My Night at the Drive-In: A Slasher Set Visit to ‘The Last Drive-In with Joe Bob Briggs’
Driving through the fake main streets familiar to those who love The Walking Dead felt surreal; a line of storefronts surrounded by a large maze of studio lot trailers and sound stages where movie and television magic happens quite literally in the middle of the woods of Senoia, Georgia. Inside one of those sound stages, through pitch black hallways and floors covered in cables and wires, sits a more familiar trailer, complete with a famous armchair and glowing marquee announcing the first title showing of the night. Kicking off its second episode of the seventh season of horror features past and present, The Last Drive-In with Joe Bob Briggs begins as the legendary host makes his way to set.
Obviously very chummy with the crew, Briggs makes small talk, admiring the set decoration and discussing physical media, specifically horror physical media, with them as Darcy the Mail Girl makes her entrance and everyone takes their place. The cameras were ready to roll, and I was lucky enough to be standing right behind them as one of horror’s most popular shows went live.
How do you keep seven seasons of drive-in style commentary going? One of The Last Drive-In’s producers, Matt Manjourides of Not The Funeral Home production company, sat down with me to talk about the show’s legacy beginning with his own involvement.
Was he always a fan? He shares:
“I grew up on Joe Bob’s Drive-In Theater on The Movie Channel and then obviously went to MonsterVision. I ended up working for Troma Entertainment in early 2006 or so. He had been off the air about ten years or so at the time. I reached out to him through his website, and he emailed me back. We had lunch, and I brought the idea to Lloyd [Kaufman] of Troma, and for whatever reason, they didn’t want to do it, which is probably for the better.”
He added, “I kept that idea of bringing him back in my back pocket for a while, and then in 2018-ish, I got a project into Fantasia’s Frontières Festival in Montreal, and Shudder was like a year old at the time. I met Sam [Zimmerman] and some other executives there and basically pitched them the idea. They loved it. I think within like six months, we were shooting the marathon.”
“Joe Bob was very hesitant because when we took him out to lunch, we were talking about pitching the show in a more official way to Shudder, and he’s like, ‘Every year, there’s some guy that wants to bring the show back, and nothing ever happens. So you guys can do it and see what happens,’” Manjourides said. “Two months later, we’re shooting in two weeks. As soon as it aired, I think the next day, they were like, “We’re going to pick you up for a whole season and see where it goes.”
How does that turn into seven seasons and just as many specials in between? Manjourides elaborates on how the show remains a fan favorite, saying,
“Since we did the marathon six years ago and, as I [and Fangoria] say, broke the internet, crashed the AMC servers, we’ve been pretty much steadily growing strong. Our fan base is just as strong as when it started, and we keep getting new fans. We’ve been doing more linear shows with FearFest and AMC, which is bringing in a new audience and I think that’s helped grow the show.”
He continued, saying, “We try to keep things fresh. We try to put new gimmicks, have them do specials and marathons. Sometimes the fans guess what the movies are, but we try to keep them on their toes and have different guests. The basis of the show has to be the same, right? Joe Bob talks about movies to the audience. But with the things around it, without getting too Pee-wee’s Playhouse, we try to make it more fun.”
If the marquee letters didn’t scream out the evening’s slasher theme, Darcy’s incredible Ghostface bodysuit was the final stab. This episode would revolve around one of horror’s most famous (and infamous) subgenres that keeps coming back for more, as evident by the feature film, director Chris Nash and Shudder’s critically successful modern slasher, In a Violent Nature.
Manjourides comments on how the show mixes the old with the new:
“We want to be a little educational. [For example,] we’re going to show Dario Argento’s Opera, so let’s show the classic The Phantom of the Opera so we can walk through the progression of this type of movie like we did with Night of the Living Dead and Day of the Dead. We want to talk about the evolution of that particular genre. We want to show you, the fans, where these things originated and how they came to be and where we are now in the modern version of that which we’re doing with slasher films this season as well. So we want to make sure that there’s something to learn, something you may or may not know, and hopefully you have fun with it as well.”
Later when I sat down with Joe Bob Briggs and Darcy in the conference room, giant posters of The Last Drive-In lining the walls around us, we dove right into the slasher subgenre. Immediately beginning our interview with questions about myself and my own work as well as academic colleagues, Joe Bob Briggs was an impressive subject who enjoyed a good discussion (and a good debate) as he and Darcy turned an interview into conversation amongst friends.
So, why do these experts think the slasher keeps coming back? Briggs thoughtfully answered,
“You know, because it’s pure fear. It’s like, you know what you’re getting. It’s sort of like saying, ‘Why does comedy keep coming back?’ I mean, it’s because people need to laugh. When they go to a slasher, they know what they’re going to get. They don’t know exactly what they’re going to get. The key to making a successful slasher is to give people exactly what they want but not in the way that they’re expecting. I think it’s become one of those evergreen genres.”
