For the children of the 90s, there were few days better than when your grade school teacher would pass out the new Scholastic Books order forms. Or even better, remember when the Book Fair would visit the school and you wouldn’t even have to wait to get your new books? You could go home that night and devour a brand new Goosebumps book.
While it’s nearly impossible to capture that feeling again, due to the instant gratification provided by services like Amazon Prime or the availability of e-books, as the pizza-driven Book It generation grew, so did the Goosebumps franchise. R.L. Stine’s horror empire expanded to include a multitude of books, a beloved TV show, and a pair of feature films featuring Jack Black. But now, the memorable tales that acted as a gateway into the horror genre for several kids from 1992 until the present day have taken a new life in the form of a brand new adaptation from Disney and Sony Pictures. Made for the current crop of young adult viewers, this isn’t their parents’ Goosebumps. But that doesn’t mean that there isn’t a little something for everyone to enjoy in the streaming series.
In honor of the inaugural season’s finale, we spoke to stars Isa Briones and Ana Yi Puig about the show. During our conversation, they discussed their relationship with the books before joining the cast, the rigorous process of special effects makeup, and various changes made from the source material that still manages to capture the same feel of the classic stories. Plus, the actors share their joy in being a part of the winds of change blowing through Hollywood when it comes to improved representation in films and television.
For the past three decades, many people have used the books, shows, and movies of the Goosebumps franchise as a gateway into horror. Whether you stayed with the genre or not as a fan, was that also your experience?
Isa Briones: Oh, absolutely! We’ve talked about this so much. When you’re a kid and you find Goosebumps, that is the time where you’re in that sweet spot where your parents aren’t necessarily reading to you anymore [and] you can pick up a book yourself. It feels like this little secret. You’re like, “Oh, I’m a big kid now. I read horror stuff. I can handle the scary things.” It’s you on your own journey, and they’re very relatable storylines as a kid. It’s like, “Oh my God, I can transport myself into this world where I’d have this exciting adventure and all these spooky, scary things.” But the fact that that’s kind of what starts you, it makes you feel like you’re growing up when you’re reading the book.
Ana Yi Puig: And I think with the nostalgia of it all, it feels so coming of age and so special because it really is your gateway into horror. When it’s sitting on a shelf, as much as it feels like it looks like it should be just for children, the stories are disturbing. They’re quite disturbing. And they all have an overlying message of temptation, of human curiosity, of greed, and of all of these different human experiences, which I think the show kind of brilliantly captures as well.
What were some of your favorite Goosebumps stories? And which ones were you most afraid of? Both answers for me were the ones with Slappy the Dummy.
Isa Briones: “The Haunted Mask” really freaks me out. As you see in this series, Ana does such an amazing job. She’s in that troll makeup and that is so disturbing. Even without seeing the show, just imagining losing control like that. For me, I love my control and the fact that you can be taken over like that is just so disturbing. And from a young age to first think about that, of things being out of your control like that, I think it is such a scary concept as a kid. And even now! It’s more terrifying now because you’re an adult and you’re like, “I need my control.”
Ana Yi Puig: Dolls don’t freak me out. Chucky doesn’t freak me out. What freaks me out is exactly what Isa just said. It is being in a hopeless or uncontrollable circumstance. So “The Haunted Mask” really freaked me out. “Welcome to Horrorland” really freaked me out. Another personal favorite is “The Werewolf of Fever Swamp.”
But “Say Cheese And Die.” When I read that book, I remember where I was sitting in the library when I pictured the idea of taking a picture of my sister, it printing out, and telling me how she would die. That is literally so disturbing for an elementary schooler to read. And brilliant. I’m like, “R.L. [Stine], Where in your brain is this coming [from]?” Those are definitely my personal favorites. But “The Haunted Mask” takes the cake for me, which is why I literally could not process that I got to do that specific story [in the show].
Since Isa brought it up, what was the experience with the makeup and the process of doing that episode like for you?
Ana Yi Puig: I have such a reverence for makeup in general. FX, stage makeup, prosthetics. It is such a thankless job and they work so hard. They built that prosthetic for me. I did a head casting in New York over a month before filming episode two. They measured my ears, my teeth, and everything to come up with hands, to come up with ears, individually placed human hair. It was the most incredible experience. And with Disney and Sony’s budget, they did it well. They did it with respect and integrity. The first makeup test was about seven hours. It took so long, but we really wanted to come up with a less traditional version of the mask, which I know some people are sad about. But I think we really wanted to push the envelope with what it looks like now for an online troll. A girl who can’t connect who is bullying people online [who] turns into a real troll and to make it look like the most disturbing, human-like transformation and less of a traditional monster mask. I think just the bulging head, the losing hair, the eyes coming out, the teeth, the black soot for the spit, it was all incredible. I would do it again and again. It was the most fun thing to film, but the head did weigh like 12 pounds. My neck! [I had to go to] Smile Thai Massage every week. Every week!
As Ana mentioned, so many people know these stories so well. They were probably expecting something different from “The Haunted Mask.” But, you know, as the story unfolded in Port Lawrence as almost like an original Goosebumps tale, which episode was most surprising to you based on what you knew previously about the stories?
Isa Briones: That’s a good question. I just think it’s so brilliant how the show focuses so specifically on the books in the first five episodes. That really sets the scene and brings the fans of the books in, but it also sets up each character so well for it to then take on its own life and then be [more] loosely based on the books. But really at that point, the characters have taken on their own life and dictated the story.
