Doug Bradley has been Pinhead since the beginning. The very first Hellraiser film starred Bradley in the role. His direct command of the dialogue lead to the character going down into horror history. Bradley has long been against the idea of someone else taking over as Pinhead. He has always been very outspoken about it at horror conventions. However, at Silver Scream Con in Massachusettes, he spoke about Jamie Clayton taking over in the upcoming Hellraiser film. And surprisingly, the actor was a little bit more reformed and kind with his words than he has been in the past.
Bloody Disgusting managed to get their ears on Bradley’s words at the con and we were shocked and pleasantly surprised with how open-minded Bradley was with Clayton specifically.
“It seemed like it was coming. It’s an interesting piece of casting,” Bradley told the con. “I don’t know Jamie. Of course, they have taken even a little bit of a wrinkle in that, because Jamie is transgender. I’m not familiar with her recent work but there was a science fiction series on Netflix several years ago called Sense8 which I was quite a fan of. Jamie was in that, and I really, really liked her performance in that.”
“I really can’t say more than that. I do like to point out that I did wear a skirt as Pinhead, it’s an interesting casting decision. Well, that only goes so far. We say ‘female Pinhead’ like we know what that means, but there are a million shades of femininity. Where exactly are they going to go with that?”
Doug Bradley is right though. Hellraiser has always been transgressive from the word go. Clive Barker wrote it and directed it that way. Everything was very sexual too and nothing was made shame of. Everything was open and out there of course the box was only brought about to take that to another level.
Sure, it is sad to not have Doug Bradley as Pinhead. It will be sad when we eventually don’t have Robert Englund as Freddy. It is just sad. But in the world of everlasting and repeating franchises, this is just how it is. We want more of our favorite franchises and sometimes the price of admission is a shard of your memories.
We are looking forward to Jamie Clayton as Pinhead. We are looking forward to what she brings to the role and to what David Bruckner brings to the story as a whole.
Hellraiser arrives on Hulu beginning October 7.
Source: (Bloody Disgusting)
