Interview (Written): George A. Romero

A previously unreleased interview with legendary horror writer-director.

George A. Romero died Sunday at the age of 77. Most remember him as a movie director, but he was also a screenwriter, penning most of the movies he made including Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead, Knightriders, Day of the Dead, and Creepshow 2.

In honor of Romero, here is a previously unpublished Little White Lies interview with the legendary writer-director.

LWLies: Night of the Living Dead has just been archived by the American Film Institute and the Museum of Modern Art. Are you still surprised by its longevity and its lasting impact?

Romero: God, I really am. I mean, it’s amazing to be honored like that, but it’s been 45 years now… Lord!

There’s been so much writing about the subtext of the Dead movies. How does that feed into the writing process, is it something you start with or does it feed in later?

Yeah, well, ever since Dawn of the Dead. The first one I never thought would go anywhere. Certainly when we were making it, no one could have envisioned what would happen to the life of that film. I didn’t really have any rules, I was just thinking of it as one film. Then when people started to write about it as though it were important, I got intimidated. Everybody was after me to make another one. I said, ‘I don’t want to just make another one, I have to have an idea, I have to have something to say!’ So that was it, and it took me 10 years to come up with that idea.

I knew the people socially who were developing this big shopping mall, and it was the first one in western Pennsylvania, the first one that any of us had ever seen. I went out to visit it before it opened and saw the trucks coming in, bringing everything that you could ever possibly want in your life into this enormous building. So the concept was there, it just seemed like this temple to consumerism. The light went off and I thought maybe I could do something with this, so I started to write the script. That was the moment I realised I could use zombies, couching whatever it was I wanted to do or say within the context of a horror film, that it would give me the chance for a little social criticism.

Have you ever been seduced by the lure of Hollywood?

My partner and I spent four or five years where we let ourselves be seduced. We made some deals and ended up writing a dozen scripts, probably. I made more money than I ever had in my entire career. Writing, re-writing, developing a version of one thing or another for Nicole Kidman. Then she says no, so it’s, ‘Let’s do one for Meryl Streep!’ We just kept re-writing, in typical development hell. We actually had a deal at Universal to do The Mummy, it was green-lit. But MGM wouldn’t let us out of a deal with only 12 days left to go. So MGM and Universal got into a pissing contest over it and neither happened. I just got so sick of that shit. That’s what brought me to Toronto, because I’d written this little film called Bruiser. We got the money from Canal+ and in Toronto that $5 million turned into six.

How do you feel about the auteur label?

I take pride in it. That’s the reason I’d never want to go do a Masters of Horror episode if I couldn’t write it, or go direct and episode of The Walking Dead. I mean, I wouldn’t wanna do that anyway. I really just wanna do my own stuff, and writing is the first line of defence. You can’t defend something forcibly if you didn’t write it.

For the rest of the interview, go here.