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Meet the Real Sisters that Inspired American Horror Story’s Tattler Twins

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As you’re probably aware, many characters from each season of American Horror Story are based on actual people, including this season’s Edward Mordrake. And he’s not the only member of the Freak Show with real-life inspirations, as most of the so-called freaks are at least partially grounded in reality.

Now available for instant streaming on Netflix is a 2012 documentary called Bound by Flesh, which tells the tragic tale of siamese twins Daisy and Violet Hilton. Joined at the side, the sisters are the real-life inspiration for Freak Show‘s Bette and Dot Tattler, and their true story is surprisingly quite similar to the fictionalized characters on the show.

Though their affliction wasn’t quite as visually peculiar as the Tattler twins, Daisy and Violet Hilton were nevertheless ostracized by society and even their own mother, adopted at a young age by a woman who wasn’t all that different than American Horror Story‘s Elsa Mars.

Daisy and Violet Hilton

Born in 1908, it wasn’t long before the Hilton sisters were exploited for monetary gain, as their handler Mary Hilton was more interested in profiting off of their deformity than caring for them. They became big time stars on the sideshow circuit, since at the time nobody had ever seen anything quite like them, and it’s said that Hilton pocketed all of the money they pulled in.

Much like Bette and Dot, Daisy and Violet had their own personalities and even their own relationships, and later in their career Daisy dyed her hair blonde, to differentiate herself and spice up their act. Their act included singing and tap dancing, and they were needless to say the headliners everywhere they went.

American Horror Story Hilton

After emancipating themselves from the ownership of Hilton, the siamese sisters landed a role in Tod Browning’s Freaks, which was a huge inspiration on Freak Show. In fact, the characters they played in the movie were much the same as the Tattler sisters, right down to conflicting personality traits.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t long after Freaks that the Hilton sisters fell off the radar, their act worn thin and the sideshow scene all but replaced by movies and television. Towards the end of their lives they worked in a supermarket to make ends meet, and their story came to a tragic end in 1969.

It was the Hong Kong Flu that spelled the end of the sisters, contracted by Daisy. According to forensic reports, Daisy died a few days prior to Violet, leaving Violet to sit around and wait for the disease to claim her life. Right up until the end, the sisters stayed by each other’s side, never giving much thought to the idea of being separated.

American Horror Story siamese

If you’re interested in learning more about the real-life Tattler twins, I highly recommend you check out Bound By Flesh, which is again on Netflix. Theirs is a fascinating story, and it’s a film that’s a must for all fans of American Horror Story.

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‘Evil Dead’ Film Franchise Getting TWO New Installments

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It was a risk for Fede Alvarez to reboot Sam Raimi’s horror classic The Evil Dead in 2013, but that risk paid off and so did its spiritual sequel Evil Dead Rise in 2023. Now Deadline is reporting that the series is getting, not one, but two fresh entries.

We already knew about the Sébastien Vaniček upcoming film that delves into the Deadite universe and should be a proper sequel to the latest film, but we are broadsided that Francis Galluppi and Ghost House Pictures are doing a one-off project set in Raimi’s universe based off of an idea that Galluppi pitched to Raimi himself. That concept is being kept under wraps.

Evil Dead Rise

“Francis Galluppi is a storyteller who knows when to keep us waiting in simmering tension and when to hit us with explosive violence,” Raimi told Deadline. “He is a director that shows uncommon control in his feature debut.”

That feature is titled The Last Stop In Yuma County which will release theatrically in the United States on May 4. It follows a traveling salesman, “stranded at a rural Arizona rest stop,” and “is thrust into a dire hostage situation by the arrival of two bank robbers with no qualms about using cruelty-or cold, hard steel-to protect their bloodstained fortune.”

Galluppi is an award-winning sci-fi/horror shorts director whose acclaimed works include High Desert Hell and The Gemini Project. You can view the full edit of High Desert Hell and the teaser for Gemini below:

High Desert Hell
The Gemini Project

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‘Invisible Man 2’ Is “Closer Than Its Ever Been” to Happening

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Elisabeth Moss in a very well-thought-out statement said in an interview for Happy Sad Confused that even though there have been some logistical issues for doing Invisible Man 2 there is hope on the horizon.

Podcast host Josh Horowitz asked about the follow-up and if Moss and director Leigh Whannell were any closer to cracking a solution to getting it made. “We are closer than we have ever been to cracking it,” said Moss with a huge grin. You can see her reaction at the 35:52 mark in the below video.

Happy Sad Confused

Whannell is currently in New Zealand filming another monster movie for Universal, Wolf Man, which might be the spark that ignites Universal’s troubled Dark Universe concept which hasn’t gained any momentum since Tom Cruise’s failed attempt at resurrecting The Mummy.

Also, in the podcast video, Moss says she is not in the Wolf Man film so any speculation that it’s a crossover project is left in the air.

Meanwhile, Universal Studios is in the middle of constructing a year-round haunt house in Las Vegas which will showcase some of their classic cinematic monsters. Depending on attendance, this could be the boost the studio needs to get audiences interested in their creature IPs once more and to get more films made based on them.

The Las Vegas project is set to open in 2025, coinciding with their new proper theme park in Orlando called Epic Universe.

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Jake Gyllenhaal’s Thriller ‘Presumed Innocent’ Series Gets Early Release Date

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Jake gyllenhaal presumed innocent

Jake Gyllenhaal’s limited series Presumed Innocent is dropping on AppleTV+ on June 12 instead of June 14 as originally planned. The star, whose Road House reboot has brought mixed reviews on Amazon Prime, is embracing the small screen for the first time since his appearance on Homicide: Life on the Street in 1994.

Jake Gyllenhaal’s in ‘Presumed Innocent’

Presumed Innocent is being produced by David E. Kelley, J.J. Abrams’ Bad Robot, and Warner Bros. It is an adaptation of Scott Turow’s 1990 film in which Harrison Ford plays a lawyer doing double duty as an investigator looking for the murderer of his colleague.

These types of sexy thrillers were popular in the ’90s and usually contained twist endings. Here’s the trailer for the original:

According to Deadline, Presumed Innocent doesn’t stray far from the source material: “…the Presumed Innocent series will explore obsession, sex, politics and the power and limits of love as the accused fights to hold his family and marriage together.”

Up next for Gyllenhaal is the Guy Ritchie action movie titled In the Grey scheduled for release in January 2025.

Presumed Innocent is an eight-episode limited series set to stream on AppleTV+ starting June 12.

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