A CHAT WITH BILL MOSELEY
Bill Moseley is no stranger to all things vile. His first big roll came in 1986 as cannibal madman Choptop in the iconic film The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2. The roll launched Moseley’s career. Since then, Bill’s characters have become as synonymous as Michael Myers and Jason Voorhees. Many thanks for letting me post our old interview, Bill.
SL: The horror bug must have bit you at an early age. What kind of child were you, Bill, and what inspired you to become an actor?
BM: I was the middle son, no sisters, grew up outside Chicago in the woods of northern Illinois. I loved dinosaurs, monsters, bugs, dressing up in costumes. I spent a lot of time outdoors in our treehouse, riding bikes on country roads, grabbing great globs of frog eggs from spring ponds and watching them hatch in Mason jars on the kitchen windowsill.
One of my favorite house rules to break was to get up long after I’d been put to bed and sneak into the library when everyone else was asleep, turn on the old black & white Zenith and watch midnight monster movies. Fear was my earliest drug of choice, and I loved getting scared by the Creature from Blood Beach, the giant grasshoppers from The Beginning of the End and of course, our old friends Dracula, Frankenstein and Wolfman.
My dad loved Halloween, and every October 31, he’d take a bunch of us sniveling boys to the local graveyard and make us get out of the car and walk to a grave...and then arrange for the police to show up and scare the crap out of us! Or to some old barn where he had a buddy in a sheet rattle a can or two and then jump out at us!
The earliest recollection I have of horror acting was standing in front of the bathroom mirror and pretending to see a monster approaching from afar. I’d start with a calm face, and then as the monster got closer and closer, make a face that was scared-er and scared-er until I’d scream out in terror!
SL: Your characters are exceedingly violent and demanding. How do you prepare yourself prior to walking in front of the camera?
BM: It’s pretty simple. I read the script at least 15-20 times so that the story becomes real to me. I’m not big on “acting,” not that good at it. What I try to do is get Bill Moseley out of the way, and then just behave naturally as the character. That’s the fun part of acting: out of me and into another person’s skin, especially some crazy booger!
The secret to playing psychos is to act as if you’re sane and everybody else is either wrong or crazy! I also remember that it’s just a movie, just make-believe, so I don’t take the chain saw home with me. I got kids and pets, so that wouldn’t be too cool if the front door opened and there stood Choptop or Otis instead of daddy!
SL: House of A thousand Corpses is priceless. Will there be a sequel to this hellish nightmare?
BM: As of February 24, ‘04, the House of 1000 Corpses sequel is supposed to start shooting sometime in April for Lions Gate Films. Rob Zombie is once again directing his screenplay, which I’ve yet to read. Apparently, Lions Gate is happy, and they plan to run House 2 on at least 2000 screens around Halloween! Rob says the story is grittier and more dark and violent than the original.
He said he doesn’t want to fall into the sequel trap wherein the characters from the original become more cartoonish in the subsequent films.
From what I’ve heard, House 2 is a road picture featuring me, Baby and Captain Spaulding on some cross-country tear. I wish I knew more. Oh, and Rob’s got me growing a beard.
SL: Three from Hell is quickly approaching. What can fans expect?
BM: It's going to kick ass! Hope you've snagged a ticket or two for the mid-September event release. As far as what happens in the movie, my lips are sealed. Good news is, you'll find out soon enough!
SL: How far will you push the line? Are there some things you consider too overwhelming even for you?
BM: As far as I can. If the screenplay is too mean-spirited or dumb, humorless or artless, I won’t do the movie in the first place. What’s the fun of doing something stupid? If the script called for me to hurt animals, I wouldn’t do it- I’m afraid they’d be waiting for me in the next life! I wouldn’t smoke in a movie- that’d be a deal-breaker: too friggin’ hard to quit! I don’t mind nudity or gratuitous violence- that’s the fun part! And as far as going to the dark places of the mind, I always find my way back.
SL: Wrong Turn has that 70s feel to it. Will we see more 70’s style horror films in the future?
BM: With the $tunning $uccesses of House of 1000 Corpses, the Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake and Freddy vs Jason, you bet we’ll see more 70’s-style horror films! Scripts follow the money in Tinseltown, so you can rest assured that every studio, large and small, has a couple of retro horror scripts in some stage of development.
SL: Do you have any desire to write/direct in the coming years? If so, what can we expect to see?
