Lew Temple – King of the Devil’s Rejects
If you know us, even just a little bit, you know that we love all things horror. So, it won’t come as a surprise that most of the Pensacon panels that grabbed our attention had some relation to the horror genre.
We kicked off Pensacon attending a panel by Lew Temple, focused on The Devil’s Rejects. And we couldn’t have picked a better place to dive in.
Temple was supposed to co-host the panel with former cast-mate Priscilla Barnes – but a winter storm affected her flight itinerary. She did make it to the convention safely, a little later.
So Temple took center stage. He never sat during his panel, even taking to physically re-enacting sections of the movie as he talked about the behind the scenes elements. He also decided against using a microphone, which created a very intimate feel to the panel. It felt like this cool guy was just in a room talking with us – and we hung onto his every word.
What did he talk about? Being a scheduled panel on The Devil’s Rejects the conversations veered to all things Rob Zombie.
Temple started the panel saying, “One of my favorite subjects is Rob Zombie. I’m a big fan of Rob.”
“If you get lucky enough that Rob wants you – go ahead and take that job. You’ll get friends for life.”
He praised all his Rejects co-stars and their physicality in becoming the characters. “They would be leaning into my space a little bit – but they were effecting a tone.”
Temple also credits Kane Hodder (who was the stunt coordinator of the shoot) for saving his life: “We had a knife that Bill was to pull out of his sheath on his leg and then one with a retractable blade. We shot that scene for three days. In this shot – it was just an insert of a real blade. The scene was going really good and no-one called cut. All of a sudden Mosley, here it comes. I was playing through and we had all lost our minds – our sensibility. Kane came running in and grabbed Bill. I’m here today, thankfully, because of Kane Hodder.”
An unexpected talent was Temple’s ability as a impersonator, specifically for his uncanny take on Bill Mosley’s distinctive speaking pattern.
He called Sheri Moon Zombie, Rob’s muse; remarked on Sid Haig’s musical talent as a drummer; and compared being in The Devil’s Rejects to being in the Super Bowl for a horror fan.
Lew Temple was every bit as warm, funny, and enlightening as one could ever hope.
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