Exclusive: Dan Riesser and Theresa Tilly Talk Stomping Ground
Staci Layne Wilson
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Stomping Ground is the story of Ben and Annie, a young couple on a weekend trip to Annie’s small North Carolina hometown. At the local bar they run into Paul, a charming old friend of Annie’s, and Ben learns something he never knew about his girlfriend: She believes in Bigfoot. In fact, she and her friends used to “hunt” for the creature when they were kids.
Before Ben knows it, he’s off on an impromptu Squatchin’ trip deep in the Carolina backwoods. Amidst the Squatch calls, campfire stories and beers, Ben quickly realizes that Paul may have an ulterior motive in bringing Annie to the woods. And something else out here seems to be after her as well. Everyone but Ben thinks it’s Bigfoot. But it can’t be, can it? After all, Bigfoot isn’t real… right?
The film features a cameo performance from Theresa Tilly, best known as one of the original “Ladies of the Evil Dead” from Sam Raimi’s horror classic The Evil Dead. We caught up with her and the film’s director, Dan Riesser, to get the big picture.
Dread Central: Stomping Ground is an interesting mix of comedy and horror; in fact, people who’ve seen it seem to be at a loss as to how to categorize it.
Dan Riesser: Yeah, it’s definitely different than just your typical Sasquatch exploitation Bigfoot movie. It’s actually a bit more like a rom-com that sort of blends into a creature feature in way, so a different kind of horror movie, and yeah, it basically tells the story of a couple that travels to the girlfriend’s hometown in North Carolina and, after meeting a friend, end up on a kind of impromptu Bigfoot hunt, and things get ‘squatchy’ from there.
DC: Theresa, tell us a bit about whom you play in the movie.
Theresa Tilly: I play the lead actress’ mother, and I’ve had experience with this whole Bigfoot thing because my husband and my daughter, in the movie, have gone searching or camping. I don’t know if they say we’re looking for Bigfoot particularly, but there is some indication that they may have encountered him, and it changed my life… all of our lives. At least that’s what the story is kind of indicating; you don’t really know for sure though. So there’s some kind of… overshadowing of the possibility that going out into the woods could be dangerous.
DC: You must get a ton of horror role offers… what made you decide to choose this one?
TT: Well, I really like the lead actor, John Bobek; we have done some work together before this in theater, and I just adore him and his whole style of acting. If you get a chance to see the movie, you’re going to see a very neat, talented guy here. He’s funny, a very good actor; he’s the one who sort of brought me on to meet Dan, and I liked the whole idea of the story. It wasn’t all blood and guts because you know what that’s like. I thought it would be fun to do something a little more, you know, mainstream in terms of horror.
DC: The Bigfoot sub-genre always seems on the brink of emerging but never really gets, if you’ll pardon my phrasing, a foothold. Can you address that in relation to your own experience?
DR: Yeah, well, we shot the movie in 2012, and around that time Bigfoot was kind of becoming… sort of rearing his ugly head again. There was Willow Creek, there was Exists; they pop up, and I don’t know… Bigfoot to me is like one of those creatures that whenever I describe to someone that I’m making a Bigfoot movie, the typical reaction is, ‘That’s cool, that’s fun.’ I feel like nobody dislikes Bigfoot, like everybody is kind of a fan, so even if you’re not interested in horror movies, even if you don’t believe in it, it’s still kind of fun, the idea of Bigfoot. So for me, the movie is very, very indie, very low budget, mainly self-financed, and it’s my first feature. I knew going into the whole thing… the plan all along was to make a small character movie, kind of a small love story movie within the realm of the creature feature.
I’m originally from North Carolina, which is where we filmed the movie, and once I started diving into the mythology and lore in my own state, I kind of stumbled upon the fact that North Carolina really has a nice Bigfoot history. Most people think that Bigfoot comes from the Northwest, Canada, and everything like that; but he pops up everywhere. I discovered some really fun stuff about North Carolina when I was researching, and the creature became Bigfoot once the research process started.
DC: As a horror site, we’re less interested in the rom-com aspect and more curious about the monster, creature-feature aspect. What can you tell us?
DR: Well, what I will say… like I said, it was a very low budget film, but I will say that our creature effects and special effects are top-notch considering how low I know my designer made the Bigfoot suit for. I know he made it for very little money because I gave him that money, and he knocked it out of the park. My personal opinion is what he created in the movie beats out a lot of the other movies, the other Bigfoot movies that you see. I think our effects are awesome, so that’s something to look forward to in the movie. It’s definitely… I’m a little wary to use the term because it’s thrown around negatively a lot, but ‘slow burn’ like Ti West, his moniker that he always gets thrown under the bus for, but it definitely is one of those kinds of movies. Even though it’s a rom-com, it’s got a lot of tension; it kind of slowly, slowly creeps up on you. It’s got a couple of really good jump scares in my opinion, it’s got some gore in it, and it kind of has everything you’d want, especially if you go in with the mindset of this isn’t going to be your traditional hack and slash, teens run through the woods from a monster. If you go in with that mindset… everyone who kind of approached it like that really enjoyed it and I think found the merit in it.
DC: Theresa, I’m sure you’re always reminded of your role in the now iconic Evil Dead original movie…
TT: Well, when I shot Wizard of Oz, and Ellen Sandweiss and Betsy Baker, who were also in Evil Dead, they were on the set for a few days as well, and he [Raimi] used to introduce us to James Franco, and some of the people on the set, and he’d go, ‘These are my first witches,’ and he loved the fact that he had created this female monster, a strong woman or something, and I do think that is unique about it. We’re not just the cute girls getting attacked, but we have revenge too… I’m not that astute on horror history, but I do think that is a change that Evil Dead made… regarding women in horror films.
DC: Where and when can Bigfoot fans see Stomping Ground?
DR: Well, the movie is finally coming out on DVD and VOD on Tuesday, March 8th. That’s been a long time coming and it was a long process and I’m just thrilled that the movie is finally available for everyone. I hope people give it a chance and check it out. I’m just plugging away at what will hopefully be my sophomore feature, but nothing is concrete at this point.
TT: Well, I’m really excited about this movie too. Dan did such a great job; it’s a really fun movie to see, scary and suspenseful all wrapped up in one. Everything is very well done, like he said, under the circumstances of being an indie film. I’m going to be at a new convention this year, where I’ll have some posters from the movie, autographed posters and DVDs, and that’s going to be at a show called New England Horror Fest in August. I don’t know if you’ve heard of Cinema Wasteland in Ohio, but I’ll be there, and so will the whole cast, maybe not Bruce, but everyone else will be there. I’ve got another movie coming out called American Fable, and that’s an indie as well, not a horror but very suspenseful.
Filmmaker Riesser, formerly an Emmy-nominated producer on E! Entertainment’s “The Soup” with Joel McHale, wrote, directed, and produced Stomping Ground as his first feature film. Along with Tilly, Stomping Ground stars John Bobek, Tarah DeSpain, and Jeramy Blackford.
Limited edition DVDs, which include an 11″x17″ poster signed by the cast and crew, can be ordered directly from BRINKvision.com. The film is also available on Amazon. It will be available digitally from Amazon Prime and Google Play on March 8th, with additional VOD outlets to follow. The film is available for Cinema-On-Demand screenings through Tugg.com.
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