BM: Prior to making a living as an actor, I worked in New York City as a freelance writer for magazines like Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair, Interview, Psychology Today and the late, great Omni and National Lampoon. I’ve written lots of poetry, some of which finds its way into my Cornbugs music. I’ve written a screenplay called “House of Usher”- NOT a horror film- that I’d love to get produced. As for directing, I’m not sure. I’d like the money, but I’ve never really aspired to be the captain of the ship- I’d rather man the guns!
SL: Cornbugs has just unleashed its third debut album. Can you tell us where this band originated, and how fans can purchase a copy?
BM: Thanks for asking about Cornbugs, the band I have with Guns N Roses guitar god Buckethead and drummer Pinchface. We’ve just put out a new CD called Brain Circus, available at cornbugs.com andtdrsmusic.com. We’re a rockin’ trio of drums, guitar and vocals, stripped down and built for E-Z listening at the asylum!
Buckethead and I have been buddies since the early 90’s when I did guest vocals on two songs for his Giant Robot CD on Sony Records. He returned the favor by cranking out some tunes for me to sing over and sell when I do horror conventions (I wanted more for the fans than just headshots!). We found we worked well together, inspired each other, so we’ve kept collaborating over the years.
Our first CD, Spot the Psycho, came out in the late 90’s, followed by How Now Brown Cow and our Halloween spectacular, Cemetery Pinch. I sell all three at my website, choptopsbbq.com, still cut out the cover art and slide it into the jewel case, sign em all, make little marker art on the discs.
Buckethead was busy with GNR for the last couple of years, but somehow he found time to get together on Brain Circus last fall, and I think it’s our best effort so far. We recorded it at a real studio (Travis Dickerson’s in Chatsworth, CA), had Pinchface on real drums (!), an ace producer/engineer/organ player (the one, the only Travis Dickerson!) and really had a ball making the music!
We’ve got a greatest hits package coming soon called Rest Home for Robots with some awesome cover art by Eric Pigors (toxictoons.com), and then another new CD called “Donkey Town.”
SL: Will Cornbugs be making any personal appearances in the future?
Tune into cornbugs.com and keep an eye on the message boards- you never know!
Thanks for sitting down with me Bill.
For more info, you can check out Bill’s website at: http://www.choptopsbbq.com/pages/chophp.html
Thanks for visiting. More interviews to come.
SL: The horror bug must have bit you at an early age. What kind of child were you, Bill, and what inspired you to become an actor?
BM: I was the middle son, no sisters, grew up outside Chicago in the woods of northern Illinois. I loved dinosaurs, monsters, bugs, dressing up in costumes. I spent a lot of time outdoors in our treehouse, riding bikes on country roads, grabbing great globs of frog eggs from spring ponds and watching them hatch in Mason jars on the kitchen windowsill.
One of my favorite house rules to break was to get up long after I’d been put to bed and sneak into the library when everyone else was asleep, turn on the old black & white Zenith and watch midnight monster movies. Fear was my earliest drug of choice, and I loved getting scared by the Creature from Blood Beach, the giant grasshoppers from The Beginning of the End and of course, our old friends Dracula, Frankenstein and Wolfman.
My dad loved Halloween, and every October 31, he’d take a bunch of us sniveling boys to the local graveyard and make us get out of the car and walk to a grave...and then arrange for the police to show up and scare the crap out of us! Or to some old barn where he had a buddy in a sheet rattle a can or two and then jump out at us!
The earliest recollection I have of horror acting was standing in front of the bathroom mirror and pretending to see a monster approaching from afar. I’d start with a calm face, and then as the monster got closer and closer, make a face that was scared-er and scared-er until I’d scream out in terror!
SL: Your characters are exceedingly violent and demanding. How do you prepare yourself prior to walking in front of the camera?
BM: It’s pretty simple. I read the script at least 15-20 times so that the story becomes real to me. I’m not big on “acting,” not that good at it. What I try to do is get Bill Moseley out of the way, and then just behave naturally as the character. That’s the fun part of acting: out of me and into another person’s skin, especially some crazy booger!
The secret to playing psychos is to act as if you’re sane and everybody else is either wrong or crazy! I also remember that it’s just a movie, just make-believe, so I don’t take the chain saw home with me. I got kids and pets, so that wouldn’t be too cool if the front door opened and there stood Choptop or Otis instead of daddy!
