Tim Robinson's Cameo, The Lost Props, And 22 More Behind-The-Scenes Facts About "Scream VI"

I'm gonna need to see all those Ghostface audition monologues.

🚨🚨🚨This post contains spoilers for the new Scream movie, as well as the previous films of the franchise🚨🚨🚨

If you're anything like me, you love some good movie trivia, and fortunately, there's already quite a bit of it for Scream VI.

Paramount Pictures / Via giphy.com

Here are 24 things you might not know about the making of the film:

1. Every actor who auditioned for Scream VI had to read a Ghostface monologue to make sure the killer's identity wasn't leaked.

Paramount Pictures / courtesy Everett Collection

"When we're casting those roles specifically, they read sides for their character and then everyone that we cast read a monologue, a Ghostface monologue," Radio Silence member and Scream VI director Tyler Gillett told Collider, adding that it's a tactic to "throw the cast off the scent."

2. The Ghostfaces didn't know they were going to be Ghostfaces right off the bat.

It was a surprise for Jack Champion and Liana Liberato, who play Ethan and Quinn respectively, according to Gillet's fellow Radio Silence member and Scream VI producer, Chad Villella.

"One of the best parts of all of that was they didn't get the third act of the script at all," he said in the same Collider interview, "so they’re in their costume fittings and they tried on their costumes, and then we came in and [were] like, 'There’s one more thing you have to try on,' and then we brought out the Ghostface robe and a mask so they could try it on for the first time. That's how they found out."

Meanwhile, Dermot Mulroney, who plays Detective Bailey, said in an interview with The Independent, "I was told by my agent, 'Good news, we have a call from Scream VI, they want you, they can't tell you anything else, but they need to let you know that you are the bad guy.' It wasn't called 'Ghostface' there; it was just 'the bad guy.'" 

He said he went on to receive the script piece-by-piece and didn't know for sure he was Ghostface until he got to the end.

3. Courteney Cox, who plays Gale Weathers, and Roger L. Jackson, who voices Ghostface, are now the only two actors to be involved in every film in the franchise.

Paramount Pictures / courtesy Everett Collection

Neve Campbell didn't reprise the role of Sidney Prescott for the first time due to salary negotiations breaking down, and David Arquette's character Dewey Riley was tragically killed in the fifth film.

4. Even years ago, Kevin Williamson's original plan for Scream 6 was going to focus more on Gale than Sidney.

Following the release of 2022's Scream, Williamson revealed that Scream 4 was supposed to be the start of a new trilogy. He told Bloody Disgusting that in his original vision for a fifth movie, Jill would have gone to college (where Sidney was a professor) and faced off with a killer who knew she'd been the killer in the previous film.

"Scream 6 was gonna answer whatever happened between Dewey and Gale," Williamson continued. "Sidney was in it, but it was more focused on Gale’s storyline."

Due to Scream 4's relatively poor box office performance — it was the first film in the series to bring in less than $100M globally, despite having one of the highest. budgets — Williamson's vision for a fifth film never came to fruition.

5. Cox did her own stunts during Gale's showdown with Ghostface.

"That was the bulk of my time filming," she told Entertainment Weekly. "It was very physical. It was my favorite scene that I've ever had in a Scream movie because I got to really fight with Ghostface."

6. The decision to have Quinn be the Ghostface to take down Gale's boyfriend Brooks was partly inspired by some of the criticism the filmmakers got for the previous movie.

Paramount Pictures / courtesy Everett Collection

"After the flack we got for Amber killing Dewey, we’re leaning into it!" they told Variety.

7. Kirby was supposed to return sooner, but no one could track down Hayden Panettiere in time for the fifth film.

Paramount Pictures / courtesy Everett Collection

Williamson told Variety, "We’re like, 'Where’s Kirby?' We couldn’t find her. She doesn’t have an agent. She had sort of disappeared." He eventually managed to catch up with her via a mutual connection in Nashville.

8. Radio Silence begged Paramount to leave out a certain moment from the trailers.

For the first time in the franchise, we see two Ghostfaces in costume onscreen together. Right after they attack Chad, they turn to face Sam and Tara and do the signature Ghostface move of wiping the blood from their knife blades — in sync.

Apparently Paramount wanted to include the moment in the trailer, which is understandable because it's cool as hell, but Radio Silence asked them not to. They told ReelBlend:

"That's one of my favorite parts of the movie too, you know? And we did ask them to take it out of the trailer, because we wanted to save it for the theater. Which was really nice. We knew that was going to be the first thing marketing would want to use. And then they did. And we were like, 'Can you please just take it out of the trailer? Let's save it, make it special.'"

9. Melissa Barrera advocated for certain changes to be made to her character, Sam, after reading the first draft of the script.

Paramount Pictures / courtesy Everett Collection

Barrera revealed that she sat down with the filmmakers to explain the changes she hoped to make. 

"I really, really wanted to make sure that we explored Sam's psyche more and we got to know her deeply because that was a reason that I wanted to play Sam in the first place," she told Collider. "The reason that I was attracted to her in Scream 5 was like, ‘Oh my god, there's so much potential here. Where is she going to go?’ And I wanted to make sure that in the sixth movie, we saw more layers to her. It wasn't just the tough girl, the protective older sister that has all these walls up. I was like, ‘What happens when those walls break down?’"

She added that because those dynamics weren't present in the fifth movie, she wanted Sam to be more "real" and "well-rounded" in the sixth.

10. Directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, dressed as Kurt Cobain, and Tyler Gillett, with a fake butcher knife through his head, appear in the subway scene.

