Skip to main content

Scream Queens of Halloween: Danielle Harris


Celebrating Scream Queens that make the Halloween season the most wonderful time of year.

It's that time of year again, the most wonderful time of year, when I fully immerse myself in all things Halloween. A few years ago I celebrated the season with a series of pieces on favorite "Women of Horrotober" for The After Movie Diner - including love for Shelley Duvall in The Shining, Lili Taylor in The Addiction, Wendy Kaplan in Halloween 5, and Heather Langenkamp in Wes Craven's New Nightmare, among others. This year I'm hoping to do a series of posts here that similarly honor the many great women in horror history. What better way to start than with one of my favorites, Danielle Harris of the Halloween films.


Harris has starred in four Halloween films: Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers and Halloween 5: The Revenge Michael Myers from the initial series, and then in the Rob Zombie reboots/remakes Halloween and Halloween II. In the earlier films she's Jamie Lloyd, one of the most important and popular characters in the franchise. The protagonist of two films, Jamie is the daughter of Laurie Strode (and named in honor of the woman who plays Laurie, Jamie Lee Curtis), which also makes her the niece of that infamous, Shatner-masked mass murderer Michael Myers. Harris was only ten years old when she took on this lofty role, but her performance over the course of both films transcends her age. Already a strong screamer, Harris makes for a powerful presence onscreen in both 4 and it's direct sequel 5.


Jamie made Harris a fan favorite, so we are all thrilled to see her cast in Zombie's films several years later, this time in the role of Annie Bracket (a character originated by Nancy Kyes in John Carpenter's original Halloween). Gone was the cute as a button Harris, and in her place stood a now-thirty year old beauty instead. Harris's confrontation with Michael Myers occurs with her wearing only a micro-miniskirt; she has explained how being topless in the scene further enhanced her extreme vulnerability. It's extremely powerful, thanks in large part to the genuine terror Harris conveys throughout.


Harris has remained a horror fixture over the years in countless films other than the Halloween franchise, even directing 2012's Among Friends. She's also been in many films outside the horror genre, like Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead and The Last Boy Scout, and is currently appearing in theaters in Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. She caused a stir online by expressing interest in being in the new Blumhouse series of Halloween reboots (two sequels to 2018's reboot have already been announced). It was all much ado about nothing, as Harris has long been outspoken and sincere in expressing her love for the franchise that made her both a star and a fan favorite among horror hounds everywhere.


The long, convoluted history of the Halloween franchise hasn't always been kind to Harris - Jamie was basically written out cannon in H20 when they cast Josh Hartnett as Laurie's son and never even mentioned Jamie having existed. Personally, then, I'm rooting for more Danielle Harris in future Halloween films. Whether she's reprising the role of Jamie or bringing an entirely different character to vibrant life, I'd pay good money to see it. For me, Harris is as important to the franchise as Curtis or Donald Pleasance (Dr. Loomis).


For all of her great horror performances, but especially her enduring and absolutely essential contributions to the Halloween franchise, Danielle Harris places high on my list of personal favorite Scream Queens. We're almost the same age, so it's always felt like we grew up together, thanks largely to the Halloween films. And little Jamie Lloyd grew up just fine.

Labels:

Comments

  1. MichaelWDenneySeptember 20, 2019 at 8:37 PM

    Nice tribute. Danielle Harris has been a favourite of mine since I saw Halloween 4 on its initial theatrical release. She grew up into a beautiful woman with a strong screen presence but I'm still blown away by her performance at such a young age in Halloween 4. I've had the opportunity to meet her twice now and that certainly has not diminished my admiration.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Words Seem Out of PlaceSeptember 21, 2019 at 5:28 AM

      Thank you. Her performances in 4 and 5 are astonishingly good for a child actor. I’d love to meet her one day. I need to get to more cons for the chance.

