'Hellraiser' Star Adam Faison Talks New Cenobites, Recalls First Time Seeing Jamie Clayton as Pinhead (Exclusive)
Hulu's new Hellraiser reboot film is out now, and the updated retelling of Clive Barker's The Hellbound Heart novella is a sprawling beautiful modern "pain letter" to the original story. Recently, PopCulture.com had a chance to speak with one of the film's stars, Adam Faison. During our chat, Faison — who plays Colin — detailed the new Cenobites in the movie, and also shared what it was like to see Pinhead actress Jamie Clayton in her costume for the first time.
"I guess my first time seeing the Hell Priest [the character's real name], probably... it was in this scene on a bridge and we're running down, then we see her there," he recalled. Faison went on to explain, "A lot of times David [Bruckner, director] would wait until the last minute to bring them onto set. I don't know if it was because of the atmosphere, if he wanted to create it, and also sometimes, they were just cold, because those suits were skin-tight. It was like a second skin, but they'd have to stay hidden in the back and constantly get reapplied, all the lube and all the different fake blood."
He continued, "We saw her, and the way the light was, they had the wavy lights coming in, the wavy blue lights, and Drew and I were like, 'Oh my gosh, dude.' Just the stillness of her, and just getting to see her up close was just so mind-blowing. I don't know. Just the way it glistened on her face and she was unrecognizable. I think we weren't expecting how cool it looked." Faison then added, "There's almost a baby like quality too, to her that's just so creepy. It's just, oh god, yeah. Soft angles, and just no pores and just seems freaky... It was very freaky, and delicate in a very haunting way."
The actor also shared a little about the other Cenobites in the movie, saying, "There's some new ones, and just the specificity, I mean, the ingenuity of just... There's one called The Mother that you'll see. I won't give too much away, but just the hand work that she has going on, I'm so excited to see what people think of her. I already see people doing drawings, especially of the Hell Priest, and I'm so excited to see them make these new renderings, especially of just these newer Cenobites. I'm just like, 'Ooh, y'all ain't ready. Y'all ain't ready.'"
One thing that really stands out about the new film, is that it essentially accomplishes in one film what the original franchise took three films to cover. "They say the basis for those three is The Hellbound Heart, the novella, right," Faison said, adding, "Bruckner was really trying to go with the original source material of The Hellbound Heart. I think that's so cool that relayed and that you felt that too, because he really took his time, and I mean just years, just basically developing this." The new Hellraiser film is now streaming on Hulu.