It’s not unusual for directors to allow their actors to improvise while filming a movie, and the horror genre has seen some interesting and memorable improvised moments. Many movies are carefully planned and designed because the stories or the director’s style requires extra attention to every detail, but many others leave some room for spontaneity. Improvised moments in movies can be the result of different factors and circumstances, such as an actor forgetting their lines, an actor being too “in the moment”, or behind-the-scenes situations that make actors come up with something on the spot.
Various movies from different genres are known for being mostly or completely improvised, and the horror genre is home to some of them. However, there are many scripted movies where improvised moments were so good that they made it to the final cut, and in most cases, these became the most memorable moments in their respective movies. Improvised moments in horror movies can go from lines that the actors come up with on the spot to genuine reactions from actors to actions that weren’t in the script or entire scenes that weren’t scripted, and the reasons behind these spontaneous additions are all different.
11 Frank’s Final Line In Hellraiser
Frank’s final line was different in the script
Hellraiser begins with Frank Cotton (Sean Chapman) solving the Lament Configuration and being torn apart and taken by the Cenobites. After the blood of Larry (Andrew Robinson), Frank’s brother, accidentally resurrects him in ghoulish form, his former lover (and Larry’s second wife) helps Frank regenerate his body, and at the end of Hellraiser, he kills Larry and takes his skin. The Cenobites can’t be fooled and capture Frank, ensnaring him with chains and hooks, with Frank’s final words being “Jesus wept”, said as he smiles at his niece.
It was revealed in the documentary Leviathan: The Story of Hellraiser and Hellbound: Hellraiser II that the original line was supposed to be “f**k you”, but Robinson didn’t feel it matched the intensity of the scene. Director and writer Clive Barker loved the idea of “Jesus wept” being Frank’s final line and kept it, giving Frank one final moment of exasperation but without being profane.
10 Richie & Eddie vs A Pomeranian In It: Chapter Two
They weren’t expecting a cute but deadly dog
In It: Chapter Two, the title creature had to find new ways to terrorize the now adult Losers, and it succeeded at it. When the Losers go into the sewers to confront It, they are separated in order to torment them in different ways. Eddie (James Ransone) and Richie (Bill Hader) end up together in some part of the sewers with three white doors in front of them that read “Not Scary At All”, “Scary”, and “Very Scary”. After opening the third door, Richie and Eddie go with “Not Scary At All” and find a Pomeranian dog, which both men find to be cute… until the dog turns into a monster. In an interview with ScreenCrush, Bill Hader shared that his and Ransone’s reactions to the dog were improvised, which definitely sold the idea of both being initially skeptical of it and then warming up to its cuteness, only to be surprised by its monstrosity.
9 Ed Comes Up With Backstories In Shaun of the Dead
Nick Frost’s improvisation skills shone through
When Shaun (Simon Pegg) gets dumped by his girlfriend, Liz, his best friend Ed (Nick Frost) decides to cheer him up. Shaun and Ed go to their favorite pub, The Winchester, to have a beer, but as Shaun doesn’t seem to be feeling better, Ed starts making up backstories for the other people at the pub. Ed comes up with some truly hilarious stories, most notably the one about a woman in conservative clothes, who he decides is “an ex-porn star” among other things. Director Edgar Wright gave Frost the green light to come up with new lines for this scene in order to get a natural laugh out of Pegg (via BigFanBoy).
8 Nada Runs Out Of Bubblegum In They Live
An improvised line that became a classic
John Carpenter’s They Live follows Nada (Roddy Piper), a drifter who, after discovering special sunglasses that show aliens posing as humans, does his best to take them down and stop them from manipulating people through subliminal messages in the mass media. In what’s perhaps They Live’s most memorable scene, Nada, wearing the glasses and carrying weapons he just stole from the police, enters a bank to kill the aliens in disguise. Nada delivers the line “I have come here to chew bubblegum and kick ass … and I’m all out of bubblegum”, which wasn’t in Carpenter’s script. Piper himself confirmed (via Highlight Media) that the line was improvised when Carpenter told him he had to say something as his character was not going to rob a bank, and the line became a classic.
