Get George Romero's unfiltered thoughts in a rare 1971 interview. The Night of the Living Dead director discusses the film's accidental allegory, his fight for creative control, and his true vision for horror. Go beyond the zombie with his candid views on censorship, studio pressure, and the film he really wanted to make.

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A 1971 Interview with George Romero

Published in Cinefantastique in 1971. Republished by HOUDINI Magazine.
Interview Conducted by Tony Scott

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Introduction

When Continental Films dumped Night of the Living Dead onto the summer/fall drive-in circuit in 1968 with a typically gross exploitation campaign, who could have expected that this cheap, black-and-white horror film was anything more than what it appeared to be? Indeed, Continental Films and the entire distribution system has since been subject to criticism—that a film of undeniable merit such as George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead was thrown away on the exploitation circuit like so many other trashy films.

But really, even if Continental had realized the merit of the film that had come into their hands, would anyone have believed them if they had tried to market it on that basis? Probably not. Because Night of the Living Dead is a cheap, black-and-white horror film, and it is beyond public acceptance that it can also be a brilliant work of cinematic art.

Director George Romero is one of the film’s makers chiefly responsible for its unexpected intelligence and sophistication. Night of the Living Dead was the collaborative effort of two Pittsburgh commercial film companies: The Latent Image, Inc. (George Romero's company) and Hardman Associates, Inc., the firm of Karl Hardman, who produced the film with Russell W. Streiner. Both firms are still active in the production of advertising and promotional films.

The filming was completed over months, during weekends, evenings, and between regular assignments. The company was short-handed and attracted actors and technicians on a deferred payment basis, with most participating for the fun or the experience. The producers doubled in acting roles: Karl Hardman appeared as the ruthless coward Harry, and Russell Streiner as Johnny, the first victim. George Romero worked as his own cinematographer and editor. Members of the Streiner family were pressed into service: Gary Streiner as sound engineer and Jacqueline Streiner handling script coordination and continuity.

Since then, Romero has produced three other films under The Latent Image, with distribution by Cambist Films:

• There’s Always Vanilla (retitled The Affair), a sentimental romantic drama.
• Jack’s Wife, a story of witchcraft and the supernatural in suburbia.
• The Crazies, dealing with the accidental contamination of a town with biological weapons.

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The Interviewer: Tony Scott

Tony Scott is a native of Pittsburgh and program director of WBVP Radio. He began his career as a radio announcer in Rockford, Illinois in 1964, later working in television at Channel 13 in Pittsburgh and WTAP in Parkersburg, West Virginia. He has participated in local theatre, and his first film role is Deputy Sheriff Shade in Romero's The Crazies.

Scott calls his role "the only light comic relief in the first thirty minutes of the film." This interview was conducted after viewing the first half-hour of The Crazies in rough form, an experience that left him "short of breath and frenetically anxious to view the finished product." Tony estimates that 60% of his thirty years has been spent in the darkness of movie theatres.

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The Interview

Tony Scott: Jack’s Wife is an occult film, which I think takes a bit of a different approach to the study—not so much of the occult, but how it works on somebody’s mind. Of course, that’s been done, but we combined it with contemporary life. We took a suburban housewife with all her frustrations, and all of the women's lib being pumped into her, and did it from the standpoint of this woman whose head gets all messed up without any real understanding. The film doesn't claim any efficacy in magic or witchcraft; it's purely in her head. It's not a metaphysical film. It's about what happens to this woman who doesn’t know what she’s fooling around with.

Cinefantastique: Do you have any special interest or fondness for making "horror films?"

George Romero: I didn’t in the beginning. When we made Night of the Living Dead, our friends in distribution told us to make something exploitive because it’s safer. So we decided to do a "horror film." We said we're not just going to do a horror film, we’re going to really "go out" with it and try to make it "gutsy." So then I got into a fascination with it from the standpoint that it hasn't really been done very often. I have a theory that there are so many films that haven’t been done, that have been done a hundred times, but haven't been done yet.

One of them, for example, is Tarzan of the Apes. I'd like to do it exactly the way Burroughs wrote it. There’s been 25 or 30 Tarzan films, and it's never been made that way. That's how I got into Night of the Living Dead, and since then I've had a fascination with the macabre. Coming off Living Dead I got into a study of the occult.

CFQ: To get it straight, you have four films to your credit?

GR: I’m cutting now the fourth film, which is The Crazies, the one you’re in.

CFQ: Do you feel The Crazies is your best?

GR: So far, technically, I think it's the best. This is the first time I’ve had enough of a budget, enough people, and enough sets. From that standpoint it's the most successful, although I think Jack’s Wife is probably a better film than The Crazies... but I don't think it will do as well at the box office.