SL: House of A thousand Corpses is priceless. Will there be a sequel to this hellish nightmare?
BM: As of February 24, ‘04, the House of 1000 Corpses sequel is supposed to start shooting sometime in April for Lions Gate Films. Rob Zombie is once again directing his screenplay, which I’ve yet to read. Apparently, Lions Gate is happy, and they plan to run House 2 on at least 2000 screens around Halloween! Rob says the story is grittier and more dark and violent than the original.
He said he doesn’t want to fall into the sequel trap wherein the characters from the original become more cartoonish in the subsequent films.
From what I’ve heard, House 2 is a road picture featuring me, Baby and Captain Spaulding on some cross-country tear. I wish I knew more. Oh, and Rob’s got me growing a beard.
SL: Three from Hell is quickly approaching. What can fans expect?
BM: It's going to kick ass! Hope you've snagged a ticket or two for the mid-September event release. As far as what happens in the movie, my lips are sealed. Good news is, you'll find out soon enough!
SL: How far will you push the line? Are there some things you consider too overwhelming even for you?
BM: As far as I can. If the screenplay is too mean-spirited or dumb, humorless or artless, I won’t do the movie in the first place. What’s the fun of doing something stupid? If the script called for me to hurt animals, I wouldn’t do it- I’m afraid they’d be waiting for me in the next life! I wouldn’t smoke in a movie- that’d be a deal-breaker: too friggin’ hard to quit! I don’t mind nudity or gratuitous violence- that’s the fun part! And as far as going to the dark places of the mind, I always find my way back.
SL: Wrong Turn has that 70s feel to it. Will we see more 70’s style horror films in the future?
BM: With the $tunning $uccesses of House of 1000 Corpses, the Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake and Freddy vs Jason, you bet we’ll see more 70’s-style horror films! Scripts follow the money in Tinseltown, so you can rest assured that every studio, large and small, has a couple of retro horror scripts in some stage of development.
SL: Do you have any desire to write/direct in the coming years? If so, what can we expect to see?
BM: Prior to making a living as an actor, I worked in New York City as a freelance writer for magazines like Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair, Interview, Psychology Today and the late, great Omni and National Lampoon. I’ve written lots of poetry, some of which finds its way into my Cornbugs music. I’ve written a screenplay called “House of Usher”- NOT a horror film- that I’d love to get produced. As for directing, I’m not sure. I’d like the money, but I’ve never really aspired to be the captain of the ship- I’d rather man the guns!
SL: Cornbugs has just unleashed its third debut album. Can you tell us where this band originated, and how fans can purchase a copy?
BM: Thanks for asking about Cornbugs, the band I have with Guns N Roses guitar god Buckethead and drummer Pinchface. We’ve just put out a new CD called Brain Circus, available at cornbugs.com andtdrsmusic.com. We’re a rockin’ trio of drums, guitar and vocals, stripped down and built for E-Z listening at the asylum!
Buckethead and I have been buddies since the early 90’s when I did guest vocals on two songs for his Giant Robot CD on Sony Records. He returned the favor by cranking out some tunes for me to sing over and sell when I do horror conventions (I wanted more for the fans than just headshots!). We found we worked well together, inspired each other, so we’ve kept collaborating over the years.
Our first CD, Spot the Psycho, came out in the late 90’s, followed by How Now Brown Cow and our Halloween spectacular, Cemetery Pinch. I sell all three at my website, choptopsbbq.com, still cut out the cover art and slide it into the jewel case, sign em all, make little marker art on the discs.
Buckethead was busy with GNR for the last couple of years, but somehow he found time to get together on Brain Circus last fall, and I think it’s our best effort so far. We recorded it at a real studio (Travis Dickerson’s in Chatsworth, CA), had Pinchface on real drums (!), an ace producer/engineer/organ player (the one, the only Travis Dickerson!) and really had a ball making the music!
We’ve got a greatest hits package coming soon called Rest Home for Robots with some awesome cover art by Eric Pigors (toxictoons.com), and then another new CD called “Donkey Town.”
SL: Will Cornbugs be making any personal appearances in the future?
Tune into cornbugs.com and keep an eye on the message boards- you never know!
Thanks for sitting down with me Bill.
For more info, you can check out Bill’s website at: http://www.choptopsbbq.com/pages/chophp.html
Thanks for visiting. More interviews to come.