'Barbarian's Georgina Campbell Has Her Eye on This Iconic Horror Franchise

Publish date: 2024-04-28

The Big Picture

Georgina Campbell is a must-watch actor on the rise in general, but as someone who calls horror her favorite genre, I can’t help but be especially enthusiastic about the force she’s becoming in that space in particular. Barbarian wound up being one of the biggest horror hits of 2022, securing a 92% on Rotten Tomatoes, making $45 million worldwide on a reported $4 million production budget, and snagging spots on a slew of “best horror of the year” lists. Now Campbell’s got a role in a highly anticipated horror film of 2024, because it comes from the daughter of a genre legend, M. Night Shyamalan.

The feature film adaptation of the A.M. Shine novel, The Watchers, is directed by Ishana Shyamalan, yet another especially promising creator on the rise in horror. Campbell plays one of four strangers who get lost in the forest in western Ireland and must take refuge in The Coop. If they’re not locked in by nightfall, they’re at risk of being attacked and killed by “watchers,” creatures that observe the people living in The Coop at night.

With The Watchers now playing in theaters nationwide, I got the chance to have a brief chat with Campbell to discuss her journey in the genre thus far. She explained what made The Watchers a standout horror script, the backstory work she did for her character that went beyond the script and the book, the iconic horror film franchise she dreams of joining one day, and more. You can hear it all straight from Campbell in the video at the top of this article, or you can read the conversation in transcript form below.

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PERRI NEMIROFF: I often get a little obsessed with backstory. Did you come up with any backstory for Ciara that we don't necessarily see or hear in the film but we can feel informing your performance and the choices she makes?

GEORGINA CAMPBELL: Well, luckily, there was a book. A.M. Shine had written the book, so you get a lot of backstory through that, and then there were little things that me and Alistair Brammer, who plays my husband in it -- ideas of, how we met, we were at university, what did we study, what were our parents like, and where did they come from? So we had little things like that. I guess one of my main ideas was that she probably didn't come from a great family and maybe didn't have a great father or a role model, which is why she's really caught on her husband and her husband means everything to her.

Obviously, everyone knows you from crushing it in the horror genre, so I’m curious, when The Watchers comes your way, what is it about that script that makes you think, “This is a fresh take on horror storytelling that could also push me in a new way as an actor?”

CAMPBELL: I just really enjoyed reading the script. The script is really well-written, and then I just love horror, so it's not that I would be like, “I'm not gonna do horror anymore.” It's just kind of waiting for the right script, for the right character, and then knowing Dakota Fanning's involved. She's such an amazing actress. And on top of it, it kind of feels like it's a blend. It's thriller, horror, fantasy. It felt like it was coming from a different angle, and Ciara feels like a character I haven't really played before.

I know you have great range, but I love horror, so if you want to stay here for a good while, I’d be quite happy about that!

CAMPBELL: I’m happy to!

Just to have a little more fun with that idea, if you got to join the long-running horror film franchise of your choice, what franchise would you pick and why?

CAMPBELL: Oh my god, maybe The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. I love the original movie of that, so I wouldn't mind doing one of those.

I like it. Those are intense!

This is one of my favorite qualities of any horror movie, or any movie in general, for that matter, it's when I see a scenario and it challenges me to wonder, “How might I fare in that particular situation?” So if you, as in real you, ventured out into the woods, found The Coop and got stuck there, what would your greatest strength be, but then I also want to know, what would your greatest weakness be in that scenario?

CAMPBELL: I think my greatest strength would be maybe adapting to it. [Laughs] Probably I would be a bit like Ciara and be like, “Okay, this is how I live now. This is where I am.” My weakness would be that I just have no skills outside in the wild. I can't make fire. I don't think I could forage. I don't know what anything is. I couldn't hunt. [Laughs] There are a lot of weaknesses there.

I can't do any of that so I'm not judging! My weakness is that I would wither away and die when I didn't have any toothpaste.

CAMPBELL: Yeah, that’s fair.

I couldn't handle that. It’d send my brain that's fearful of the dentist spinning.

Related
'The Watchers' Ending Explained: Ishana Night Shyamalan Drops a Horrifying Twist

Who watches The Watchers? Hopefully people who have already read the superior book where the twist was done infinitely better.

I love asking about the value of a good scene partner, but it feels especially important here when it's pretty much the four of you together, always. Can you recall a time on set when a scene partner gave you just what you needed, and it helped you crush a scene that you might not have been able to without them?

CAMPBELL: I think Oliver Finnegan. We have such a lovely little relationship, Ciara and Danny, and whenever I was in scenes with him, he was just so wonderful and felt very real. So yeah, he's the best.

Looking for even more The Watchers talk? You can catch my interview with Dakota Fanning below:

The Watchers is now playing in theaters nationwide. Click below for showtimes.

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