CFQ: Are there any horror films that have influenced you?

GR: Influenced me? I don’t know.

CFQ: Your shadows. I see a lot of shadows in your work...

GR: That might be influenced more by my background as a painting and design student. I have a concentration on composition and lighting.

CFQ: Were you born in New York City?

GR: Yeah. I came out to Pittsburgh to go to Carnegie Tech to study painting and design. I guess maybe influenced a little by the Spanish painters. I think my approach to visualization comes out of that rather than any film director or cinematographer.

CFQ: I think that may be what gives a film that Romero touch.

GR: Anyone who has an eye for composition is influenced by two-dimensional things he’s seen, not so much by film. You can look at a painting endlessly. You may stare at it for hours.

CFQ: The theme of Night of the Living Dead—how did you develop it?

GR: I wrote a short story which was, in fact, an allegory, a statement about society, which dealt with a siege by the living dead. It was purely allegorical. A lot of people seeing the film are seeing the allegory anyway.

CFQ: I’ve heard it called a political film.

GR: That maybe was in my head when directing, when we were looking for an approach, but I don't think it is really reflected. I wasn’t consciously thinking of it, with the exception of a few scenes, like the posse and the final scene. It wasn’t a conscious effort, but I guess it was a strong enough influence that it came out.

CFQ: Did you have any trouble with the cast and crew, getting them to take it seriously because it was a horror film?

GR: Not really. We have a totally in-house unit. We work with each other well. We know our intentions and don’t have internal strife. You have fun no matter what you’re doing. You can be doing Hamlet and have fun.

CFQ: In horror cinema there are two techniques: the suggestive school and the graphic school. You seem to do both. Could you discuss your approach?

GR: I prefer the subtler approach, which wouldn’t be indicated by Night of the Living Dead, which is why I am happier with Jack's Wife. I’m into Don Siegel pretty hard. Invasion of the Body Snatchers was a tremendous film which had a little of both, but it was more suggestive, more moody.

CFQ: The actual production of Night of the Living Dead—did you have trouble getting backing?

GR: Yeah. Pittsburgh is a wealthy city, but it's nuts and bolts industrial money, not gambling money. We tried for about three years. People were interested in a script we had, but they wanted to buy it and take it away. We said no. We finally formed a corporation called Image Ten. Ten of us each put in seed money to buy film stock, and we talked to the cast on deferred payments. We shot over about nine months, with breaks to do a pickle commercial or something. After we got some footage, people started coming 'round saying, "Hey, that looks like a movie!" and they started to put up money.

CFQ: Who is John A. Russo?

GR: He wrote the script with me. We collaborated. It was based on my story. I had written about half, then turned it over to Jack and we worked on the rest.

CFQ: Did you work from a complete script?

GR: We had the structure, the scenario, but we did some scenes on the spot. I remember one morning sitting on the porch of that house and writing a scene we shot that afternoon.

CFQ: What particular scene?

GR: It's where Helen Cooper comes up from the cellar and says, "There's another broadcast at three a.m., maybe we should try to make it to the car." And Ben (Duane Jones) says, "You have a car?" Where Ben discovers they have a car.

CFQ: Was anything cut that you would have preferred left in?

GR: Yeah. The feast on the front lawn was inserted where I had another cut—expansive shots of the fields with ghouls dotting the countryside. The distributor insisted we cut back to the ghouls eating flesh. I didn't get my way. The film was about ten minutes longer, with more dialogue scenes that helped set up characterizations.

CFQ: Besides making money, Night of the Living Dead had good critical reviews. Did you expect that?

GR: No. I knew some people would like it. I knew it had guts and that certain things were cinematically successful. I really didn’t think people would see the allegory. I laugh about some of the interpretations. I didn't expect this much acclaim. There are so many things in the film I consider bad—terrible dialogue, poor performances. Technically, the film is not that bad, but our commercial work is better! We were working under adverse conditions.

CFQ: Do you think the Reader's Digest article helped or hindered?

GR: That kind of stuff never hurts. People writing biting things create curiosity. That was picked up from a newspaper article and then by Life magazine. The film had controversy from the jump. But it didn't have its big life in its first release. It went out as a showcase piece. It was on the drive-in circuit, and it was gutsy and unrelenting.

CFQ: Was it only financial considerations that forced black and white? Would you do it in color now?

GR: You have to be careful with color. Not as much now with new stocks. The decision was budgetary. I don't know if I would have gone with color. Right now, I feel it’s better in black and white.

CFQ: Do you feel that comedy is appropriate in horror films?

