By Shannon McGrew
In the new series HYSTERIA!, when a beloved varsity quarterback disappears during the "Satanic Panic" of the late 1980s, a struggling high school heavy metal band of outcasts realize they can capitalize on the town's sudden interest in the occult by building a reputation as a Satanic metal band, until a bizarre series of murders, kidnappings, and reported "supernatural activity" triggers a leather-studded witch hunt that leads directly back to them.
For the release of HYSTERIA! Creepy Kingdom's Shannon McGrew spoke with Anna Camp and Nikki Hahn, who play mother-daughter duo Tracy and Faith, respectively. During their chat, they discussed the challenges of portraying a complex mother-daughter relationship and how HYSTERIA! mirrors societal pressures, both past and present.
Thank you both so much for taking the time to speak with me today. To start things off, your dynamic is rooted in religious trauma and societal pressures. How did you both work together to bring that tension to life on screen?
Anna Camp: Oh my gosh, I love Nikki. I love working with her so much. She's so present. She's so emotionally available, and we get along so well off-camera. Our relationship on-camera is the exact opposite, and that helps us reach these dark, intense places. I trust her as a fellow actor and as my friend. There's a real wonderful give and take between the two of us, and you don't always get that all the time, so it feels really special, and it feels like we can get to places that I didn't even know I was going to get to when I came to set that day. It's really exciting to get to work with her.
Nikki Hahn: Thank you! We don't usually rehearse beforehand, so when Anna is yelling at me and being scary, I'm experiencing that for the first time on camera. That really allows for some different reactions that you can't necessarily plan out in your head or rehearse. That really allows for some magical moments to come out on camera.
What was the most challenging or rewarding part of portraying such a complex mother/daughter relationship?
Anna Camp: Tracy Whitehead is so conflicted. She loves her daughter, and she's doing everything from the goodness of her heart. I have to go into this role with 100% commitment, and I'm not judging it. I'm not judging how she does it. As the actor, I fully commit to that. One of the most challenging things for me is that I am not aggressive. I'm not a controlling person. I'm, hopefully, not a mean person. To reach that level where I'm so fearful of [Faith] ruining her life, to scare her out of that was challenging for me emotionally because my body doesn't know the difference. My mind knows this is acting and that I'm in a scene, but my body gets worked up, and it takes me a second to calm my heart and nerves down. Then I think, oh my god, I just yelled at my friend Nikki! She's a wonderful actor and gets it, but it is a strange feeling to have that much emotion come out, especially in those very intense scenes.
Nikki Hahn: It's such a fine line that Faith walks between. She loves her mother, and she wants to do right by her mother, but she also wants to find her individuality and use her voice but not go so far in each direction. It's not complete rebellion, and it's not complete, total submission. Finding that fine line was really interesting to work out.
With so much going on in the world today that could mimic the hysteria seen during the Satanic Panic, how do you think audiences are going to react to HYSTERIA!?
Anna Camp: I hope that people can still relate because there are a lot of things that are going on now that happened during the Satanic Panic when it comes to censorship, when it comes to trying to silence people and saying that people are weird or wrong because they like certain things. That's happening to this day, so I'm hopeful that people will watch the show and go; my god, we haven't come that far; we still have to work hard at accepting. Every generation wants to challenge the previous generation, that's just a continuining thing that will happen. I want people to watch this and go: is that person over there really bothering me that much? Is it ruining my life if they want to listen to that music or wear those clothes? Is it really affecting me? Hopefully, people will watch this for the fun and the mystery of it, but also, there are some really incredible statements that we're making with the show, and I hope that they resonate.
You can now stream all eight episodes of HYSTERIA! on Peacock.
Halloween is a traditional festival typical in the West, Slice Master with the full name All Hallows' Evening or also known as "devil festival".