The director of the new I Know What You Did Last Summer reboot revealed that she tried “crazy shit” to get original star Sarah Michelle Gellar to return to the franchise.
The Buffy The Vampire Slayer star was in the original 1999 film, about four friends who hide a body they accidentally hit with their car. However, a year later, a mysterious killer hunts them down in search of justice.
Fans wanted Gellar to return for the movie, which brings back original cast members Freddie Prinze Jr. and Jennifer Love Hewitt. However her character Helen Shivers was quite clearly killed on screen during the original movies.
The writer-director of the new film, Jennifer Kaytin Robinson, told Entertainment Weekly that despite the setback of her character’s passing, she tried to make a return work. “I tried, okay? I harassed her! But she is dead,” she said.
“I tried to pitch some crazy shit too. I was like, ‘What if it’s like you weren’t dead and you’re actually alive, but in hiding?’ And Sarah’s like, ‘I was on ice. I was the most dead a person could be. You can see my frozen body.’ I was like, ‘Yeah, but what if?’ And she said, ‘I am dead. I am Sarah Dead Gellar’”.
Earlier in the year, Gellar confirmed to People that she would not be returning, but did say she had some input in the film. “My best friend (Robinson) is directing it, so we joke that I have an unofficial job, which is I am continuity,” she said. “So I’m always the one telling her, ‘Well, that would happen, or that wouldn’t happen with those characters,’ so I do have kind of an unofficial job title.”
The new film, also titled I Know What You Did Last Summer, comes to cinemas July 18. Despite his re-appearance, Freddie Prinze Jr (who is married to Gellar), revealed in 2023 that the original movie almost made him quit acting.
In February, Gellar confirmed that she would be returning to another former role, starring in a reboot of the show Buffy The Vampire Slayer.
English (US) · 