I love when a show starts one way and then you get to the end and you’re like, “How did we get here? These are two different shows. How?” But somehow it works. And that is the journey that this show does. “Welcome to Horrorland” is the last episode and it’s completely different and takes something that is a classic book and concept and ties it in with all the lives that have been created from the books [that the first episodes are based on].
Throughout the season, Isabella, Margot, and the whole gang experience a bunch of weird stuff. But on top of visiting other dimensions, dealing with ancient magic, and goop dupes, they all have to deal with the same stuff that regular teenagers go through like dating, parental pressure, and deciding what to do with their futures. First, do you think that you would have made the same decisions that your characters made in their situations? And what advice would you give to your characters when it comes to surviving the horrors of adolescence?
Ana Yi Puig: It’s a great question. In playing a character that you aren’t similar to, I personally believe that you have to find a way to justify their choice. You have to find a way to support them in their decision. So I had to kind of explore my own empathy and figure out how could someone who is kind and misunderstood like Isabella also bully people online and fall for this temptation of using this mask for evil essentially after she knows that it is not good for her, but it feels good?
But first of all, if I was at a Halloween party and I heard [my name faintly], why am I walking through that door? Why are you walking down to the basement with the lights off? That’s your first mistake, Isabella. I would say, “Girl, turn right around. Call your mom. Call Alan. This is not the place to be. I know you’re lonely, but literally watch Friends and get a milkshake. Because this is not the answer.” [But] if I did get past that point and I realized all the dupes weren’t real, I would take a bat and I would go find all the dupes and kill them myself. That we are aligned with.
But if I were to tell her anything about the adolescent experience in high school, I would tell her to be herself and to stop listening to her mother in terms of forcing her what to wear, telling her how to be. Don’t listen to anyone or anyone else’s projections of who you need to be. Be yourself and then you will be seen. If you are authentic and who you are, you will attract the people who will love you the most and you will love them so much. Which I think happens in our friend groups in real life, like it did with ours and onscreen. But yeah, I would just tell her to embrace her own heart and her own expression.
Isa Briones: For Margo, when it comes to the scrapbook, I think I would have done the exact same thing. I’m too curious. I got to know. I’m all. Also, I love my mother so much. I would have to see what she looked like in 1990. I would want to be like, “Yes Mom! Slay! Love that outfit.” I want to see everything. I need to know all the information.
But one thing that I do connect with Margo on quite a bit, the one part of the storyline that really affected me, and I think is a very universal storyline for just being a teenager is her parents separating and she doesn’t know a lot about it. Her parents aren’t telling her a lot about it. And classically, she’s turning it in on herself thinking it’s her fault, thinking she’s driving her mother away, and she’s the problem. That is unfortunately such a common feeling. But for just being a little more of an adult, barely, I would want to be like, “Girly, think about the fact that your mom is going through life for the first time as well, and she’s going through her own things, and she may be inflicting pain on you that she doesn’t realize because she’s in so much pain.” Thinking of that, expanding it, the empathy for everyone involved, and realizing it’s not actually about you. And that’s okay. And like Ana said, be secure in who you are, be authentic to yourself, and have grace for those who are not there yet. That’s all you can do.
Unfortunately, we’re at my last question, and I really wanted to talk more about the potential for Season Two and how much I loved Star Trek: Picard, but I feel like this is an important question to ask: Recently, the Norman Lear Center at USC and Gold House released a study with some interesting figures about Asian characters in media. But Goosebumps has such a diverse cast from several different backgrounds. What does it mean to you to represent your respective communities in your work and offer the audience with similar backgrounds the chance to be seen?
Ana Yi Puig: It’s the greatest. For both of us, I think it’s the greatest privilege and responsibility. It was so empowering for us to get cast in these respective roles because they weren’t specifically seeking Asian actors. However, they choose they chose us and we happened to be Asian, which I think is beautiful. The studios were so supportive about wanting our families to authentically reflect our ethnicity and race. So to have a biracial, mixed set of parents and siblings is really impactful. And I think it’s so important, especially when you have a younger audience, for them to see not only themselves, but their families reflected on screen. No one understands how important that is unless you grew up without it, and it’s isolating in media to not watch any horror and not see Asian people. So I think specifically in this genre, it’s really cool that Isa and I get to help head and helm this franchise and help younger Asian people see themselves.
Isa Briones: It’s changing and it’s getting better, but there’s still such a long way to go. But historically, I feel like it’s kind of known that Asian actors rarely play their own Asian race. Like my father, Jon Jon Briones. Big fan of him.
Me too!
Ana Yi Puig: He’s so good!
Isa Briones: He’s a wonderful actor. He’s so good. But for the longest time, he had never played a Filipino person. He played every other Asian ethnicity, of course, but he was never representing his own culture. And the fact that now being the the daughter of an immigrant who experienced that and was always kind of having to push away their own culture, now I get to reclaim that and he gets to also see me do that, see me authentically play myself.
The fact that they cast us, not looking for Asian people, just kind of auditioning people, and that I was cast and then they were like, “Okay, this is your background? We’re going to find an Asian parent, a white parent.” It just wasn’t even a huge conversation. It was just like, of course. That is a dream that I know my dad gets to see me live, and I get to then pass on to younger kids. This is a show that I would have wanted to watch when I was a kid. I just didn’t see a family that looked like mine and now I get to be a part of that. And my dad also gets to see his legacy continuing and continuing to progress.
All episodes of Goosebumps starring Zack Morris, Isa Briones, Miles McKenna, Ana Ti Puig, Will Price, and Justin Long are now available on Disney+ and Hulu.
