SOME COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT THE EVIL DEAD FILMS

ASSUMPTION: The farmhouse does exist from ED in real life! It is on a farmers land in Tennessee. Supposedly, when they went back to film ED2 in the same house, they found that the farmer had filled it with manure! And they were shooting in July! Stinnnkkyy!

TRUTH: False. One is in North Carolina on private property (EDII) - the original, in Tennessee (which had cow manure in it because it was abandoned and overrun by cattle when we found it) burned down in the early 80's.

ASSUMPTION: In AOD, when Ash is forced to swallow a little Ash, he grabs a boiling kettle and yells "How about a little Hot Chocolate for ya!" But when he pours it in his mouth, it is only water!

TRUTH: "Hot chocolate" was merely an expression.

ASSUMPTION: There were three little Ashes. One was Bruce and the other two were actors who wore latex masks of Bruce's face. Look closely at the non speaking little Ash's - the faces never move much.

TRUTH: Not true - some had tiny latex "appliances" like chins or noses, but that's it.

ASSUMPTION: The rumor mill said that the day when Ash was gonna get the dirt to the face in the grave, Sam personally took it upon himself to hit Bruce in the face with the dirt and he really let him have it too!

TRUTH: Not true - it was a very light peat moss.

ASSUMPTION: The music of AOD was composed by Danny Elfman, onetime leader of the now split party band Oingo Boingo.

TRUTH: True, but only the "March of the Dead." 95% was composed by Joe LoDuca. What, there aren't credits on the film?

ASSUMPTION: The dancing girlfriend corpse in ED2 was done by Leanna Quigley, who if you know B-movie horror is one of the leading actresses of her time.

TRUTH: Absolutely false - she auditioned for the film, but never got cast.

ASSUMPTION: The man who asked Ash if he had said the incantation right at the end of AOD was Sam Raimi's brother Ted, who is a professional actor.

TRUTH: True.

ASSUMPTION: The Original title of AOD was Evil Dead 3:AOD (changed because the production company thought sequels made less money) Also the original caption was "One Man-One Million Dead-The odds are just about even!" (I like that better myself). It was later used in ads for the comic book adaptation of AOD.

TRUTH: Not true. Universal Studios wanted a "separate entity." The only other title I ever heard tossed around was "The Medieval Dead."

ASSUMPTION: Watch for Sam's and Bruce's little thanks to Fangoria Magazine (Gave a boost for the first ED with a feature page and cover story) and to Dark Horse Comics (Did the comic book adaptation for AOD) in AOD. They are both in the trunk of Ash's '73 Olds in AOD.

TRUTH: I don't think Dark Horse hadn't done the comic yet.

ASSUMPTION: Ash was a lot more grittier in the first draft of AOD. His character was basically fed up with everyone and everything that happened to him and was always mouthin' off to anyone who stood in his way. He was this still in the final version, but to a lighter sense. An example was when the old woman who was eating the bread gave her line to throw the whole lot of them in. Ash would have said "Someone ought to do away with you and that rotten breath of yours!" The reason for some of the changes, Universal wanted to make him less of a anti-hero.

TRUTH: Absolutely not true.

ASSUMPTION: They also shortened the pit scene for lack of time... it was going to be a full out proving ground with Ash wasting about 10 deadites! It was to be a real gorefest with Ash throwing in such lines as when he cuts a deadite arm off while saying "Meet my friend Buzz!"

TRUTH: Not true. It might have been cut down, but this is over stating it.

ASSUMPTION: The poster for AOD was supposedly done by the same person who does the paintings for romantic cover novels for Fabio!

TRUTH: That I don't know, but I kind of doubt it as well.

ASSUMPTION: Listen to some of the audio effects, They are made to be exactly like the three stooges sounds. Examples: when ash gets stuck in the butt by the fork, the sound is someone plunking a violin string, and sounds from the graveyard scene.

TRUTH: True.

ASSUMPTION: Raimi actually planned to have Ash lose a body part a movie. He was going to lose a leg in AOD and replace it with a prosthetic like the hand.

TRUTH: No - it was an eye.

ASSUMPTION: Bruce became quite a accomplished swordsman when filming AOD. He used this talent later in Adventures of Brisco County Junior episodes.

TRUTH: The application in "Brisco" was not because of "Army."

ASSUMPTION: It seems that lines from the Evil Dead Films are popular in music sampling. The line let's go downstairs and carve ourselves a witch is used often by a industrial group called KMFDM. And I remember the line Hello Lover was used in the song 'People are still having Sex'.

TRUTH: Skinny Puppy had a song too.

ASSUMPTION: As many of you know, several lines from AOD were also used in the game 'Duke Nukem 3D'. Examples include: "Come get some", "Groovy", "That's gotta hurt", and "Hail to the king baby."

TRUTH: True.

ASSUMPTION: If you compare ED 1 and 2 you will find some funny things. One is the Necronomicon grows about 5 inches around. It goes from a palm-sized book to a full page novel. The same goes for the shotgun. It went from single barrel to a double barrel. I guess the bigger budget shows a bit more in the small things as well!

TRUTH: Damn straight.

ASSUMPTION: Did anyone notice that the Necronomicon has two names for it? In ED 1, the prof called it The "Naturum de Montum" but in the prolouge of ED 2 it is named the "Necronomicon ex Mortis" and both are supposed to translate to mean (roughly) "The Book of the Dead" (the second one translates to "To join the book of the recently dead")

TRUTH: Okay, what's your point? Different names, same thing...

ASSUMPTION: ED 1 has the personal significance of being the first to call its secondary characters the "Spam" in Hollywood lingo. Spam is what the victims are called in all Hollywood horror movies. Actually, the entire first film was called the "Spam version."

TRUTH: Who coined this phrase? I have never hear Sam Raimi say it...

ASSUMPTION: Ash has (or had) a sister! The first spammer in ED1 who got raped by the trees, Cheryl, was supposed to be Ash's sister.

TRUTH: True.

ASSUMPTION: Sam and Ted are the fishermen waving to the passing car in the beginning of ED 1.

TRUTH: False - Sam (director) and Rob Tapert (producer).

ASSUMPTION: In the original script of AOD, the skeleton warriors were going to be rancid corpses like Night of The Living Dead types and the fight scenes were going to have buckets of blood and gore. But of course, the sponsor intervened and demanded a PG -13 rating so out with the gore -in with dust and dry bones (sigh).

TRUTH: Not true. We never planned on "buckets of gore." The "sponsor" was the studio and they only demanded an "R" rating.

ASSUMPTION: Another difference in the ED 1 and 2 - the knife. It gets a cool serrated edge to it in the second one while in the first it was smooth.

TRUTH: Right - more money.

Q: I SAW AN "EVIL DEAD IV" SCRIPT ON THE WEB, IS THIS THE REAL THING?

A: No, no, and no! This phoney Evil Dead IV script is in no way affiliated with or connected to Sam Raimi or me. It's just the brainchild of some "genius" who apparently has no idea that what he's doing is illegal.

Q: I HEARD YOU TWO HAD A FALLING OUT. IS THAT TRUE?

A: How come I'm always the last one to know these things? No, Sam and I did not have a falling out, as some people have erroneously reported.

Heck, recently, we've worked together on "Hercules," "Xena," and "American Gothic."