‘Crystal Lake’ Creator Reveals Why Linda Cardellini Had to Play Pamela Voorhees & More

Linda Cardellini has played her share of iconic characters over the years, from Velma in Scooby-Doo and Wendy Corduroy in Gravity Falls to Judy Hale in Dead to Me. But her latest role might be her most terrifying yet: Pamela Voorhees, the mother of all murderers, in Peacock’s upcoming Friday the 13th prequel series, Crystal Lake.

Cardellini joined creator Brad Caleb Kane and costars William Catlett, Devin Kessler, Cameron Scoggins, Gwendolyn Sundstrom, and Callum Vinson at New York Comic-Con this week, and while visiting the TV Insider and TV Guide Magazine studio, Kane revealed that his connection to the horror franchise goes back decades, long before he landed the job.

“I’ve been working on this for probably about 40 years,” Kane explained.

Matt Infante/Peacock

“Since I saw the original movies in theaters, with giant crowds of people yelling at the screen, I knew my path was going to converge with this franchise at some point in my life,” he explained.

When it came time to cast one of horror’s most notorious mothers, Kane had only one actress in mind. “She asked me that same question when I first met her,” Kane said when asked why Cardellini was the perfect Pamela Voorhees. “Linda was always the only person that I had in my mind for Pam, ever. You can ask anyone I was working with at the time when we were starting to cast this role and trying to figure it out.”

For Kane, the decision came down to instinct and Cardellini’s ability to convey far more than what’s happening on the surface.

“I’m a very instinctive person. I follow my instincts, whatever they are, good or bad,” he explained, adding that his instincts happened to be “perfect and stellar” when it came to casting Cardellini.

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While the actress has delivered memorable performances throughout her career, from Lindsay Weir in Freaks and Geeks to her work on ER, it was her performance in Netflix’s Dead to Me that ultimately convinced Kane she was right for the role.

“Dead to Me was the thing that came to mind when I was thinking about Pam Voorhees,” he revealed. “The work she did on that, the secrets she kept while trying to put a false front forward, there is just a lot going on behind her eyes. There’s a lot of subtlety, and I knew we needed that sort of quality.”

Check out more of our interview with the Crystal Lake cast and creator above!

Crystal Lake, Series Premiere, October 15, Peacock

– Reporting by Damian Holbrook