Party tapes and a Linnea Quigley’s Horror Workout video. Femme Fatales and Scream Queens Illustrated started appearing on magazine racks. There were posters, comics, more videos and even Scream Queen trading cards. Some of the actresses, including Stevens, parlayed their popularity into writing screenplays and eventually directing.
The next generation of Scream Queens appeared in films like Subspecies, Sorority House Massacre 2, Puppet Master, Hard to Die and dozens more. These were mostly direct-to-video features, and they filled video stores from coast to coast.
Then, around 1996, “Scream Queen” was almost a dirty word. With the success of Scream, a new term for horror heroines entered the genre lexicon: “Final Girl.” Coined in her 1987 essay “Her Body, Himself: Gender in the Slasher Film,” Carol J. Clover outlined the traits for a Final Girl after watching hours and hours of Golden Age slasher films.
SCREAM (1996) marked the rise of the Final Girl
Calling Neve Campbell a Scream Queen for her portrayal of Sydney Prescott in Scream honestly did not sound right. She used her brains and made smart decisions. She never came home from school and immediately took a shower (We’re looking at you, Brinke!) or walked around a dark, empty room, topless, investigating a strange noise.
The term Scream Queen started to fall out of fashion in light of I Know What You Did Last Summer, Urban Legend, and TV’s Buffy.
Scream Queens still existed, but the Final Girls took center stage.
After years of making features for direct-to-video and then streaming, Charles Band delivered what could be considered the ultimate Scream Queen flick of all time in 2014, TROPHY HEADS.
The story is simple enough. Geek fanboy Max (Adam Roberts) loves movies, and he loves his Scream Queens. He loves them so deeply that he kidnaps each of his favorites and eventually hangs their heads on his wall. The line-up is impressive, putting Stevens, Quigley and Bauer back on the screen where they belong. In addition, Darcy Demoss is featured alongside Full Moon favorites Denice Duff and Jacqueline Lovell.
Initially, it was released as a web series, short films centering on different actresses. Charlie Band later recut the footage into a traditional feature. (It fooled me. I thought it was shot like a typical film.)
Writer Neal Marshall Stevens (better known to Full Moon fans as either Benjamin Carr or Roger Barron), wrote each episode geared toward the specific actress. In the case of Jacqueline Lovell, whom he worked with on Head of the Family and Hideous, he knew she was an incredibly funny actress and wrote to her strengths.
TROPHY HEADS is ghoulish, graphic and gratuitous in all the best ways, just like the Golden Age Scream Queen flicks from the late ’80s and early ’90s. It is a testament to the women who were just as resourceful as any Final Girl, but they always hit back harder, got a little crazier and always did it covered in blood.
Happily, the era of Scream Queens is not over. Charles Band offers plenty of opportunities to up-and-coming Scream Queens – not to mention Brinke Stevens, who stepped up to direct the 2022 sequel Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-A-Rama 2. Reuniting with Michelle Bauer, she returned to the world of sexy sorority sisters and foul-mouthed imps. (Sadly, the planned on-screen reunion of Stevens, Bauer and Quigley did not work out.)