      Delete
  2. HalogirlOctober 3, 2019 at 12:27 PM

    Great article! I completely agree that it feels like a lot of us have grown up with her! So very true. Danielle will always be one of my favorite scream queens.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Words Seem Out of PlaceOctober 3, 2019 at 12:59 PM

      Thank you! And yes, growing up with her makes the bond between us fans and her/her characters even stronger, I think.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Blowing in the Wind: Marilyn Monroe and That Iconic White Dress

This month marks sixty-five years since one of the most iconic moments in twentieth-century popular culture: Marilyn Monroe’s angelic white dress being blown sky high by wind rushing up from a subway grate beneath her feet in the film  The Seven Year Itch . Billy Wilder shot multiple takes, while Sam Shaw snapped photo after photo for what had to be the biggest publicity stunt ever staged at the time. Marilyn wore two pairs of underwear for the shot, yet, as noted in Lois Banner's critical biography Marilyn: The Passion and the Paradox  (2012), "a dark blotch of pubic hair" remained visible to the 100 male photographers and over 1,500 male spectators, all of whom crowded eagerly around the set to gawk and drool.  Due to strict 1950s movie censorship laws, photos had to be doctored to white out the offending blotch, but those in attendance saw it, over and over, shot after shot. Marilyn's husband at the time, the extremely old fashioned Joe DiMaggio, stormed off th
Post a Comment
Read more

All I Want For Christmas: Phoebe Cates's Monologue in Gremlins

Joe Dante's 1980s classic Gremlins will always be a subversive Christmas favorite. From Spike exploding in the microwave to Mrs. Daigle's "stairlift to hell", the movie is packed with deliciously transgressive moments that turn the holly jolly season right on its ear. None are more memorable, though, than Phoebe Cates delivering her legendary "worst thing that ever happened to me on Christmas" monologue. It's a jaw-dropping, tour-de-force moment, a truly horrific story that's also one of the most darkly comic moments in Christmas movie history. Cates really shines during this scene. There's no denying just how seminal that scene of hers in Fast Times at Ridgemont High was for a generation of young people, but her speech in Gremlins is equally important and a wonderful showcase for her serious and comedic acting skills.  Here's the speech, in its entirety. No Christmas season is complete without at least one viewing
Post a Comment
Read more

Misspent Youth: Joanne Whalley

Looking back at the pop culture mainstays of this Gen-Xer's gloriously misspent youth. One of the most famous and oft-quoted Seinfeld scenes involves Bobka and Jerry's discovery of the existence of Cinnamon Bobka. After Elaine scoffs at the notion of such a thing, even calling it a "lesser Bobka," Jerry unleashes one of the great defenses of a freshly ground spice ever delivered: People love cinnamon. It should be on tables at restaurants along with salt and pepper. Anytime anyone says, "Oh This is so good. What's in it?" The answer invariably comes back, Cinnamon. Cinnamon. Again and again.  Joanne Whalley is like Cinnamon. Yes, I just compulsively double-checked my DVD copy and it's the unrated version, thank you very much. Let me explain. You see, during the formative years of my misspent youth, if I stumbled on a movie featuring the doe-eyed, petite, beautiful English actress, invariably I'd feel like Jerry does about Cin
2 comments
Read more

"That girl looks just like Pat Benatar"

Linda, that girl looks just like Pat Benatar. I know. Wait, there are three girls here at Ridgemont who have cultivated the Pat Benatar look. I was just a kid when Fast Times at Ridgemont High opened in 1982. Still though, even at the tender young age of seven, I knew who Pat Benatar was, because a.) her music was all over the radio and even then I recognized the utter awesomeness of her vocal talent in songs like "Hit Me With Your Best Shot", and b.) some of the older girls around town were obviously cribbing their looks—clothes, hair, makeup, strut—from Benatar's own style. Benatar was ubiquitous. So, when I see or hear vintage-era Benatar now, I think of Fast Times , but mostly I remember that ubiquity—of both the performer and her legion of young imitators. I know it's not true, but when I recollect those years I swear every older girl looked like either Benatar, Juice Newton, or Joan Jett. It's easy to forget, years later, that
Post a Comment
Read more

Misspent Youth: Randi Brooks

Looking back at the pop culture mainstays of this Gen-Xer's gloriously misspent youth. ***** A note on the series and this site: This might be the final post in the "Misspent Youth" series - at least here. Maybe it'll eventually move with me. Oh, right, I buried the lede: I've moved, and would love for you to come visit me at my new site, The Starfire Lounge ! Moving forward, this site will likely cease to be updated, but will remain around for posterity and your continued reading pleasure. I have a few more things to post here over the coming days or weeks as a sort of "everything must go" send-off to the old girl. I also plan to write a final farewell post to my main online home for the last five years. Stay tuned and, as always, thanks for reading. ***** It's no surprise that the talented but now mostly forgotten Randi Brooks would make an appearance in the Misspent Youth series. She may not be a household name, but her resume
Post a Comment
Read more

