It’s been over a decade since Orphan was released and took horror fans on a psychological journey with that shocking twist. Now Esther is set to return to our screen in an equally horrific prequel, Orphan: First Kill, this time with 10 Things I Hate About You leading lady Julia Stiles starring alongside Esther’s Isabelle Fuhrman. Stiles opens up about the upcoming film by teasing another major horror twist we can expect to be thrown at us.
In a video chat interview with Collider for their segment “Ladies’ Night After Hours”, Julia Stiles says while she is not a huge fan of the horror genre, the gripping script and psychological twist of Orphan: First Kill drew her out of COVID isolation to work on the horror film. Without giving anything away, Stiles says she’s sure fans will like the film. Here it is in the actress’s exact words:
I do not watch horror movies and when I was sent the script for it I was like, ‘I don’t know. I’m not into that genre.’ And I was also really worried about going back to work after COVID. And the script was so dang good, I couldn’t put it down and I was so surprised by the twist that I’m not gonna give away that I think you’ll like it. It’s incredibly psychological.
I honestly don’t think she could have said anything more promising about the film. The fact that Julia Stiles not only took on a project that she didn’t initially want a part of before reading the script, but she also put aside her level of comfort concerning the pandemic to take part in the film. A script being so good to first change a person’s perspective and also bring them out of the comfort zone is one that I definitely want to see the product of.
Another interesting thing about Orphan: First Kill is that even though it is a prequel to Orphan, Isabelle Fuhrman is taking back up her role as Esther, which she played at the age of 12 over ten years ago. Now in her mid-20’s, it’ll be interesting to see her character played out on screen again. Of course, if you’ve seen the first film, the weird age thing kind of makes sense.
It’s worth noting that even though Julia Stiles does say she’s not a fan of horror, she did act in the Omen remake and had a pretty wild role in Dexter, which could be classified as a type of horror show - it’s disturbing to say the least. It seems that, although she has been successful in a number of genres, Stiles finds a more comfortable home in thrillers and psychological films, which appears to have drawn her to the Orphan prequel.
Orphan: First Kill has recently completed and is set to release next summer. While there is not much known about the plot of the film other than it being a prequel to Orphan, we are now pretty much promised by Julia Stiles to have an awesome twist to look forward to - which we will totally hold her to.
