It may appear that being a successful actor in Hollywood is all about VIP treatment and red-carpet events, but reaching that level of popularity requires more than just ability. In addition, it needs real guts and drive, as well as the ability to endure what could have been a harrowing bear attack on occasion. Take it from Neve Campbell.
As the eldest daughter on Fox drama Party of Five, Campbell rocketed to popularity in her early twenties and is presently making the rounds to promote the latest installment in the meta-horror Scream franchise. In the film, simply titled Scream, she reprises her role as Sidney Prescott, whom we first met in 1996 as a high school student who had a propensity of luring serial killers.
There were earlier projects that may have developed into real-life horror films that Campbell had plenty of screen time as a scream queen. Following the release of her new film, Campbell sat down with Kelly Clarkson earlier this week to talk about it, when the conversation turned to a project she worked on when she was 17 years old, in which she and a bear she was acting opposite didn’t get along.
“I was playing this role where she’s ‘one with the animals’ and there was a scene where I was getting chased by a bear,” Campbell explained. “They brought this bear on set and they first gave me this big bottle of Coke to feed it. [Then] they said, ‘Dip your hand in honey and just run. And when you get to the tree over there, turn your hand out and feed the bear.’”
Campbell, always the obedient performer, did what she was told. Campbell explained, “I dipped my hand in honey and ran to this rock, and I turned around and put my hand out, and the bear isn’t slowing down or coming for my hand.” His grip on my leg pulls me through the forest,” I say. My mother was on set and screamed at the time. Because no one can accept what’s happening, the entire crew is frozen. All I can think of is, ‘He’s biting me,’ as if it weren’t evident already.”
Campbell escaped largely unhurt after a bear wrangler threw rocks at her ursine co-star to divert the bear’s attention away from her. Campbell considers the event to be kind of stupid now that he has seen it. She explained, “We get asked to do foolish stuff.”
The entire portion may be seen above. On January 14, 2022, Scream will be released in theaters.
