Portraying a character as diabolical as one of the most sinister clowns in cinema –Pennywise the Dancing Clown–in the It films is bound to leave a mark on any actor. For Bill Skarsgård, the experience seeped into his subconscious, manifesting in unsettling dreams that could rival any script for the best horror movies . Now, the Boy Kills World actor has revealed more about the strange, haunting dreams he experienced after stepping into the clown’s terrifying shoes.
Reflecting on his post- It experience with Vanity Fair , Skarsgård described how embodying the Stephen King creation left an unexpected mark on his psyche. As he explained: Those dreams were so strange. Either I was confronting Pennywise and I was upset with him, yelling at him—or I was Pennywise, but I was walking around in the streets that I grew up on, and I’m like, No, no.
I shouldn’t be out here in public walking around like this. This is not how it’s supposed to be done. It was this weird thing where I was trying to separate myself from this thing, literally back in the place that I grew up in, in the same apartment that I grew up in.
The idea of confronting Pennywise—or even becoming him—while roaming the familiar streets of his childhood adds a surreal, psychological twist to the Clark performer’s experience. It also shows that portraying one of the scariest modern horror villains isn’t something you just leave behind on set. This isn’t the first—or the last—time Bill Skarsga.