Interview:
Indie Horror Darling
Rachel Amanda Bryant

We had the opportunity to speak with our friend Rachel Amanda Bryant who’s an award-winning actress and producer. This “Indie Darling” talks about her career and experience in the horror film genre. Rachel also produced and starred in our horror short film Wrightwood that is currently going through the festival circuit and won the Grand Jury Prize at the Visioni Notturne Short Horror Film Festival.

Married to Horror (MTH): Thank you for joining us. Would you tell us about your background and how you got into acting?

Rachel: I grew up in Northern California and I went to Chapman University. I got a BFA (Bachelor of Fine Arts) in Theater Performance and I decided to pursue acting because when I was in high school I decided to do a play at my community theater, Anne of Green Gables. I got cast as her best friend Diana, it was my first play really and I was so stoked. It just changed my life. I love storytelling and the audience’s energy. I love doing theater so much. I wish I did it more honestly, now but that got me started on the path to acting which got me on the path to doing movies. As far as horror movies, I think I’m very pale and I have very light-colored hair so blood really pops off of my skin.

MTH: (laughter) Nice!

Rachel: And I know how to scream.

MTH: That’s awesome! You get real bloody and dirty a lot. Is that something that you feel comes with the territory or a part of the process you enjoy?

Rachel: I’m just like, this is the truth in the moment and that’s why I’m covered in blood but often we were shooting in the middle of the night and it was cold. It was not a pleasurable experience but I thought, “Well, I gotta do it because A) Continuity and B) This looks really cool! It’s fun in the sense that it’s like that childhood play of being able to relish in something gooey and icky.

MTH: What actors or performers have been especially inspirational to you and why?

Rachel: I really got inspired by Moulin Rouge when I first saw that movie because Nicole Kidman is someone that I really look up to. Kate Winslet also because of the Titanic. I just really was drawn into her work. Kate falling in love with Leo made me fall in love with Leo and him falling in love with her made me fall in love with her. The same thing could be said for Ewan McGregor and Nicole Kidman. Those love stories are so magical and I thought, “I want to do magic like that. Like these women.” Cate Blanchette is another woman who I totally respect as well.

MTH: She’s incredible. We love Cate Blanchette. Do you feel yourself gravitating towards the horror genre or do you think it’s something you get cast for a lot because of your type?

Rachel: I kind of more fell into horror. So, Jetset LA was the first project I produced and acted in. I did that with my friend Colin Lawrence and he’s the guy who directed, In Bed with a Killer. So, I had met him a few years ago through my friend James. Colin’s a director/writer and I’m an actor and we kept saying, “We should do something!” and he likes horror movies. So, I pitched him this idea about an Airbnb gone wrong essentially and he wrote the script. I had met this guy who does blood work. Really great with special effects. Then I thought, “I have all this great horror footage, so I should just keep doing horror!” I just fell into it because that’s what I had in my marketing materials and so that’s why I ended up doing more horror movies because I knew the blood guy who did all the effects for Death Day (Formerly known as The Campus), Robert Bravo. His company is BravoFX and he still does a lot of horror and stuff.  He knew that I could handle all this blood, that I’m not allergic to latex and I’d be kind of down for whatever. So, he was good with putting me through hell and back because he’d already done makeup on me. He’s killed me like four or five times or something. (laughter)

MTH: Nice! How did Jetset LA come into being?

Rachel: I had come up with this concept that was actually much less horror and more thriller I would say. This idea that you’re in an Airbnb and you can hear that terrible stuff is happening in the room next door. What would you do? That was more the idea I had come up with and he kind of took the nugget of that and springboard it into a little bit of a different story. My best friend Grace worked at Dapper Cadaver for many years which is a horror prop house. So, she was working there when we were developing this. She was able to get us discounted props and discounted blood. So, that also influenced a lot of why we made what we made. So, it was like as an indie filmmaker, what do you have on hand? That influences the story you end up telling versus trying to go the other direction. I’m really happy with how Jetset LA came out. I wasn’t expecting that story initially. However, what we got through that was a lot of relationships that started with horror articles and horror reviewers because of the type of project it was. Colin was very collaborative with me which was awesome because it was my first time producing.

MTH: Fantastic! We thought the film was a lot of fun. We did read that the short Jetset LA was going to be developed into a feature-length film. Do you have any updates on that especially in the wake of the Covid19 pandemic that you can talk about if it’s still happening or if the project is on hold?

Rachel: Colin did write a feature-length version and he pitched it around and there was a little bit of interest but as far as I know he’s still hoping to get the meeting that will produce that. It’s still in the works. It’s not a done deal but there’s not much momentum. Covid has influenced that too. It’s a really slow process.