After Girl on the Third Floor, director Travis Stevens drops another horror film that is a bit more bloody. Jakob's Wife follows Anne (Barbara Crampton) on a journey of self-discovery. After being married to small-town minister Jakob (Larry Fessenden) for 30-years, she feels her life is shrinking. But an unexpected run-in with "The Master" brings her a novel sense of power and desire to make her own decisions. The only catch -- it involves a lot of blood.
Jakob's Wife is a feminist story that delivers dramatic performances combined with comedy and a healthy dose of gore. CBR had the opportunity to speak to Travis Stevens about the upcoming film, working with horror icon Barbara Crampton and the greater messages hidden within the vampire flick.
CBR: Do you want to talk a little bit about how the idea of Jakob's Wife came into existence?
Travis Stevens: The original screenplay was written by Mark Steensland, and it won a screenplay contest at Screech Fest several years ago. And the festival director and Mark had thought it might be perfect for Barbara Crampton. They got it to her, and Barbara fell in love with the character. Then she spent a few years developing it, nurturing it, working with different writers, and one of the writers, Kathy Charles, she had a good experience with.
I was out promoting Girl on the Third Floor -- my first film as a writer/director -- and Barbara said, "Hey, I have a passion project. Would you be interested in reading it?" And I said, "Of course." I read it and fell in love with it as well.
Barbara Crampton is a horror legend. What was it like working with her, especially given her producer status on the film?
Stevens: That was one of the fundamental reasons why I wanted to do the movie. Of course, the movie itself is a work of art. But as an artist, there's also value to the process of making it. I had known Barbara for years. We had done We Are Still Here together. And the fact that she was taking such a proactive step in making a movie and redefining her career and saying, "Hey, this is what I want to start doing, and here's the first step in that process," to be a part of that, for me, was so exciting. I wanted to support her. I wanted to do everything I possibly could to make this next phase of her career a big success.
So, to work with somebody who has such a known -- almost iconic -- status in horror is a fun challenge because you can start to play against what they are known for a little. I think with Barbara Crampton and her co-star Larry Fessenden, Barbara is known for these very, very glamorous horror looks, and Larry is known for sort of a wild man look. So, it was a lot of fun to play against that at first.
Then the movie transforms around Anne, the character. I also wanted it to be a transformative experience for both Barbara and Larry, where they get to show audiences some sides of their acting that maybe audiences haven't seen before.
One of my favorite parts of the film was The Master's reveal. Do you want to talk about your thought process behind making a female or maybe more androgynous Master than the male most audiences probably were expecting?
Yeah, I think the movie plays against our assumptions that the character is going to be male. It certainly was a look that I could understand how it's a bit ambiguous, but the intention is The Master is female.
The thinking with that is what Anne's trajectory in this movie is about her regaining the confidence to have more active ownership over the life she wants. And if that's the point of the movie, it seemed to make sense to remove an either/or aspect from the vampire that comes into their life, meaning I did not want Anne's choice to be about being with her husband or being with The Master. I wanted it to be entirely about Anne and what she wants for herself. Changing the gender of The Master removed that aspect from it and really opened it up.
I just like thinking of it as The Master was an old, rich divorcee who is like, "Come on, sweetheart. We can go have some drinks and have some fun, like what are you doing?" In this particular case, the allegory of the vampire is really about rediscovering your lust for life and all the things that can sort of get strangled over time unconsciously: your relationships, your jobs, your world. Your life can start getting more and more constricted feeling. I wanted this to be a movie about recognizing that and having a strong enough relationship that you can make the adjustments necessary for things to flourish again – for your own life to expand again.
This is very much Anne's story, but one thing I noticed was Jakob's "savior complex," which is a psychological construct often seen in men. Did you intentionally try to touch on some of Jakob's own identity issues as well?
Yeah, because in order for it to not feel binary -- good or bad -- [Jakob] needed his own sort of transformation as well. [Anne and Jakob] don't successfully resolve all of their issues by the end of this film. And Jakob's actions in the third act, he is still taking some wrong steps in what he thinks is right. "I'll save my wife, and then everything will be back to normal." It's like he's not quite hearing what she's saying yet. I think that often happens, especially -- well, I can only speak from the male perspective -- if your partner brings up an issue, you think you understand it. You think, "Oh, okay. I know what to do to fix this," but you might not actually be really hearing what the person is saying, and that is basically what Jakob is going through.
For so long, he has thought of himself as the shepherd that when this fantastic event happens and his wife goes through this transformation, that's still his reaction to take action and fix it. What he actually just needs to do is stop and listen more and not do anything. Let Anne do more [laughs].
Jakob's Wife focuses on women's issues by exploring themes ranging from victim-blaming to gender roles. What is the big message you hope audiences take with them after watching the film?
I'm thinking about how sincere I should be because it's, you know, a vulnerable question [laughs]. I mean, this is a movie about reclaiming your voice. Although it's a horror movie and it gets wild and crazy and over the top -- and I want people to enjoy that aspect of it -- I do hope that your life can be whatever you want it to be, plants a seed, and people can take that with them.
Both for the character of Anne and for Barbara Crampton, it is an empowering movie. We just spent a year carrying this anxiety, stress and weight of the pandemic, and it would be awesome, as we are sort of reaching the other side of that, to put that weight down, get loose and maybe dance a little like Anne does in the movie.
It's funny you say that. That scene has already become very iconic among early reviewers. People love it.
Amazing [laughs]. I mean, that's good. I think art; there's a value beyond it than just entertainment. And this idea of rediscovering our lust for life and reclaiming the confidence in the life you want and having fun and stretching and standing tall are beautiful things. That's where happiness comes from, and this is what Anne is looking for. She's trying to refind her happiness, and she's starting to identify some of the reasons why it went away. And maybe we can all use that in our lives.
Given that you could explore so many themes with this storyline, is it possible we'll ever see Jakob's Wife as a miniseries?
It is our hope to explore what happens next for these characters, and the series format would be amazing. So, yeah. We love these characters. We love this movie, and we are definitely doing everything we can to explore where they go next.
Directed by Travis Stevens and starring Barbara Crampton and Larry Fessenden, Jakob's Wife is available in select theaters, VOD and digital April 16, 2021.