Nightmarish Conjurings: October 2021

In the latest series, I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER, one year after the fatal car accident that haunted their graduation night, a group of teenagers finds themselves bound together by a dark secret and stalked by a brutal killer. As they try to piece together who’s after them, they reveal the dark side of their seemingly perfect town—and themselves. Everyone is hiding something, and uncovering the wrong secret could be deadly.

Ahead of the release of the I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER series on Prime Video, Shannon spoke with actor Madison Iseman, where they chatted about tackling playing two twin characters in this iteration of IKWYDLS, how production kept the cast guessing about the killer, and why the horror genre continues to suck her in.

To kick things off a little bit, how exciting was it for you to find out that you would be a part of this reimagining of this huge franchise?

Madison Iseman: Super exciting. Also, at the same time, nerve-wracking. You have people who are so precious about this original film. I mean, I was a huge fan of it as well but, anytime you take anything that people love so much, it’s always going to come with this extra level of pressure of doing justice and wanting to do a good job. But I read the pilot for the first time and it was just so fantastic, and the opportunity to get to play twins and just be a part of this universe of I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER, was pretty crazy

Speaking of the characters that you play, how difficult was it to go back and forth between those two different types of personalities?

Madison Iseman: There were difficulties and then there were also fun parts of it. I really enjoyed creating these two characters and sisters as different people, but also, you know who they are together as sisters. Definitely, the hardest part was the technicality of having to play two parts and double the memorization, double the work hours. It was a lot of work, but I had an amazing acting double who had to learn everything with me, and she was so well. And it’s interesting, because where I love to act in if I’m in a scene, I love to prepare, prepare, prepare, and then on the day, just kind of forget everything and just being in the moment with whoever I’m with. But with this, everything had to be performed because she basically had to mimic everything I created. So, it was a lot of rehearsals. It was a lot of figuring out beforehand exactly what we were going to do. So, it was just very time-consuming, but it was so much fun at the same time.

Well, you did a great job on both of them. How was it working with the rest of the cast? Did you guys have time to like get to know each other prior? Or was it more difficult due to COVID and everything?

Madison Iseman: They’re fantastic and so talented. We really did bond mainly because the only thing we could do during COVID was hang out in our bubble. That was it. But we’re in such a beautiful place, which was fantastic. You’re in Hawaii, so we got to go to the beach, basically do anything outside: beach, hiking, kayaking; we were very active. But it was a little strange because one of my favorite things about going to a new place, working on a new project, is getting to try all the different restaurants and going out seeing everything but we pretty much had to keep to ourselves this time.

You’re no stranger to the horror genre. You’ve been in The Conjuring universe. You were in Fear of Rain, etc. So, what is it about the genre that you enjoy exploring?

Madison Iseman: I really love the fact that there are really no rules, you know? You can kind of make whatever you want and it can exist in that space. And they’re just fun. Honestly, they’re my favorite to watch. They’re my favorite to work on. I always have a good time. I really love fake blood. It’s just always a really good time.

I’ve asked everybody else this so, I have to ask you if you were playing yourself in a slasher, what role would you be?

Madison Iseman: Oh, gosh. I would want to be the killer.

Yay. You’re the only person to say that.

Madison Iseman: What does that say about me? Is that…?

I’d be right there with you. To wrap things up, what are you most excited for people to experience with this show or with your character? Is there anything you hope that they take away from it?

Madison Iseman: I hope people are so confused and I hope they’re all second-guessing what the heck is going on. Also, we got maybe the first four episodes when we got there and so, we had no idea how this thing was going to wrap up. So, it was a surprise to us. We had bets on set over who was going to be the killer and we were all wrong, except one person. And so, it blew our minds. So, I hope it kind of does the same thing for everyone else. And it’s a good payoff. I’ll say that.