'Scream queen' Stevens highlights upcoming horror convention

A lot has changed in the horror film industry, since Brinke Stevens became a “scream queen” icon in the 1980s. When the home video market exploded in popularity, Stevens' movies could be found in almost every video store horror section.

“I think that in the 1980s and ‘90s, it was much more innocent,” she says in a recent phone interview. ”I did a lot of horror comedies — and it was all in good fun.”

Stevens, with credits in more than 100 films, and best known for the horror cult classics “The Slumber Party Massacre” (1982) and “Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama“ (1988), is one of the headliners at the upcoming Horror Realm Con 2017, March 3 to 5 at the DoubleTree by Hilton, Green Tree. In addition to Stevens, other celebrity guests include Reggie Bannister (“Phantasm”), Diane Franklin (“Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure”) and Jill Schoelen (“Popcorn “). There will be a special screening of “Slumber Party” on March 4.

For Stevens, the interaction with horror fans is something she has always cherished.

“I love the conventions, because the people who go are such fans and they're usually really intelligent and very knowledgeable about all manner of topics,” she says. “I find horror fans to be some of the most interesting and smart people that I've ever met. And, a lot of them are also misfits, in some way, socially awkward — or whatever — but I just love horror fans.

“People said to me early on, ‘Face it Brinke, you're a nerd, just like the rest of them, but you're just better looking,'” she said with a laugh.

Stevens knows a thing or two about being intelligent — she was a member of Mensa, the high IQ society, although she admits she has let her membership lapse. Her intelligence isn't the thing that most surprises people when she meets them in person.

“They're mostly surprised how short I am,” she says. “They always say, ‘I thought you'd be taller,' because I play these monsters in movies, but I'm actually like 5-foot-3, but they're all stunned when they meet me.”

Stevens remains active in the film industry, as a writer, director and star, but trying to emulate her career today would be almost impossible.

“It's so much harder today then when I first started back in the 1980s,” she says. “I was in the right place at the right time, for the video revolution. Prior to that, movies had played in theaters. And then suddenly, there was direct-to-video productions, so I was working all the time.

“We'd wrap one movie on Friday and start the next movie on Monday,” she says. “We always thought it would be that way, but things have slowed down considerably since then.”

In the course of her many movies, she's familiar with Western Pennsylvania, as she filmed two movies here: “Eyes Are Upon You” (2001), which was made with local makeup and special effects legend Tom Savini, and “Demon Divas” (2009), which was shot in Kittanning.

“We did a bowling alley there,” she says. “It was kind of a remake of ‘Sorority Babes.'”

Internet changes

While it may seem intuitive that websites like YouTube have made it easier to get movies online and make stars out of unknown actors and actresses, Stevens doesn't see it that way.

“Yes, that's true, but the whole filmmaking changed, like lighting packages, camera equipment got smaller and more affordable, so it democratized filmmaking, where anyone, anywhere could make their own movie,” she says. “But, the budgets went way down and they have a much smaller distribution, so I'm afraid that not a lot of movies I've done lately have been seen, and it's much harder to make a living now, with the lower budgets and smaller salaries. Another thing that changed was that vampires used to be really popular, back in the ‘70s and ‘80s — it was all vampires — then zombies started to take over and now everything is zombies, like ‘World War Z' and ‘Walking Dead,'” she says.

“Well, they say that you don't get work after you're 40, but I had special circumstances here with my career and I still get work,” Stevens says. “I appeared in, I think, five movies last year and I'm shooting a few more this year, so the work keeps coming.”

Horror icon

“But, then at some point, I became kind of a horror icon, so now all of the young filmmakers want to work with me,” she says. “So, it's been nice, it's been a career that keeps on perpetuating itself.”

She keeps her hand in many aspects of the film industry, with several movies scheduled to be released this year, including the big-budget film, “Death House.” Other upcoming projects, including a film she wrote, directed and starred in, titled “Personal Demons” and three audiobooks.

“I taught myself how to be a sound engineer, so that I could learn to edit and master these audiobooks,” she says. ”And, I'm about to start another course, to learn to be a script supervisor, so I can add one more skill to my resume. In the old days, it was called the ‘continuity girl,' to make sure all the details were consistent in the movie.

“I don't want to rely on just the acting,” Stevens says. “And, especially now that I'm older; I'm in my 60s. The roles don't come as often as they used to, so I think learning a new skill within the film business is a smart move.”

Steve Segal is a Tribune-Review contributing writer.