Matthew Lillard says he thought Scream was “lame” and that nobody would see it while he was filming it.
The actor, 56, made the admission at a New York Comic Con panel, as reported by Entertainment Weekly.
Lillard recalled riding home in the back of a car at around six in the morning, covered in blood, after a night shoot.
Read more: Can Melissa Barrera’s Scream 7 exit change the entire movie?
The other actors were talking about what they’d do next. He had just filmed a pilot and figured the horror film would sink without a trace while he became a television star.
The pilot, he said, never went to series.
“Here we are 30 years later,” he said, adding that nobody could have possibly imagined what the franchise would become.
He played Stu Macher in the 1996 original, a role that lifted him into the mainstream, and reprised it in Scream 7.
The film’s 30th anniversary arrives in December. He has been equally frank about other franchises.
In a Variety video series, he said he came to resent the Scooby-Doo films after the sequel disappointed at the box office, which meant downsizing his life.
Read more: Matthew Lillard reflects on ‘humbling’ fall from stardom after ‘Scooby-Doo’
