‘Texas Chainsaw Massacre’ actor John Larroquette says he was paid in weed for role
John Larroquette has said he was paid in weed for The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.
Speaking to Parade, the actor said that Tobe Hooper, the director of the 1974 horror film, offered the alternative form of payment for narrating the movie’s prologue – a rumour that has long circulated on the internet.
“Totally true,” Larroquette said. “He gave me some marijuana or a matchbox or whatever you called it in those days. I walked out of the [recording] studio and patted him on the back side and said, “Good luck to you!”
Larroquette said he first met the director in the summer of 1969, when he was working as a bartender in Colorado and Hooper was in the area working on a project.
The pair struck up a friendship before reconnecting a few years later, when Larroquette had move to LA to pursue a career in acting.
“Tobe heard I was in town and asked for an hour of my time to narrate something for this movie he just did,” he said. “I said, ‘Fine!’. It was a favour.”
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre went on to spawn a franchise, with Larroquette returning to narrate the subsequent sequels. For those jobs, however, he received a proper payment.
“You do something for free in the 1970s and get a little money in the ’90s,” he said. “It’s certainly the one credit that’s stuck strongly to my resume.”
A ninth instalment of the horror series was released last year. Directed by David Blue Garcia, the film was set several decades after the original, with returning serial killer Leatherface targeting a young group of adults.
In a three-star review, NME wrote: “Director David Blue Garcia is safe pair of hands, hitting all the right shots as he tosses blood and guts around with abandon, looking for increasingly inventive ways to put people to the chainsaw. He builds up tension convincingly enough that you wonder if maybe, just maybe, this character is going to to get out alive.
“Sure, there’ s no real reason for this story to keep unfolding. This is all about enjoying the imagery of human beings getting chopped up. And in that regard at least, Texas Chainsaw Massacre does not disappoint.”
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Chris Edwards
NME