"It’s maybe a matter of 12 frames, if not less. Just a quick little flash, but we appear very briefly," they told Variety. "The best 12 frames in the movie, certainly the scariest."

11. Blackmore University, the college Tara, Mindy, Chad, and their new friends attend, could be a substitute for New York University.

Paramount Pictures / courtesy Everett Collection

Both feature Greek life — the kids are first seen at a frat party, and there's mention of Omega Beta Zeta, the same sorority Cici Cooper was a member of in Scream 2 — and both have film programs. Blackmore's logo also features the Washington Square Park Arch, and while parts of NYU are scattered throughout the city, the bulk of the campus is clustered around that particular park.

It's also possible some inspiration was taken from another NYC college, as there's a stop off the 2/5 train for Blackmore, just as there is for Brooklyn College, located in the Flatbush neighborhood of Brooklyn.

12. Though it's set in one of America's most well-known cities, Scream VI is the first to be filmed outside the US.

Peterspiro / Getty Images

It was shot in Montreal, Canada, and the Blackmore University scenes were shot at the city's McGill University campus (pictured above).

13. One of the film's marketing stunts caused a slight panic.

In early March, people in Ghostface costumes were sent out to various cities as part of a viral marketing ploy. One of those cities was Sonoma, CA (where the original Scream was filmed), and police received several 911 calls from alarmed locals.

14. Jack Champion, who was just 17 at the time of filming, is the youngest actor to play Ghostface to date.

Paramount Pictures / courtesy Everett Collection

He's also one of only two teenagers to actually play a teenage Ghostface. Emma Roberts, who was 19 when Scream 4 was shot, is the other one. Skeet Ulrich and Matthew Lillard, who played killers Billy and Stu in the original movie; Rory Culkin, who played Charlie in Scream 4; and Mikey Madison, who played Amber in 2022's Scream, were all in their 20s.

15. Out of all the Scream movies, this one had the second-highest budget at $35M.

The third and fourth films both had budgets of $40M, the second and fifth both had budgets of $24M, and the original had a budget of $15M.

16. Adjusting for inflation, Scream VI had the third-biggest domestic opening weekend of the franchise.

It brought in about $44.5M, while the second and third films both brought in about $60M.

Not factoring in inflation, Scream VI had the biggest opening weekend.

17. As with the previous films, this one includes characters whose names are references to previous horror movies.

Paramount Pictures / courtesy Everett Collection

Samara Weaving's character Laura shares a last name with Marion Crane from Psycho, and given that Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan is playing on the TV in his apartment, it's fair to assume Tony Revolori's character is a nod to the machete-wielding killer. Josh Segarra also plays a character named Danny Brackett — as in Annie Brackett, Laurie Strode's best friend from Halloween — and it's possible that Henry Czerny's character, Dr. Stone, is a nod to Steven Stone, played by Patrick Warburton in Scream 3.

18. The inclusion of Jason Takes Manhattan couldn't have happened a few years ago.

The Friday the 13th movies have always been Paramount productions, but it wasn't until 2020 that Miramax — the company that owned the rights to the Scream franchise — was officially sold to Paramount.

"It was really serendipitous, actually," Bettinelli-Olpin told Bloody Disgusting. "We kept making jokes, obviously; from the first time we read the script, Jason Takes Manhattan was a part of the conversation. But we never had a place for it in the movie to actually call it out. Then...we had a list of movies from Paramount that they owned that we could use in the movie. The second we saw that one, we were like, 'Oh, there it is.' It all just fell into place."

19. Tim Robinson of I Think You Should Leave fame has a cameo.

Netflix / Via giphy.com

We don't actually see him, but when you hear Quinn's date shouting things like "Who the fuck is Paul?" and calling her "babe," that's Robinson.

20. The home videos featuring Richie at the end of Scream VI weren't created digitally — they're actual home videos of a young Jack Quaid.

He also "revoiced all of the lines in Stab that you hear in that sequence," according to producer James Vanderbilt.

21. In an original cut of Sam's scene with her therapist, who's clearly a horror fan, she comes across a Ghostface doll as she's leaving his office.

Paramount Pictures / courtesy Everett Collection

22. There were no props left over from the previous films — "Not even the graphics files from the posters and book covers," according to production designer Michèle Laliberté — so everything for the shrine had to be recreated from scratch.

Paramount Pictures / courtesy Everett Collection

Laliberté told IndieWire, "We went through the films and made a list of all the murders and all the victims," adding that everything had to be from the murders that occurred in the Scream movies, not the Stab movies, and that "the only Stab objects were related to Scream 3, which was about the making of a Stab movie."

23. Illustrated images of the previous victims were used instead of photographs for legal reasons.

"We didn’t have rights to photos of those actors," Laliberté explained, adding that while "it started as a problem or a challenge," she thinks "it’s more interesting than if we just had photos of the victims in the displays. In the end, it’s much more emotional."

24. 2022's Scream made it clear that the filmmakers pay attention to what fans say online, and Scream VI continues this trend.

Paramount Pictures / courtesy Everett Collection

Considering the killers in the fifth film were conspiratorial Reddit users, it makes sense that the filmmakers would have spent a lot of time online to see exactly how people like that might actually behave, and they likely learned a lot along the way — for instance, the debates over whether characters like Kirby and Stu were actually still alive. (Both were subtly addressed in the movie.)

In the sixth movie, during Gale's phone call with Ghostface, the latter says it would be a great twist for Gale to be revealed as the killer — a theory fans have had for years (and one that was hinted at in Scream 2). The theories about Stu Macher are mentioned again in Scream VI, when Kirby and Mindy are bonding at the Ghostface shrine.

If you've seen Scream VI, let us know what you think about it in the comments!