How Did Art The Clown Make "Terrifier 3" A Box Office Sensation?
Building A Cult Horror Movie Franchise
You’ve all likely heard the phenomenal return Terrifier 3 has currently achieved at the box office - over $41 million globally off a $2 million production budget and a modest $500k marketing budget by Cineverse, the film’s distributor. That equates to a hitherto 600% gross return… and rising. Three cheers for filmmaker Damien Leone. Leone kept true to his vision and didn’t turn Terrifier into an over-indulgent, VFX studio gorefest at the expense of his campy slashfest.
That’s two thumbs up since it’s only been released for two weeks and still has its streaming life, merchandise and ancillary assets to boost its revenue.
Terrifier 3 relied on the success of the previous two films to carry it into the marketplace following its packed-house screening at Fantastic Fest in Austin this year.
The franchise began with a clown character called Art The Clown, designed by horror effects and makeup impresario Damien Leone. His job was to penetrate the crowded marketplace and make Art special and distinctive as he forged a career in horror filmmaking. He didn’t seek to reinvent the clown horror slasher genre.
Read our full Terrifer 3 article at Creative Screenwriting Magazine HERE.
Introducing Art The Clown To Audiences
Damien Leone didn’t simply raise the biggest budget and hope for the best in the first Terrifier film in 2016.
Using his background and love of the horror genre, he created Art only using practical effects. A mammoth feat in today’s digital world. However, it wasn’t all smooth sailing.
In 2006, Leone introduced us to Art in his short film called The 9th Circle in a few short scenes, and again in his 2011 short film called Terrifier. There was enough buzz to continue Art’s violent adventures, but Art was no Pennywise. Leon realized that good things take time to build a solid following and continued.
Leone later combined elements of these two proof-of-concept shorts in his anthology feature film of 2013 called All Hallows’ Eve. Scary, but not enough to scare up big box office returns… yet. Its purpose was to showcase Damien’s practical effects skills and reinforce Art as a staple psycho clown and his lust for sanguine entertainment.
In 2016, Damien Leone set out to make the first Terrifier feature film. Like many filmmakers, he turned to crowdfunding to fund his $35000 passion budget. That’s low, even by micro-budget standards. But we all know, that the biggest budgets don’t always make the best horror films. Succes is more about how that budget is used.
Leone fell short of his fundraising goal, but he was not deterred. He knew he was onto a winner. Rising producer Phil Falcone ponied up the budget shortfall in exchange for a producer credit on this film.
The goal was to increase exposure to Art the Clown at the Telluride Horror Show Film Festival in 2016 where Terrifier first screened. Some audience members reportedly exited the screening after they felt nauseous. Who knew walkout were a badge of honor. Leone made people’s stomachs curdle.
Terrifier was picked up by Dread Central Presents for cheap distribution on its cable Dread TV channel 2018. Epic Pictures also picked up Terrifier for an extremely limited theatrical run. It became a cult hit and grossed a modest $400000; an impressive nearly tenfold return.
Terrifier Regrets
Damien Leone was so preoccupied with the logistics of creating a durable horror character and producing his films that led to certain characters like Sienna being underdeveloped.
He remedied the situation in Terrifier 2 (2022) and Terrifier 3 (2024). He fleshed out the characters and gave them backstories and cross-movie storylines so they could be enjoyed to their fullest. He’s currently developing Terrifer 4 and tantalizing us with further sequels.
Read our full Terrifer 3 article at Creative Screenwriting Magazine HERE.