Horror sequel a 'Scream' for Neve Campbell

February 9, 2000
Web posted at: 5:46 p.m. EST (2246 GMT)

From Paul Vercammen
CNN Entertainment News Correspondent

LOS ANGELES (CNN) -- Sequels have a shaky reputation, so when the producers of "Scream" approached Neve Campbell about doing a trifecta, she hesitated.

"I think it's always risky to do any kind of sequel for a film," the 26-year-old actress says, "because the very reason it's being made is because the first one is excellent, and people loved it. Can you possibly do that again?"

But she eventually yielded to director Wes Craven's powers of persuasion and signed on again -- a shrewd move. In its opening last weekend, "Scream 3" scared up an estimated $35 million in ticket sales.

That's the biggest debut of 2000 -- or for any film released in February. It's also the biggest opening in distributor Miramax's history.

The third slasher thriller follows two similarly lucrative shriekers. "Scream 2" opened to $32.9 million in December 1997 and eventually made $101 million. The original "Scream" raked in $6.4 million in its December 1996 debut and went on to rack up $103 million.

With numbers like that, "Scream 3" doesn't vary too far from the premise that served its two predecessors so richly. Campbell returns as the perpetually imperiled Sydney Prescott. She's joined by the husband-and-wife team of David Arquette and Courtney Cox Arquette. They reprise their roles of Dwight "Dewey" Riley and Gale Weathers. In this effort, Sydney takes a job on the set of "Stab 3." Life imitates art as a real-life killer goes after the cast members.

And, Campbell says, although she knows the film is fiction, that doesn't mean she plans to watch it -- or any other scary film.

"I'm not good at watching them," she says. "I end up having nightmares for a month and screaming and crying and that whole bit."

So it seems no more screaming for Campbell -- and no more partying, either. She plans to leave the Fox drama "Party of Five" at the end of this season.

"I had made the decision not to go back for a seventh season anyway," she says. "If the show doesn't go back, I'll be sad in the sense that family won't continue. ... But on the other hand, it's time to move on and challenge ourselves in different ways."

Campbell is instead focusing on her movie career, trying to branch out in different roles. She plays a bisexual hairdresser in "Panic," which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival last month.

"We got (a) good reception," she says. "There were people lining up for three hours to see the film."

Campbell also will share a marquee with Bette Midler in "Drowning Mona." In that film, scheduled for a March release, Midler plays Mona Dearly, an unpleasant woman whose car plunges off a cliff. Campbell plays the daughter of Chief Rash (Danny DeVito), who's investigating the accident.

Asked whether she would ever return for a "Scream 4," Campbell says she won't rule it out.

"You never know," she says. "Twenty years from now, we might really need the money."

Stars say 'Scream' effective catharsis, classic whodunit
December 20, 1996

'Scream 3'
'Drowning Mona'

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