Cut It scene reportedly had Pennywise trying to eat a baby

October 16th 2017, 1:16pm

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

Not only is IT the highest-grossing horror movie ever at the domestic box office, it’s also one of the highest-grossing R-rated movies period. The movie didn’t skimp on the bloody horror, with Pennywise (Bill Skarsgard) devouring on small children like he was at a Golden Corral buffet. But there were lines the filmmakers decided not to cross, and now we have the very grim details of a scene that was supposedly in the movie at one point.

While speaking on the Throwing Shade podcast, actor Timothy Simons (who read for the part of Pennywise) said that his audition involved reading a scene that detailed Pennywise back in the 1600s, forcing a woman to hand over her baby to the demon clown:

It was [Pennywise] way back at the beginning of Derry convincing the woman to give him her baby to eat. And it was scary. The thing that was scariest about it was that it was very direct. It was, 'If you don't do this, these are the things that I'm going to do.' And they were all terrible.

Not too long ago it was revealed that there was a very dark, grizzly scene cut from IT that took us back to the 1600s, and so the nature of this scene does fit the bill. However, who knows if this was the scene they actually shot and later cut, or if it was just some sort of test scene for potential actors. It is worth noting that when the deleted flashback scene was detailed by Skarsgard, he said it showed him without makeup, and it took place before he was Pennywise as we know the monster in the movie. If that's the case would he be eating babies at that point? If true, though, this shows just how far the filmmakers were willing to go to show just how evil this demonic clown is.

If this is truly the scene, it’s something I’d like to see it as a deleted scene, purely out of curiosity. I can imagine how it would be too grizzly for audiences to handle, and you don’t really need it as an introduction as to what Pennywise’s goal is (eating all the children in the land). The opening with Georgie does that just fine and is brutal enough. The sequel will be much darker, so who knows, maybe there will be plenty of baby-eating in that one.

IT is still in theaters now!