Misspent Youth: Morgan Fairchild

Looking back at the movies, music, television, and other pop culture mainstays of this Gen-Xer's gloriously misspent youth. Once I decided that Morgan Fairchild would be the subject of the next installment in this series, I did what I usually do and researched online for a bit, just to refresh my memory on details that might've previously been lost to time. Morgan Fairchild was legitimately one of the most potent sex symbols of the 1970s and '80s. Not that I needed much refresher when it came to Fairchild. Born Patsy Ann McClenny in Dallas, Texas, February 3, 1950, the American actress was everywhere during those oh-so-crucial formative years of my pop culture obsession. She loomed large in the growing ranks of proto-haughty glamour queens, a trope that was hot on prime time TV in the 1980s. The characters she was most well-known for were drop-dead gorgeous and didn't suffer fools lightly. Really, few ever did it better than Fairchild. The shirt do
3 comments
Read more

It Came From the '90s: My Secret Crush on The Nanny

This series looks back at the 1990s and its influence on the generation of people who came of age during the decade. For six seasons in the 1990s, The Nanny made many of us laugh. At times, it could be downright hilarious . At others, well, not so much . This isn't a review of a '90s sitcom staple, though. No. This is simply an excuse to come clean about something I've kept buried deep inside for over two decades now: I had a secret crush on The Nanny herself, Fran Drescher. The unadulterated nineties-ness of this is practically blinding. And I love it. While The Nanny was sometimes quite funny, thanks largely to Drescher's spunky charisma and wholehearted commitment, the show was never considered hip. People my parents age seemed to love it, but my friends preferred, well, Friends . That smile! Those legs! That dress! It's all overloading my circuits. I watched Friends with my friends, but I also thoroughly enjoyed The Nanny , to
2 comments
Read more

Margot Kidder and the Childhood Crush That Will Never Die

"I dream about sex, flying, and being chased by Nazis." — Margot Kidder,  Rolling Stone , "The Education of Margot Kidder", 1981 ***** File that quote under, "Reasons why I love Margot Kidder." Last month, Margot hopped a one-way flight with old pal Chris Reeve off into the stars and beyond, where they could reenact their iconic moment from  Superman  (1978), for all eternity. I wrote a little about Margot, here and here , trying to explain why this particular actress meant so much to me as a kid growing up in the 1980s. I thought that would be enough. It wasn't.* Those posts were my fumbling attempts to sort out just how large an impact Margot had on my young life, and, to my present-day surprise, how much she still means to me now. Before news of her death, I hadn't thought of her in ages. I assumed the early childhood crush I harbored for my Lois Lane had dwindled and faded. Ha! I was a fool. My crush on Margot was very
4 comments
Read more

It Came From the '90s: Kelly Bundy and the Alternative Family Ideal

This series looks back at the 1990s and its influence on the generation of people who came of age during the decade. Very few television series in the 1990s were as polarizing as Married...with Children . People either loved it or they loathed it. TV critics and good upstanding Catholic families like mine fell into the latter category. Soon after it debuted during my first year of junior high in 1987 (not quite the '90s, but on the brink), my parents made it clear that we would not be watching. I believe the words they used were "vulgar," "unfunny," and, one of their perennial favorites, "risque." Of course, this meant it immediately took on a prurient appeal for me. Parents can never win, honestly. Kelly Bundy—the talented Christina Applegate, who never gets enough credit for elevating the blonde airhead trope into an art form—only further piqued my interest. She was like the girls in school with the absurdly voluminous hair and ridiculously sh
4 comments
Read more

My Favorite Death Dealer: Kate Beckinsale

"I dropped out of Oxford, and now I only speak Russian with the woman who gives me a bikini-wax. See what Hollywood does to you?" "Apparently, I'm very good at firing a gun without blinking, which is unusual. That's why so many action characters have to wear sunglasses during shoot-out scenes. That's my party trick." "Someone once said that you can make the choice between getting old and getting creepy, and I think getting old is the way to go." ***** Before I begin, here's a haiku that took me at least ten seconds to write: Ah, Kate Beckinsale.  We'd gladly live with you, in your Underworld Yeah, so, I'm a fan. I've always been a fan of Kate Beckinsale, especially as the vampire Death Dealer Selene in the action/horror franchise  Underworld  (five films and counting now) and as a young upwardly mobile publishing professional in Whit Stillman's masterpiece of earl
Post a Comment
Read more