Craven admits to being exhausted after the battle-ridden experience of taking Scream 4 to the big screen (read S.T. VanAirsdale’s review here) but is already talking about a Scream 5,albeit in wide brush strokes. Given the surprising-yet-fitting ways in which Scream 4 ups the ante — in typical murder-mystery fashion, with original final girl Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) returning home to battle Ghostface yet again, a gang of series veterans (David Arquette, Courteney Cox) and new teen meat (Emma Roberts, Hayden Panettiere, Nico Tortorella, Erik Knudsen, Rory Culkin) by her side — it’s hard to predict where the next film(s) can even go.

But after rest (“I’m going to go someplace and sleep for six weeks”) will come new ideas, whether for more Scream films or, perhaps, non-horror projects. There’s no use in making more sequels unless you find a way to top the last one, says Craven, “and if you can’t do that, then you should retire.”


Considering where you go in Scream 4, it seems exhaustive to even begin thinking of a way to top it in Scream 5. Doesn’t continuing this particular series mean the bar must be set higher and higher for any future sequels?
Yeah, it does! [Laughs] But in a way that’s the great thing about it. It keeps you from being lazy because you set the bar so high that the next time you have to jump the bar up a notch. And if you can’t do that, then you should retire. But now that we’ve finished this film — or virtually finished it, we’ve certainly delivered the print and all that — there is an exhaustion. I know I’m going to go someplace and sleep for six weeks. And I can’t imagine going out and doing it again now, when every muscle in my body is aching from the physical exertion and lack of sleep for a year and a half.


check out the rest of the interview here