GR: Oh, sure. Hammer Films have excellent production values, a gothic aura, good actors... but every damn one is exactly the same. You never get off it. I think you can go one way or another. There's stuff in Living Dead that gets nervous laughter. In the 25 minutes of The Crazies, there are a few nervous laughs—a release. Hitchcock always follows a tense sequence with a little comedy. In Living Dead, in the middle of the posse scene, the sheriff's dialogue has some ad-libbed things left in purely for the chuckle. It's not counterproductive.

CFQ: Does it bother you when an audience reacts differently than expected?

GR: No, I always find it interesting. Anyone endeavoring to do anything creative is trying to communicate, and reaching people in any way is substantial. I've seen Night of the Living Dead with audiences three or four times. It has pretty much a uniform reaction.

CFQ: Sex and nudity have become increasingly evident in recent horror films. Do you regard this as an obstacle?

GR: It's a nuisance arguing with distributors over how much and how little. It gets ludicrous—36 frames of tit rather than 24. If it serves a purpose, you should use it.

CFQ: You’re almost a pioneer—Night of the Living Dead features one of the first bare asses in horror films!

GR: (laughter) I don’t think so. No. It was just on the cusp. The rating system was just coming in. That film wasn't rated.

CFQ: What do you think The Crazies should get? I don't think it should get an R.

GR: I don’t think so either, but I think it will. An independent has a harder time with the ratings board. I don't think the rating system makes sense. All the X rating did was license meaningless pornography. A sexual passage, if it means something, is fine. I had arguments on Jack's Wife. There are two sexual passages. The woman needs sexual release, and the first one is graphic because she finally gets it after 45 minutes. You need enough to show that release, the change in her. But you didn't have to go that graphic.

Living Dead got an X in Great Britain because they take violence into account. I don't think any of that stuff does damage to a developing mind unless they're disturbed to begin with. I don't think a kid will see A Clockwork Orange and go out and start beating somebody. Violence might affect people more than seeing sex. I don't think pornography is unhealthy in that sense. It might be healthy.

CFQ: Duane Jones is the only character given no background. As the central character, why?

GR: One of the scenes cut was a background scene that gave a bit of who he was.

CFQ: What has Duane Jones done since?

GR: He's in New York City. He's done off-Broadway. He has a background in education and teaches at an underprivileged school. He's more interested in that than acting, although he enjoys it.

CFQ: Ben convinces everyone to fight upstairs, then winds up surviving in the cellar he prevented them from using. Why?

GR: It was just another little irony. An intentional irony. There was an establishing sequence that keyed that up harder. There was realization on his part, but the distributor felt it wasn’t registering, so it was cut.

CFQ: The lighting in daylight scenes is natural, almost documentary, while night scenes are expressionistic. Intentional?

GR: We’ve talked about my artistic background.

CFQ: What lighting techniques were used?

GR: That was budgetary. In daylight scenes we just used ambient, natural light.

CFQ: How would the film have been different if made by AIP in Hollywood?

GR: There probably would have been a scientist explaining what was going on. The ending would have been different. American International turned it down for being too unmitigating. They told us if we reshoot the end, have Ben survive, they would distribute it.

CFQ: Can artistic horror films be made under the Hollywood system?

GR: Oh, sure. I’ve been trying to walk the line. We’re still independent. Our films have been commercial but have had some intelligence. Jack’s Wife is an intelligent commentary, yet commercial enough that it's going to be released.

CFQ: Your most recent is The Crazies. Are you sticking with that title?

GR: I hope to hell not! The original was The Mad People, and I liked that better. That film, as an original story, was a pure allegory. The basic premise: everyone operates at some level of insanity. The device was an accidental spill of a biological weapon, which enabled us to look at people operating at varying levels. It was purely an allegory. The distributors liked the premise, not the allegory, once again. In the rewrite, we went literal, plot line, although I think the allegory is still there.

CFQ: Is there a similarity between The Crazies and Night of the Living Dead? Intentional due to commercial success?

GR: No, it really wasn't. We had the basic story. I wasn't looking for intentional similarities. Some people will say it has similarities. One commanding officer is a black man; it's a band of people trying to survive an onslaught. In that sense, yes, but beyond that the similarity is gone. It’s a different commentary.

CFQ: Were you satisfied with Continental's distribution? Would you have done it differently?

GR: Yes, I would have promoted it subtler, understated. I was distressed. I felt it could have done better, even had some key run.

CFQ: Have you been approached by any Hollywood studio?

GR: A few offers, not directly from studios. Most production is independent now. I've been approached by independents and written into proposals. Some didn't come through. One I turned down to be able to do it here.

CFQ: Do you plan on making more horror films?

GR: I don't know.

