8 Questions with........Debbie Rochon

Interviews
8 Questions with........Debbie Rochon
By Michael Sullivan
Feb 18, 2008, 16:54

I started this series as a anti-Tila Tequila showcase...you know,someone who got famous for having the most friends here on MySpace. I found it a bit weird that a person could have over a 1,000,000 plus friends yet have to do a sleazy "reality" show to find love.*LOL*

So this series was my way of getting to know the people behind the faces...and I have met some very cool people...the extremely talented Ezel,the witty JD,one of the best singers you should know in the lovely Kate Emerson,the courage and honesty of Mike's Spiral (the most commented interview in "8 Question" history) and even some famous folks have started to be interviewed here...Gretchen Peters,recently named "FolkWax Magazine Artist of 2007",Matt Iseman of Style Network's number one rated show "Clean House" and Eric Stuart.

I have written about my one encounter with the lovely Debbie Rochon. I met her when my buddy Farmboy and I went to the Michigan Comic Con a few years back. Back when we went,there were three things to do...hunt for rare comics/bootlegs,gaming and meet a lot of movie stars. While Farm went comic hunting,I shopped for rare Yu-Gi-Oh cards and dueled a lot fellow gamers. But we also walked through the celebrity section. Cons are both good and bad for both the fan and star. Fun because you can meet a famous person you have seen on TV or a classic film...or bad if your star has waned so badly,you haven't worked on a real project in years and are living on a certain role thats been gone 20 years. The Michigan Comic Con has a nice mixture of serious sci-fi/fantasy heavyweights and folks who may have appeared as a "red shirt" is a TOS Star Trek episode. As I have noted before,some stars are just rocking...like Julie Newmar or Bernie Kopell and others are just bitter as hell...Herbert Jefferson,Jr,whoa..

As Farmboy and I walked thru,I saw Debbie Rochon setting up her table alone. No assistants,entourage or Con volunteer to help her. She was pretty upbeat and happy. Up to that this point,this Con had been a huge letdown,they had removed the gaming area for a grade Z wrestling promo,so I decided to take a hand held recorder to try and interview some of the stars. Thats when I discovered another weird facet about these folks,very few can actually think for themselves...and no,I'm not rude. I asked 3 different folks for interviews and thier handlers wanted to see the questions beforehand...which I hadn't done nor would I have done so.

So imagine my great surprise when Debbie said "Yes" right away. The problem was my timing,she had just gotten there and a growing group of fans were buzzing about waiting to talk to Debbie. I stood back while this hard working actress greeted every fan while a sweet smile and took countless of photos. A zine from Toledo sent a 13 year old girl to do a scheduled interview which Debbie did. She sat the young reporter next to her and not only did a great inteview yet entertained her fans as well.
She caught my eye and waved me forward and offered to do the interview at 5 pm "You can talk as long as you want". Such gracious gesture. Sadly,I couldn't stay that long as Farm had to go and I had come with him. I explained my situation to Debbie and she told me to come back in 20 minutes or so.

When I did,she had wrote her personal email address and she would be happy to talk with me anytime.
Up until now,she and I have exchanged 3-4 emails a year and when I saw her on here on MySpace and had started this series,I asked her for the long awaited interview. Despite being incredibly busy with films,hosting a radio show with Dee "Captain Howdy" Snider and also writing columns herself,Debbie was very quick to say "yes indeed" when I sent my request to her.

Debbie is a horror film legend,she has done over 140 films,acted in the theater and has appeared in many TV shows including the gritty "New York Undercover" and Dick Wolf's "Conviction". But horror is where Debbie has made her mark and any horror fan who sees her in attached to movie knows its going to be bloody good and slightly kinky...and not necessarily in that order.

1.What was your childhood like, what movie really caught your eye as a child?

A)My childhood was pretty damn crappy. There are a lot of reasons why and that is certainly the subject of the book I'm writing now! But things are pretty awesome for me as an adult so I have only to thank my difficult early life. It affords me to be aware of how lucky I am now. Regardless of what I have or don't have. I feel like I have won that battle just surviving it and coming out the way I did. I have a lot more battles to fight but that particular one is done. Now, The first movie I can remember really liking and having an impact on my young mind was the 1951 Alastair Sim version of SCROOGE one Christmas. I found it really scary and powerful as a morality tale. I have always loved Dickens as I relate to his stories very well from my personal struggles.

2. What is the difference between an "A" actor and a "B" actor?

A)‘A’ actors make more money! ‘A’ actors tend to have the ability to choose their directors and material more than ‘B’ actors who take the best work they can find but also need to pay the bills. Also ‘B’ actors also are required to do nudity on a regular basis.

3. What’s the typical pay for an indie movie and the average shooting time, length wise?

A)It is such a difficult question to answer because every project has different variables. Depends on the budget of the movie and whether I am being paid by the day or for the whole project and what I have to do in the role. For a simple cameo it’s never below 300 a day but more often its 500 and up, again depending on what the role requires. For a lead role in a movie that can take from 2 weeks to a month to shoot it’s somewhere between 5 and 10 grand. The typical movie shoot is about two weeks but that’s always a tough shoot schedule because there’s so much sacrifice when you’re working so quickly. I prefer to work on things that take more time but it’s not always easy on the production to have 4 weeks shooting when they’re working with such limited funds.