7 Howie Sees The Wicker Man
Edward Woodward’s genuine reaction made the scene better
The reveal of the Wicker Man in the movie of the same name and what the cultists are about to do to Sgt. Howie (Edward Woodward) was a surprise to both viewers and Woodward, whose reaction to seeing the Wicker Man was genuine. Woodward shared in the documentary Burnt Offering: The Cult of the Wicker Man that he declined to see the Wicker Man before filming the scene in order to get a natural reaction to it. As a result, Howie’s shocked look and “oh God! oh, Jesus Christ!” cries were Woodward’s real reaction to the massive Wicker Man structure.
6 Billy Hits Stu With The Phone In Scream
Billy wasn’t supposed to hurt his friend
The reveal of Billy Loomis (Skeet Ulrich) and Stu Macher (Matthew Lillard) being the Ghostface killers in Wes Craven’s Scream wasn’t the only surprise in the movie – or, at least, for the cast. In the scene where Sidney taunts Billy on the phone, Ulrich was supposed to throw the phone in the kitchen countertop, but the fake blood was too slippery and the phone slipped away, landing on Lillard’s head. As confirmed by writer Kevin Williamson on the Blu-ray commentary of Scream, Lillard added the line “you f***ing hit me with the phone, d*ck!”, which fitted perfectly with the character and the moment, so it was kept.
5 The Ending of Witchfinder General
The original ending was less brutal
Witchfinder General is based on the 1966 novel of the same name and almost had the same ending as the book. In it, Vincent Price’s Matthew Hopkins would have been beaten by Marshall, forcing a “confession” out of him, and would have also been partially drowned before being hanged. However, this ending, which would have needed a bunch of extras, was too expensive, and with Price booked to start working on the Broadway musical Darling of the Day, director Michael Reeves came up with a different ending. The result was Marshall grabbing an axe and striking Hopkins repeatedly, with one of Marshall’s friends putting Hopkins out of his misery with a shot to the head. Although both endings were shocking, there’s something especially unsettling in the final, improvised ending.
4 Chief Brody’s Most Iconic Line In Jaws
Brody’s line was the result of behind-the-scenes issues
Bringing Steven Spielberg’s Jaws to life wasn’t easy, and the many problems the cast and crew encountered while filming the movie – from technical issues to delayed lunch to producers not wanting to spend more money on a bigger support boat – led to the in-joke “you’re gonna need a bigger boat” among the cast and crew. As shared by writer Carl Gottlieb (via THR), Roy Scheider started sneaking the line into takes, with one of them making it to the final cut of Jaws and becoming the famous line everyone now knows.
3 The Chestburster Scene In Alien
Nobody knew what was about to happen to Kane
Just when Kane seemed to have recovered from having a facehugger on his face, he surprised everyone when an alien burst out of his chest. During the final crew meal, Kane started to choke and convulse, and while he was lying on the table, with his colleagues around him, his chest exploded and an alien came out of it. The reactions of the rest of the actors were real, as they were only told that something was going to come out of John Hurt’s chest, but they weren’t prepared for an alien, animal organs, and lots of blood. Only John Hurt knew exactly what was going to happen in the scene, and so the reactions of his cast mates were 100% real.
2 Jack’s “Here’s Johnny!” Moment In The Shining
An addition that became a classic in film history
When Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) succumbs to the evil forces of the Overlook Hotel in Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining, he goes after his wife, Wendy (Shelley Duvall), and their son, Danny. The most famous scene in The Shining is the one where Wendy locks herself inside a bathroom and Jack arrives with an axe. Jack breaks through the door, peers through it, and says “Here’s Johnny!”. The line isn’t part of Stephen King’s novel nor was it in Kubrick’s script, and instead, it was ad-libbed by Nicholson after shooting the scene too many times. Luckily, the scene made it to the final cut, and it’s now one of the most iconic lines in film history.
1 Most of The Blair Witch Project
The Blair Witch Project was mostly improvised
The Blair Witch Project is a found-footage horror movie, so to make it seem as real as possible, most of the movie was improvised. Directors Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez had an outline of the story and let the actors improvise the dialogues, and gave them individual instructions every night so they would know where to take their characters next, but without telling the others what their instructions were (via Vice). This process was key in making The Blair Witch Project believable, so much so that many people actually believed that three filmmaking students got lost in the woods.