Briggs then said, “It’s almost a genre of its own, separate from horror, because horror went in two directions: forward towards folklore and serious psychological horror, which would have been in the 60’s or 70’s called an ‘experimental’ film or an underground film. Well, those are mainstream now. You know, those are A24 films. But with a slasher… It’s sort of like watching football. It’s like, ‘I don’t want to do anything serious today, I just want to watch it.’ That’s why I think it’s good.”
Darcy adds, “I think the simple way to put it is that it’s just the most basic form of fear, you don’t need anything surrounding it…very simple. It’s an instant thrill. It’s hard to resist that.”
In addition to the thrill of it all, Briggs adds that any good slasher must be fresh to catch the attention of viewers, especially those seasoned in the subgenre.
He explains:
“I think all of the good ones since the 80s, if you make your mark with a slasher, you have to have done something a little different. All of these rediscovered slashers, movies that didn’t make it in the marketplace, they were movies that got put on a shelf. We like them now because there’s a nostalgia factor for the hairstyles and the clothing and the way people talked and everything. But in fact, they’re slashers that didn’t provide enough new technique to make a mark back in the 1980s. So we watch them now as a nostalgia thing. But, I think any slasher has to sort of make its way in the world. In a Violent Nature struck a chord with people because it was very successful. That’s very successful for a slasher, $4 million in ticket sales. You know, because most of them do go straight to streaming.”
We discuss modern horror, from what makes a film a slasher to remakes and production company dollars. Joe Bob and Darcy go back and forth on whether the original Texas Chain Saw Massacre is better than Marcus Nispel’s 2003 remake. Briggs even asks our thoughts on both the Black Christmas and The Hills Have Eyes remakes, sparking a friendly debate. In this episode, Joe Bob and Darcy delve into slasher factors that are necessary criteria to be met when formally added to consideration. Everything from having sex and doing drugs to psychological motivations are covered as the duo playfully rank Darcy’s favorite slasher icons and Joe Bob reveals signs of a slasher along the way.
As far as keeping The Last Drive-In alive and fresh, Manjourides and I discussed the future of the show beyond a successful seventh season. How does one keep a show going entering the latter part of a decade-long run?
“The AMC linear channel is great. The more specials we have, like FearFest or something that we can do outside of Shudder, is always good because every horror fan knows who Joe Bob is, basically. So those are the fans that we know are there that love Joe Bob and we want them to stay there,” he said.
But how does The Last Drive-In reach new audiences?
“Anything outside of the show itself, whether it’s a live event or something on linear that can be reached… is good because we reach more fans that way. We can bring in an audience that is new to Joe Bob, which any show wants, but we especially want people, the community, out there that love watching movies or reacting to movies or getting scared by movies, you know, now they can join the family…The biggest part of the show is the element of watching the show when it airs on Shudder Live and interacting online with all the rest of the fans. It’s a good, safe place to do that, and that’s what we want to encourage.”
When it comes to The Last Drive-In, a huge community comes into play in making the show a success, ranging from newcomers to the dedicated Mutant Fam fanbase, many of whom engage with Briggs and Darcy via social media outlets as the show airs.
I wondered if that was something new coming from Briggs’ days of Joe Bob’s Drive-In Theater and MonsterVision in the late 80s and 90s.
“He would legitimately get mail from fans. He’d read it on the air and there was a newsletter he’d send out. He would have write-ins, and he’d go to signing conventions and things. So he had a fan base, but it was an analog fan base. It was very old school,” Manjourides says. “This is much more direct and immediate for better or for worse, getting everybody’s opinion immediately on something. It’s been positive because it’s built this community. It’s what brought people to our live events, and it helps keep the show going. We have a really strong fanbase that’s active continuously. Even our [older] episodes on Shudder have a high rewatch rate. Fans will do an impromptu gathering and watch an old episode. That’s encouraged by us and we want to grow that.”
To wrap things up, I was interested to know more about Darcy and Joe Bob’s slashers of choice. What do they enjoy the most about them? “It’s like a constant adrenaline rush.” Darcy admires. “That’s my favorite form of horror. It’s just like a roller coaster of scariness.” Briggs, on the other hand, likes to know why the killer does what they do.
“I like to know why he’s doing it. Why does he kill this one? Why does he kill this one in that certain way? And if the filmmaker knows what he’s doing, he’s giving me the answers without telling me straight out, without having dialogue to tell me. He’s giving me the answers as to why he kills the way he does and why he kills those particular people. To me, it’s like psychological horror. It’s not just great kills,” Briggs explained. Darcy smiles and says, “But it can be…”
And so, the great slasher debate continues…
The seventh season of The Last Drive-In with Joe Bob Briggs will consist of monthly double features and holiday specials, covering over 30 titles throughout. The seventh season will premiere its episodes on the first Friday of each month this spring, live at 9:00 pm EST on Shudder and AMC+. The episodes will then stream on both platforms the following Sunday.
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