{"id":51839,"date":"2025-10-02T19:00:07","date_gmt":"2025-10-02T19:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/51839\/"},"modified":"2025-10-02T19:00:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-02T19:00:07","slug":"heres-where-zach-cregger-got-aunt-gladys-magic-from","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/51839\/","title":{"rendered":"Here’s Where Zach Cregger Got Aunt Gladys’ Magic From"},"content":{"rendered":"

Weapons is one of those horror movies that lingers after you watch it, finding new ways to freak you out even after the lights come up. But the most indelible part of Zach Cregger\u2019s haunting tale is its villain, Aunt Gladys<\/a>, played by Amy Madigan. We\u2019ve learned about the origins of the character, her style inspirations<\/a>, and how Cregger calibrated the reveal<\/a> of her sinister powers<\/a>. But now Cregger is lifting the lid on how he came up with Gladys\u2019 particular style of magic.<\/p>\n

Speaking to Entertainment Weekly<\/a>, Cregger described his unexpected source material. One was Wade Davis\u2019 The Serpent and the Rainbow book (not the Wes Craven movie adaptation<\/a>, he specified); the other was the Mekons song \u201cDancing in the Head<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat song is just an instruction manual on how to create a zombie,\u201d he explained. \u201cIt\u2019s no singing, it\u2019s just someone explaining to you this ritual. I love it \u2019cause it\u2019s a weird ritual where you soak a dollar bill in rum and set it on fire and arrange four mirrors for the four corners of the earth and get a shard of a human skull and all these things. I was like, \u2018One day, I wanna make up my own crazy, evil recipe.\u2019 This movie was my chance to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Weapons production designer helped Cregger fine-tune Gladys\u2019 signature \u201cbowl of water\u201d ritual. \u201cIt needed to be simple and very digestible,\u201d Cregger recalled. \u201cI needed people to get it the first or second time they saw it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Head to EW<\/a> for more from Cregger, including his detailed explanation of how he and Madigan collaborated on Gladys\u2019 memorable final scene\u2014a frantic foot chase with its own equally unexpected source material, including Raising Arizona and Point Break.<\/p>\n

Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel<\/a>, Star Wars<\/a>, and Star Trek<\/a> releases, what\u2019s next for the DC Universe on film and TV<\/a>, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Weapons is one of those horror movies that lingers after you watch it, finding new ways to freak…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":51840,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[146,85,46,397,3803,20996],"class_list":{"0":"post-51839","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-il","10":"tag-israel","11":"tag-movies","12":"tag-weapons","13":"tag-zach-cregger"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51839\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/51840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}