CFQ: You’re gonna make films?

GR: Yeah. The content is not important. I have a script I want to do, and I would really like to do Tarzan like I mentioned.

CFQ: Which ape call did you prefer, the MGM or the other?

GR: (laughing) Neither. Didn't sound like an ape. That’s what I’d like to do. I’d like to get in touch with Kubrick and get those ape suits. Really do the number.

CFQ: It’s been so long since anybody has made a good Tarzan.

GR: It's never been made. The closest was Elmo Lincoln, closest to being the "ape man." But that wasn't it. Jane should be in it the way Burroughs wrote it. He should come up to the burning mansion in his limousine and rescue her. You'd think it would have pertinence today. It's a statement in itself—an original hippy. That’s what he is. He goes back to the jungle for a sabbatical. He’s intelligent, glib, a man about the world.

CFQ: Would you pick a known actor?

GR: Yeah. I don't know. When he was younger, Connery would have been good. I'm just thinking of physical dynamics.

CFQ: You were raised on Weissmuller?

GR: Yeah, Weissmuller and Lex Barker. But they were the Hollywood image, the romanticized ape man who beat up baddies after ivory.

CFQ: Do you think you’d have trouble making a Tarzan with the Black movement being what it is?

GR: I don’t think so. That doesn't happen often in Burroughs. He's in a predominantly black society. There are goodies and baddies. No sweat.

CFQ: Have you ever gotten into Burroughs' fantasy?

GR: The other stuff, yeah. I’d love to do some of that too.

CFQ: Would you like to do a western?

GR: Yeah, although I used to say they’ve never made a good western. Suddenly along came The Wild Bunch and others. I'd still like to do it, but my interest has been knocked out a little by seeing good stuff. I’ve lost interest in doing it just for the sake of doing it because it hasn't been done.

CFQ: It would be hard to do in Pittsburgh anyway?

GR: (laughing) Oh yeah... I’m a romantic. I’d really like to do just a straight romantic thing.

CFQ: Like your film The Affair?

GR: Well, no. That was a spinoff of the trend at the time—The Graduate, Goodbye, Columbus period. An attempt to walk the line, make something commercial trying to be intelligent.

CFQ: When can we see Jack’s Wife and The Crazies?

GR: The Affair should be starting in New York now. Jack’s Wife is coming out of the lab in a couple of weeks, but by the time it's sold and a campaign worked on, it’ll be some time. The Crazies will be out before Jack’s Wife even though we shot it after, for several reasons. It was presold; it's a co-production with the distributor, Cambist Films (Lee Hessel). Secondly, it was shot in 35mm and Jack’s Wife in 16mm. The Crazies will probably open around Thanksgiving. That might be optimistic, but definitely by year's end.

CFQ: Do you think The Crazies will be a "drive-in" movie or "indoor"? Does release date matter for a horror film?

GR: I don’t consider The Crazies a horror film. It's science fiction to the extent Fail Safe was. It isn't really fantasy. The Crazies could go first run. I think it will have success in showcases.

CFQ: I hope it's not going to get saddled to the bottom of a double-bill.

GR: He's planning on opening it in New York. Depending on what it looks like, he’ll either give it first run or open it showcase. In Pittsburgh it will play by itself in a first-run house. In New York it is difficult and expensive to open key run. He had a failure with The Affair (There’s Always Vanilla) in Pittsburgh. Our only bad review was here. Everywhere else, good reviews.

CFQ: After viewing the first 25 minutes of The Crazies—what a pace! Running time?

GR: I'm shooting for 90 to 100. There's a rule of thumb that a film has to be 90 minutes. I think if the film holds interest, it's not important. This 25 minutes rolls and seems like 10 or 15. It's brutally paced, unrelenting, dealing with a commentary on the military.

CFQ: Don't you think television would ruin this?

GR: Yeah, but I don't know if they could show it. One negotiation was with a TV outfit. They told us what would have to be done to put it on TV.

CFQ: Take out the military.

GR: Right. It would have been too tame. The language isn't heavy. They may be reluctant because of the subject matter.

CFQ: Should we discuss the ending?

GR: Well, let’s not.

CFQ: Could we discuss the ending you had in mind and say there's a different one?

GR: Originally, the town was gonna get wiped out.

CFQ: Describe that scene.

GR: The romantic leads get separated. The military moves in. You find out a plane carrying a deactivated bioweapon crashed; deactivation means 98-99%, so some active virus is in the water. A bomber is over the town in case the perimeter breaks. We were going to end with the two lovers, after being separated, running toward each other, and just before they reach, the screen was gonna go white—they destroy the town with a bomb. But we didn't do that.