4. You started out as a rising stage actress in New York, why the move to horror films? Do you miss the stage?

A)I miss the stage in a way, it’s certainly a very pure way to work and there are a lot of benefits to stage work. There’s little money and huge time commitments for it though. I love the writing which beats almost anything you will end up doing in film. But I have always loved horror and film in general so I have just followed my passion. I just adore film. Every aspect of it.

5. Fan conventions are pretty surreal at times...what three moments stand out as the WEIRDEST you have seen or heard about?

A)Only three moments? Hahaha! OK, well the first would be when a fan walked up to me while I was eating a slice and wanted to buy the pizza from me and have me sign it. I declined. I think the second might be when a woman came up to me and shook my hand and got me to sign her TROMEO AND JULIET DVD cover. Then a minute after she left the table her boyfriend came up and shook my hand then said “Thanks to your performance in that film my girlfriend thinks it’s cool to be bi-sexual!” Too much information there. The third might be when I was setting up my table on a Saturday and a fan walked up and asked me how much it cost for everything I was going to put out on display. Considering there were many duplicates of things in my bag I thought that was strange.

6. What motivates you as an actress to accept a job? (besides money!)

A)Script. Always script. If there is a character I am asked to play that I can see I would be able to really bring to life, or have fun with or have never played before a hundred times I am always intrigued. Also if I love the director’s work I am very excited to work on the project. A good example of that would be last summer when I worked with filmmaker Ivan Zuccon in Italy on THE COLOUR FROM THE DARK. I had seen a couple of his other films and they blew me away. But I don’t have a preference from comedy to drama to horror. Anything well written is a joy to perform. And if the director’s on the ball so much the better.

7. How did you come to be employed by Fangoria?

A)I was initially working for a company that was creating programming in the horror genre and they ended up buying Fangoria. I had shot a couple of different series ideas with them and brought in a lot of talented people I knew locally in NYC into the fold to help create projects. We covered the New York City Halloween Parade on TV two years in a row which is where I also met Dee Snider for the first time who was also covering the parade with us. He of course became my co-host on the Fangoria Radio show. Once the company bought Fangoria then I became an employee. I have been with the company for four years now.

8. As a genre actress and a pretty respected writer, how do you write about a bad horror movie objectively?

A)I don’t write about horror movies in a review sense; I tend to do interviews and write about my experiences making movies. Luckily I don’t do reviews right now which I doubt I would like very much. I always have a need to be honest and so many people I know make horror movies it would be a very uncomfortable situation to be in. Some ‘writers’ don’t care and even get off on the supposed ‘power’ of it, but I would not want that. I think everybody gets enough slams from crazy people on the internet I certainly don’t want to be another one.

9. Is there a subject matter that you would never do in a film?

A)Well it depends. I think film is an expression of what we see, dream about and fear. I think I would have a problem doing a film that had subject matter where kids or animals were hurt IF the bad guy didn’t have his/her comeuppance at the end of the film. I think those are the only times the ending does need to be ‘upbeat’ if you would call it that. I don’t normally like happy endings it’s just that if you take on offensive material that is really taboo you have to end it with a little morality. Very little offends me but I still am capable of being offended by certain things. As I said it is really a medium where people are expressing themselves so it’s hard for me to put limitations on what exactly should be acceptable to be expressed or not.

10. Can good horror be rated PG-13 and still be scary?

A)YES. A perfect example is THE SIXTH SENSE. I found that movie very disturbing, in a good way, and it was PG-13. In this film’s case I don’t think they needed to show anymore than they did to make the point of the film. It never felt like it held back whatsoever. And it was gruesome and disturbing.

11. Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

A)Writing a lot. Doing awesome character roles. I hope directing by then too! We’ll see, some of the coolest stuff that I have fallen into is because of the unplanned paths that I have taken in life.

12. How has having your own MySpace page helped your career?

A)Myspace is a huge help and the source for a lot of evil. There’s very good and very bad that lives on Myspace. When I meet someone not in the business and they are NOT on Myspace I am very impressed! I do think the ability to meet like minded people is terrific. I think you can get the word out about stuff much easier than a web site because all people have to do is ‘friend’ you and that’s it. On an actual web site you have to get your links out there one by one and hope people frequent it and even find it. Myspace is immediate gratification. It’s also the source of some crappy and sleazy behavior. But you can’t blame Myspace for that only the individuals who use it for those reasons. People are responsible for themselves and even if a website makes deviant behavior easier it’s still the person punching the keyboard that is creating it. As far as meeting current and past friends, fans and listening to music it’s really a fun site. I think the good outweighs the bad.

13. Debbie, you are a real star both as an actress and more importantly, as a person. Thank you so much for agreeing to do this...
A) I thank you for your time and interest! Your cat looks just lovely!