Muschietti and Chastain comment on the hate crime in It: Chapter Two

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

SPOILER Warning: If you haven't read Stephen King's novel IT and want to go into IT: CHAPTER TWO completely spoiler free, you might not want to read the next paragraphs in this article.

It sounds like IT: CHAPTER TWO might be stirring up controversy from the moment it begins, as a scene from King's novel that was left out of the previous mini-series adaptation will be the very first scene in this new film. Apparently this scene is never addressed in the rest of the movie, but it depicts a hate crime committed against a gay couple.

A gay couple is walking home from a carnival in Derry, Maine when they are brutally attacked by a group of teens hurling slurs. During the beating, the attackers throw one of them from a bridge into a river. It’s a brutally realistic scene — that is, until Pennywise appears and drags the man out of the water and bites into his lifeless body, as his boyfriend looks on in terror.

King initially wrote the scene into his novel after being disturbed by the news that a gay man named Charlie Howard had been killed by a group of teens in his hometown of Bangor, Maine in 1984. IT and IT: CHAPTER TWO director Andy Muschietti felt the scene was essential for his adaptation. He told Variety: 

It was very important to me because it is of relevance. I probably wouldn’t have included it if it wasn’t in the book, but it was very important for Stephen King. When he wrote it, he was talking about the evil in the human community. He was talking about how dark humans can get in a small American town… For me, it was important to include it because it’s something that we’re still suffering. Hate crimes are still happening. No matter how evolved we think society is going, there seems to be a winding back, especially in this day and age where these old values seem to be emerging from the darkness."

CHAPTER TWO star Jessica Chastain also discussed the scene with Variety, saying 

I think you need that scene because (King) writes about the darkness that’s under the surface. The dirt under the fingernails of these small towns or of mankind. That’s what ‘It’ represents. It’s the darkness of human behavior. I think it was important to see (that scene) and not to change it from what it is in the novel because we’re living in a time right now where it is very much a part of our culture and part of our conversation and we haven’t moved past it. So, we can’t pretend that it doesn’t still exist because it’s part of our every day."

The gay couple in the film are played by Xavier Dolan and Taylor Frey. Their co-stars include Chastain, James McAvoy, Bill Hader, Isaiah Mustafa, Jay Ryan, James Ransone, and Andy Bean as the adult versions of the Losers Club. Jaeden Martell, Wyatt Oleff, Sophia Lillis, Finn Wolfhard, Jeremy Ray Taylor, Chosen Jacobs, and Jack Dylan Grazer are back as the child versions of the characters. Bill Skarsgård is also back as the evil clown Pennywise.

Scripted by Gary Dauberman, IT: CHAPTER TWO has the following synopsis: 

It's been 27 years since the Losers' Club had their traumatizing clash with the inhuman, child-eating clown from Derry, Maine – and they've since grown apart. But battling an unspeakable circus evil tends to bond people together, and they find themselves reunited in their hometown, unearthing a sinister history that threatens both their lives and their sanity. 

Produced by Barbara Muschietti, Dan Lin, and Roy Lee, with Marty Ewing, Seth Grahame-Smith, and David Katzenberg serving as executive producers, IT: CHAPTER TWO is set to reach theatres on September 6th.

I imagine that anyone who isn't familiar with the novel is going to find that opening scene very jarring and disturbing – which is the point of including it. Even those of us who have read the novel are probably going to find it tough to watch brought to life.