Sleepaway Camp
Sleepaway Camp is a 1983 American slasher film written and directed by Robert Hiltzik, and starring Mike Kellin, Katherine Kamhi, and Paul DeAngelo alongside Jonathan Tiersten, Felissa Rose, Christopher Collet, and Karen Fields. The original entry in the Sleepaway Camp film series, it focuses on serial killings which occur at a summer camp for teenagers.
Filmed in upstate New York in the fall of 1982, Sleepaway Camp was released the following year by United Film Distributors. It earned approximately $11 million at the box office, but was met by largely unfavorable reviews from critics, many of whom deemed it exploitative and derivative of such films as Friday the 13th.
In the years since its release, Sleepaway Camp has gone on to develop a cult following, a more positive reappraisal from critics, as well as garnering notoriety for its twist ending, which has been named as one of the most shocking and unforgettable in cinematic history.
It was followed by four sequels: Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers, Sleepaway Camp III: Teenage Wasteland, Return to Sleepaway Camp and Sleepaway Camp IV: The Survivor.
Plot
In 1975, John Baker and his boyfriend, Lenny, take John’s children, Angela and Peter, on a boating trip. After the boat capsizes, John and the children try to swim to shore, but they swim into the path of a reckless motorboat and are struck. John and one of the children are killed.Eight years later, Angela, the surviving child, is traumatized and lives with her eccentric aunt, Dr. Martha Thomas, and cousin Ricky Thomas. Angela and Ricky are sent to Camp Arawak. Angela’s introverted nature makes her a target for bullying by fellow camper Judy and camp counselor Meg. The head cook, Artie, attempts to sexually assault her, but Ricky intervenes. Later, an unseen figure causes Artie to be severely scalded by boiling water. Artie is rushed to the hospital, and camp owner Mel Kostic dismisses the incident as accidental.
Campers Kenny and Mike mock Angela, prompting Ricky and his friend Paul to confront them. Paul befriends Angela. Later, after Kenny is out at night on the lake and capsizes his canoe, an unseen figure confronts Kenny. Kenny is found the next morning, drowned, and Mel again rules the death an accident. Paul asks Angela to go to the movies with him and kisses her. Campers Billy and Jimmy throw a water balloon at Angela, then Billy is killed when someone traps him in a public toilet with a beehive, exploiting his allergy. Mel begins to suspect a killer is at the camp.
Tensions rise as Angela and Paul’s relationship becomes strained. When Paul kisses her again, she has a flashback to witnessing her father with Lenny. Judy seduces Paul, and Angela finds them kissing. Paul tries to explain, but Judy goads Meg into carrying Angela to the pier and dumping Angela into the water. Mel stops Ricky from helping by holding him by the arms while accusing Ricky of harming campers to protect Angela; Ronnie intervenes. While Ricky helps Angela out of the water and back to the beach, four small children throw sand at Angela. Ricky comforts her, swearing revenge. Right after dinner, Meg is killed during her shower in one of the vacated cabins.
During the camp social, Paul apologizes to Angela, and she tells him to meet her by the water. Meanwhile, Mel discovers Meg’s body, and camp counselor Eddie finds the bodies of the four children who threw sand at Angela, brutally murdered in their sleeping bags. Soon after, Judy is killed by being vaginally penetrated with a hot electric curling iron. Panic spreads through the camp. Believing Ricky is the killer, Mel beats him unconscious, then runs into the woods, encountering the real assailant. Horrified, Mel recognizes the attacker before being killed by an arrow to the throat. Police begin searching for missing campers. Paul is at the beach with Angela, who suggests they go for a swim, while Officer Frank Breton finds Ricky alive but unconscious.
Camp counselors Ronnie, Angelo, and Susie discover a naked Angela humming and clutching a hunting knife alongside Paul’s severed head. They are shocked to realise that "Angela" is actually a boy. It turns out Angela is actually Peter, Angela's thought-to-be-dead brother. The real Angela had died in the boating accident, and Peter survived. After Martha gains custody of him, she decides to raise Peter as "Angela"; the girl she has always wanted. It is implied that Peter was mentally affected by being forced into the identity of his dead sister. The nude, blood-covered Angela/Peter stands before the horrified Susie and Ronnie, hissing and growling.
