Bruce Campbell wrote, directed and starred in "Ernie & Emma," a film set in Southern Oregon where Campbell has lived since the '90s. Campbell says the movie allowed him to break away from being typecast as just the "Evil Dead guy."
Courtesy of Bruce Campbell/Ernie & Emma
Bruce Campbell may best be known to cinephiles as Ash, the protagonist of the classic cult-horror franchise “Evil Dead” by director Sam Raimi. In the last 40 years since the first “Evil Dead” movie, Campbell has been prolific, acting and producing in television and film every single year since.
Now, the Oregon-based actor has written, directed and stars in a new movie called “Ernie & Emma.” It was filmed entirely in Southern Oregon, featuring iconic Pacific Northwest landmarks like Table Rock and the Rogue River.
“Southern Oregon just has not been overexposed. It’s a wonderfully diverse, beautiful area,” Campbell said.
”And if you catch it right, it’s magic.”
At its core, “Ernie & Emma” is a story about processing grief: A widower is sent on a road trip — a scavenger hunt via letters from his late wife, detailing where she wants her ashes spread.
Campbell said writing a movie that he was also going to star in gave him the flexibility to take risks.
The movie premiered on Valentine’s Day in Medford, and will screen in Portland on Saturday, April 4th at the Hollywood Theatre, before a nationwide release in the fall.
OPB “All Things Considered” host Crystal Ligori spoke with Campbell about his new film, and the joys and challenges of breaking away from traditional filmmaking.
This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Crystal Ligori: Your movie is definitely a departure from something like “Evil Dead,” but it still has a lot of humor and sass, which, as a fan, felt familiar. But I was not expecting to cry while watching it.
Bruce Campbell: I’m not a big crier. I’ve done a couple of Hallmark movies, so I get it. I get the procedure, but the emotional side of me is never something that as an actor I’ve really used a lot. But it’s not like I can’t do it. And if you pick a subject matter that’s close to you, you can see yourself going there.
And on top of it, it’s just, “How do I write myself a big fat part?” Because I’ve been pigeonholed for a long time. And if this kind of helps break it out of the box, I’m the first in line to say, “Yeah, baby!”
Ligori: Can you talk about how the idea for the script came about?
Campbell: The very nucleus of it was basically, “Could you actually do a movie with one person?” My wife, Ida Gearon, and I had been talking about if we could make a movie off the grid [since] I self publish now.
I did three books through a publisher in New York City, [a] New York Times bestseller. That was all very delightful, but the numbers were lousy. Meaning that they keep the bulk of the money and I’m doing all the work. I write the book, I travel, I tour. I’m like, “You guys, all you really did was distribute the book.”
So I took it upon myself [and] I just put stuff out when I want to and I get used to that freedom. So we realized the only way to ever have creative freedom is that you have to put up the money. So this was a chance to go, “Well, if we did do it off the grid, what would we do?”
Ligori: This movie has such a vivid sense of place. Not only being filmed entirely in Oregon, but it just feels like the Pacific Northwest. Not to spoil anything, but I’m thinking about the Bigfoot scene.
Campbell: Oh yeah. And here’s what’s fun about that — one of the places his wife sends him is to go back to return from when they were young. They got wasted and as a joke, [like] a lot of people do, “Let’s go find Bigfoot!” And in the ’70s, they actually built a Bigfoot trap that exists to this day. So, let’s shoot a whole scene at the Bigfoot trap.
It [has] scenes that people have just never seen in movies before. It’ll be landscapes that they’ve never seen before: Table Rock and the Rogue River, which happens to be an absolutely gorgeous river where they shot “The River Wild” and stuff like that. It just is so much beauty.
Bruce Campbell kayaks along the Rogue River in his new film, "Ernie & Emma." Campbell says that Southern Oregon is a beautiful, diverse place that hasn't been overexposed in movies yet — and that he wanted to showcase its magic.
Courtesy of Bruce Campbell/Ernie & Emma
We also experienced the joy of working with people that were not jaded. That was a much better atmosphere to play in where it really felt like we were just having fun, playing around, shooting a movie.
Ligori: The main character Ernie is a local celebrity of sorts, a spokesperson for a pear orchard. Throughout the film he is recognized as “The Pear Guy.” I’m curious if that character element is somehow related to your own experience being known as “Ash” from “Evil Dead”?
Campbell: Absolutely. People call me Ash. They holler “Ash! Hey, Ash!” Which is fine. It’s wonderfully familiar for them. It put my kids through college. They can call me whatever they want, really, but that represented X amount of my life professionally and the rest of it, overwhelming, was not the character Ash. So it amuses me more than anything. I could be doing Shakespeare in the Park and I’m the “Evil Dead” guy. So Ernie Tyler is “The Pear Guy.”
In a still from the film "Ernie & Emma", Bruce Campbell hikes along a scenic trail at Table Rock in Jackson County, Ore. Campbell says the movie gave him an opportunity to show more of his range as an actor, as his character grieves the loss of his wife.
Courtesy of Bruce Campbell/Ernie & Emma
Ligori: Bruce, what do you want an audience to take away from this movie?
Campbell: I want them to be happy. I want them to watch the movie and have a happy experience. I’ve seen too many movies that are just drudgery. God bless the new horror filmmaker. Their favorite thing is to add a slightly gray or green tint to the movie where everything looks kind of like you’re in an emergency room.
And I’m like, no, I would like to see color and faces! I want to see all of their faces, and I want to see their eyes so I can see their expression.
The “Evil Dead” movies have been very grim over the years. I swore up and down that I would never allow myself to start another shooting day facing a dirt floor covered in blood in some basement somewhere. And it’s happened so much now that I’ll do everything I can to avoid ever letting that happen again.
