The minds behind “IT: Welcome to Derry” didn’t show viewers Bill Skarsgård’s Pennywise until Episode 5 – and they didn’t allow his scene partners to get too familiar with him before that, either.
In order to capture some authentic shock from the actors, the showrunners made sure Matilda Lawler, Amanda Christine, and Clara Stack — who play Marge, Ronnie, and Lilly, respectively, in HBO’s horror series — didn’t lay eyes on Skarsgård in his demonic circus garb until it came time to shoot Pennywise’s grand entrance.
“They kept him top secret … from us until we got to that specific sewer scene,” Christine told Collider. “He takes the character so seriously and really takes on the role of being Pennywise. … It was just really cool to experience that and really scary, too. That reaction you see is our real reaction.”
Stack echoed this sentiment: “He is a nice guy off set, but when he’s Pennywise, you feel that terror and it is indescribable.”
Bill Skarsgård wasn’t always scary as Pennywise … sometimes, he was just weird
You might expect the sight of Bill Skarsgård roaming around as Pennywise to inspire fear in his younger castmates. But now and again, it was also a source of humor.
“There were some really exciting, random Pennywise sightings on set,” said Matilda Lawler in an interview with MovieZine. “Like sometimes, you’d just be walking to … get a snack, and you’d just see him walking in fully sweatpants and a normal shirt with his full Pennywise head, and you’d just be like, ‘Oh, hi, Bill… ‘ and he’d be like ‘Hi!’ That’s not something you see every day.”
“IT: Welcome to Derry” is shaping up to be one of the best Stephen King TV shows to date, as evidenced by Rotten Tomatoes where it’s ranked No. 9 among almost 30 shows based on his work. Notably, the site has the original “Stephen King’s IT” series ranked at No. 12.