Sam Raimi's new Quibi series 50 States of Fright has a simple but compelling premise: to tell the urban legends and ghost stories that haunt each of the states that make up America. In addition to serving as executive producer, Raimi co-wrote and directed the first story in the series, "The Golden Arm." A tale from his home state of Michigan that's told over three episodes and stars The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel's Rachel Brosnahan and Vikings' Travis Fimmel.
Raimi spoke with CBR and other outlets about the genesis of 50 States of Fright, how it came to be on Quibi and why the streaming service's short format was perfect for the scary stories the series tells.
Raimi became involved in 50 States of Fright when producers from the production company Gunpowder & Sky came to him with the concept for the show. "They said, 'We think that this is a really good format for a TV show each week telling the horror story of a different state, all the lore that every state must have, there’d probably be one or two stories for every state of the union,'" Raimi explained. "And I recognized when the producers came to me, that even in the state of Michigan there’s even some books that I see at tourist spots... you'll see like 'Ghost Stories of Michigan,' a little pamphlet a local writer has published. And I've seen something similar in the state of Illinois. And I realized, when they presented the idea to me, there must be writers and stories for every state.... And I saw how instantly people would think, 'Oh, I want to see the story from my state,' 'I hope they use the story that I've heard as the lore in my state' or, 'That's a neighboring state’s story, I wonder what happened there.'"
Initially, Raimi and the other producers were planning on creating a typical television anthology series. At the time, they weren't even aware that Quibi was in the works. However, the stars aligned when they took the idea for the series to Quibi founder Jeffrey Katzenberg. "We pitched it to him, and he said, great," Raimi explained. "We hadn't thought of short-format Quibi at the time... but he said, 'Sounds perfect for what I'm doing.' And so we started to work with Quibi and that's really how the show came to be."
In many ways, Raimi's contribution to the show, "The Golden Arm," was a return to his low-budget roots in films like the beloved The Evil Dead 2. "The challenges of working in this format were limited time to shoot, like any television program would have. Even though this is a new format, that limitation was the same," Raimi noted. "And limited resources. These are not big-budget films. They're fairly precise with the budgeting."
The first season of 50 States of Fright involves nine separate stories (from the states of Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Oregon and Washington) that each required different actors, sets, costumes and locations, which strained the budget even more than a typical television show. But Raimi said that helped him and the other filmmakers who contributed to the series focus on making sure the stories they told were as strong as possible.
"It came down to not relying on visual effects or a budget spectacle but trying to get back to the basics of telling a simple story," Raimi shared. "So, that was both the challenge given by the format and the limitations of budget, but also the advantage is that we knew that audiences take good stories and so that’s where we put our focus, trying to entertain with simple characters and plot and simple story construction to try and please the audience.
"We just tried to focus on characters and twists," Raimi continued. "Making sure that the audience was left at a good cliffhanger at the end of every episode, that we had enough character development to hold the audience and we had, hopefully, some chilling and thrilling ideas in each story. Those are the things that the producers and I really focused on with the writers and the directors"
"The Golden Arm" is based on a story that scared Raimi when he was growing up in Michigan. Creating a version of the story for 50 States of Fright was a way to share a tale that had frightened him with the world. "I remember hearing it around a campfire in Michigan," Raimi said. "It was a little different, but basically the same thing. I know there's a lot of versions of 'The Golden Arm.' This terrifies me."
In fact, Raimi found that many of the writers and directors who became involved with the project were equally excited to create stories that they heard about their home states when they were children. "There's a real passion for these stories," Raimi observed, "and it seems like, I think maybe with a few exceptions, there are stories that terrified these writers and directors as kids and they were first told them and they experienced how frightening they were… So it's really an unusual project in the sense that they're really little independent mini-movies that tend to be filled with passion by the storytellers."
Given the nature of each of the stories told in 50 States of Fright, ultimately, Raimi found Quibi was the perfect vehicle to tell these short but terrifying tales. "I do love ghost stories, the kind you tell around the campfire," Raimi confessed. "And so... for me, I think it works beautifully to have a 15-minute type of story. I think it's kind of like a roller-coaster ride. You don’t really want to be on it for an hour and a half… a five minute, 10 minute thrill experience with its ups and downs [is enough]. So I think, for me, the [Quibi] format is perfect for conveying thrills and chills and little ghost stories."
Ultimately, Raimi acknowledged that despite time and budget constraints, 50 States of Fright's minimalist ghost stories demonstrate that "no amount of special effects can beat a simple, strong story."
The first season of 50 States of Fright stars Rachel Brosnahan, Travis Fimmel, Christina Ricci, Jacob Batalon, Ming-Na Wen, Taissa Farmiga, Asa Butterfield, John Marshall Jones, Ron Livingston, Victoria Justice, Karen Allen, James Ransone and William B. Davis. The first series' first three stories are currently available in their entirety on Quibi with new episodes released each day.