Nearly a year after the slasher sequel hit theaters, Scream 6‘s Dermot Mulroney recalls getting in trouble for letting his character details slip early. Mulroney starred in the latest installment in the horror franchise as Wayne Bailey, a New York Police Department Detective and the father to Liana Liberato’s Quinn, who begins investigating the latest series of Ghostface killings as they’re tied to Melissa Barrera’s Sam and Jenna Ortega’s Tara, both of whom are Quinn’s roommates. Having seemingly been heartbroken by Quinn’s murder, it’s revealed that she and Bailey are two of the Ghostface killers alongside Jack Champion’s Ethan, all revealed to be the family of Jack Quaid’s Richie from the prior movie.
During an interview with Screen Rant for his new action-thriller Ruthless, Mulroney reflected on his time working on Scream 6. When reminded of sharing early details about his role in the movie, the star revealed he actually got in trouble with Paramount and Spyglass for letting it slip he was the father of one of the victims, though humorously acknowledging that what he shared was ultimately a red herring. Check out Mulroney’s funny recollection below:
I love it, you interviewed me after I shot Scream and before Scream came out, so I knew what happened, and I played it off in the interview? That’s amazing, because I had slipped earlier on, so I guess I really was toeing the line by then. It was during those series of interviews for Gone in the Night that I let out what, of course, turns out to be a false lead by mentioning a family relationship that hadn’t been released yet, and scream Paramount came down on me hard about that. [Laughs]
Well, that was a moment [we can share]. Can I just take another moment to tell you that what I mean when Paramount comes down hard is that I got an immediate email on a chain with about 10 CCs on it with a bold print in the subject line, basically saying, “Shut up!” [Chuckles] But now, we know that even that leak [chuckles evilly] was a red herring. So, if you know the movie well enough, you know what I said on your show wasn’t true.
How Scream 6’s Ghostface Reveal Twisted A Prior Fakeout
The reveal of Bailey, Quinn and “Ethan” as Scream 6‘s Ghostface proved to be one of the more unique of the franchise as it marked the first time there were three killers involved in the murders. If counting the opening fakeout, however, the sequel features five different killers, the most for any of the Scream movies as all prior installments only featured one or two as being behind the iconic mask. But more than just upping the stakes for the movie, Bailey being one of the Ghostfaces actually served as a fun twist on a previous fakeout in the franchise.
Scream 3, infamously the most divisive of the sequels, hinted at a wide variety of suspects as being behind its Ghostface killings, namely that of Patrick Dempsey’s Mark Kincaid, a detective investigating the slayings who seemed to have a particular focus on Neve Campbell’s Sidney Prescott. With his also frequently arriving at important scenes with convenient timing and the killer getting Sidney’s phone number shortly after Kincaid gets it from Dewey, he seemed prime to be one of the killers. Instead, it was ultimately revealed to be Scott Foley’s Roman Bridger acting on his own, a twist that has been criticized by Scream fans for creating various plot holes, while Kincaid would go on to marry Sidney off-screen in the years since.
In addition to twisting the helpful cop fakeout from the prior sequel, Bailey’s Scream 6 reveal also tapped into the fakeouts from various other prior installments with a seeming victim being revealed to be one of the killers. The original Scream saw Skeet Ulrich’s Billy fake stabbed before continuing his killings, while the threequel saw Roman fake his death and the fourquel finding Charlie faking being held captive in order to lure Hayden Panettiere’s Kirby out to be stabbed. Between setting a new path for the franchise while honoring what came before, the Radio Silence team offered a variety of thrilling layers during their tenure in the Scream franchise.
Scream 6
Scream 6 is a horror-slasher film that brings the terror of the iconic Ghostface to the streets of New York City. The survivors of the 2022 fifth Scream entry have moved to one of the biggest cities in the world – but not even a population of eight million will stop a mysterious new assailant from trying to fulfill the Ghostface legacy.
- Director
- Matt Bettinelli-Olpin , Tyler Gillett
- Cast
- Melissa Barrera , Courteney Cox , Jasmin Savoy Brown , Mason Gooding , Jenna Ortega , Hayden Panettiere
- Rating
- R
- Runtime
- 2h 2m
- Main Genre
- Horror
- Genres
- Horror , Thriller
- Writers
- James Vanderbilt , Guy Busick
- Prequel
- Scream 5
- Studio(s)
- Paramount Pictures
- Distributor(s)
- Paramount Pictures
- prequel(s)
- Scream (2022) , Scream , Scream 3 , Scream 2 , Scream 4
- Franchise(s)
- Scream