Cast
Production
Development
Writer-director Robert Hiltzik, a New York University film school graduate, began developing the idea for Sleepaway Camp in the 1970s. He was inspired by his own experiences attending Camp Algonquin in Argyle, New York as a child. He was also inspired to make the film following the success of Friday the 13th, though he has denied that the film was a direct inspiration on the screenplay.Hiltzik privately raised funding for the film through friends, family, and other "connections," eventually amassing a budget of $335,000 to make the film.
Casting
Unlike many of its contemporaries, which had adults portraying youth, the cast of Sleepaway Camp was primarily made up of adolescent actors. During casting for the role of Angela Baker, actresses were asked to stare wide-eyed into the camera while pretending to eat a chocolate bar. Felissa Rose was cast in her debut role as the character, and was paid only $5,000 for her performance. Rose wore a bra to appear flat-chested. She made friends with all the kids on set. Frank Sorrentino was cast as the young Peter Baker at the beginning of the film. Dan Tursi, who played John Baker, was one of Hiltzik's classmates at New York University Tisch School of the Arts, where he appeared in three of Hiltzik's short films. When auditioning for the role of Ricky Thomas, Jonathan Tiersten was asked by Hiltzik to curse him out, and thus was given the role. Both he and Rose initially did not get along, so they were taken bowling in order to bond with each other. They developed a romance during filming, but broke up soon after.Jane Krakowski was initially cast as Judy, but turned down the role upon learning of the character's death, and was replaced with Karen Fields. Fields improvised her performance, finding it fun to play a "bad girl" character. Christopher Collet was cast as Paul. Katherine Kamhi and Thomas E. van Dell, who played Meg and Mike, dated during production. Kamhi also became close with Rose and Fields. When filming the skinny dipping scene, Loris Sallahian, who played Billy, was displeased with the conditions and walked off the set, but returned after a personal chat with Hiltzik. John E. Dunn and Lisa Buckler were cast as Kenny and Leslie, respectively; during filming of the scene in which the canoe flips over in the lake, Dunn cut the top of his hand open and had to be rushed to hospital. Producer Michele Tatosian filled in for Buckler in the shot where Leslie swims away, as Buckler had gotten infectious mononucleosis and was sick.
Desiree Gould was with the agency Marje Fields Talent in Manhattan, and was urged to audition for the role of Aunt Martha by her agent, Dorothy Scott. She appeared in only two scenes in the film, initially wanting to leave as she found Martha's dialogue too bizarre to say with a straight face. Hiltzik sought Mike Kellin to portray camp owner Mel Kostic, and managed to track him down to his home in Nyack, New York, after Kellin's agent initially rejected the screenplay. Tatosian managed to contact Kellin via phone, and convinced him to take the role. Kellin was ill with lung cancer during filming, and died on August 26, 1983, three months prior to the film's release.
The cast and crew's relatives and some local kids played some of the campers leaving the buses near the beginning of the film. Willy Kuskin, who played Mozart, was genuinely bullied by the other kids during filming. Frank Trent Saladino, who played Gene, had to intervene and protect him. The Glens Falls Police Department lent one of their uniforms to Allen Breton for his role as Officer Frank Breton. At one point, Breton shaved off his mustache during filming for another acting job, and had to wear a fake one for the film's remaining scenes.
Filming
of Sleepaway Camp took place at Camp Algonquin in Argyle, New York. Filming began in September 1982 and lasted five weeks. Hiltzik dedicated the film to his mother, who died in a car accident before production began. The film had been storyboarded but after the first day of filming, the film was already behind schedule. The storyboards could not be used and were thrown out. The trees, with their leaves turning, belie the summer setting of the film.Several crew members, including costume designer Eileen Sieff and mechanical effects technician Ed Fountain, were hired by production manager Carl Clifford; Clifford, Fountain and Sieff had previously worked on George A. Romero's Creepshow.
Special effects
The practical and makeup effects were done by Ed French, Diane Lawrence, and Suzen Poshek. Jonathan Tiersten performed Angela's killing scenes since Felissa Rose's contract stated that she would not do the killings on-screen due to her young age. A lifecast of John E. Dunn was used for Kenny's death scene. The effects used for Billy's death were achieved using a dummy with sugar mixture on its face to attract the bees.For the scene in which "Angela" is revealed to be Peter Baker, Rose was originally going to wear a prosthetic penis. Archie Liberace, a local college student, was paid $200 to fill in for Rose. Liberace had to be drunk before filming the scene. He shaved his body and stood naked on the waterfront, wearing a mask of Angela's face. The mask, designed by French, featured glass eyes and was crafted out of dental acrylic.