Coverage of Sandra's treatment in horror and film media is... unsatisfactory

Earlier I looked at whether Sandra Peabody's experience making Last House on the Left was covered extensively both in legacy media and in academic publications. In both cases, on what was necessarily a sample of both types of media, I found that it was not. In fact, Sandra's abuse was mentioned only once or twice.

So, let's turn our gaze to horror media. Surely that will bring us better results? Last House is, after all, a highly influential film – often treated as something of a foundational text for the slasher movies that followed it.

In his book about US exploitation cinema of the era, The Style of Sleaze, Callum Waddell notes that Chas Balun, who wrote for Fangoria and acted as its film critic, disdained Last House on the Left on its original release, saying:

Even some of the genre’s most famous critics found themselves unsure of how to approach Craven’s debut film. Celebrated Fangoria contributor Chas Balun would write that The Last House on the Left should be scorned for its ‘explicit horror and mayhem ... one of the most repugnant “horror” films ever made’.¹

This however says nothing about the film's production conditions. Digging deeper, we can look at back issues of genre periodicals – and here we do find something, albeit not much. Another major US horror magazine, Rue Morgue, ran a "Whatever happened to...?" article about Sandra in its March/April 2022 edition. The relevant part says:

"[Sandra] didn’t exactly receive prima donna treatment on set [as] co-stars David Hess and Marc Sheffler remained in character between shots, bullying her and even going so far as actually threatening to harm her to get good footage. She reportedly walked out of the cast screening of the film, horrified by what she saw."

This is factually true, and Sandra's screening walk-out isn't often mentioned, but it's notable that her actual abuse is reduced to part of one sentence. The feeling of this being largely treated as a trivia spot is enhanced by the one small picture showing the bound and gagged Mari as she spots her mailbox. Not great for an article written as recently as 2022.

Books? Again, there's very little that I've found, beyond of course Szulkin's much older work. Jason Zinoman's book Shock Value is notable – and unusual – for repeating David Hess's rape threat from Zinoman's own Vanity Fair article, although it truncates it and adds an assertion about Wes Craven's behaviour:

"Craven did not object to his star David Hess's method-style brutality [...] On the set, it was equally uncomfortable, which [Hess] readily admits. 'I was very mean to the girls, so when it came to the rape scene [Sandra Cassell] didn't have to act,' he says, referring to the costar who played one of the victims. 'I told her, "I'm really going to fuck you if you don't behave yourself. They'll just let the camera run."'²

The second half of Hess's magazine quote, in which he tells Sandra he will "devastate" her and trivialises her reaction as saying he didn't think "she was too happy about that", is omitted by Zinoman here.

Surely horror-focused web pages and blogs – as opposed to listicles or Blu-ray reviews – will have something relevant to say? I touched on Surgeons of Horror's blog post near the end of my piece about their podcast. Elsewhere, though, the results are unimpressive. A few examples will suffice.

Ashley Manning's review of the film notes that it feels "very raw and real", but the only real attention paid to production ethics is this:

"The final sequence involves a chainsaw, and it looks like the shot was incredibly dangerous and something that wouldn’t be made in the same way today."

Nicolò Grasso's piece "The Imitative Grindhouse Cinema of Rob Zombie" notes that Zombie is particularly influenced by Last House, as well as The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, and adds:

"Actors are constantly sweating and panting, experiencing real hell on these independent productions to the point that their suffering increases the empathy of the viewers."

This is a rare acknowledgement of the toll on grindhouse cinema's performers, not just their characters. As soon as this uncomfortable aspect is raised, however, the writer moves on to talk about Zombie being influenced by Mari's walk to the lake before her murder.

More interesting for our purposes is the article "Exploiting Exploitation: The Last House on the Left", published without a byline by Morbidly Beautiful in 2018. An odd mix of conventional article and extended listicle, it includes this:

"[A]t least on film, it’s hard to see where the actor Hess ends and the character Krug begins. That is the genius of an intelligent, talented actor like Hess. David’s thespian abilities will make you think, “Is this guy really crazy?” Damn fine acting!"

This is deeply frustrating: the writer glimpses the blurring of character and actor that was behind Hess's obsessive holding character, but never takes that a stage further to consider that his "genius" resulted in real-life harm to Sandra. Worse, the "Can I?" incident is referenced (largely accurately) by Morbidly Beautiful – but only in the listicle-like "trivia" section at the end.

Let me be clear: Sandra Peabody's abuse is not trivia. That so many sources still treat it as such is a sign of how far they still have to travel in properly acknowledging what was done to her.

Admit One Film Addict has a spotlight on David Hess. The section about Last House is headed by the rape scene close-up – unusually, with Sandra's eyes open – but all we actually get about her is this, right at the end of that section:

"Hess's technique of method acting really came into play as he famously threatened co-star Sandra Peabody to get a better reaction from her."

The author calls Hess "easily one of [their] favourite bad guys" and refers to his part in Last House as a "triumph", so I suppose it's something that his threat is mentioned at all. We do see yet another appearance of the misuse of the term "method acting", however.

We'll end with two sources that do at least mention the ethical failure of Last House on the Left's production. Davide Prevarin's article for Frame Rated includes this brief passage near the end:

"Actors were mostly inexperienced first-timers, and the crew filmed at certain locations without permits. A fair deal of what was once termed “method acting” was involved, now better described as “workplace abuse”."

This last point is very important, and the use of the word "abuse" in Last House media is sufficiently rare as to be highly noticeable when it does occur – but predictably and disappointingly, the writer suggests that it was simply one aspect of several that added up to the film receiving cult status.

Finally for this post, there's the detailed review of the movie by the oddly named 2 Unpaid Movie Critics!!! blog. This once again contains factual errors ("the bound and gagged victims are being slowly carried out the window of the apartment" – we only see Mari being carried, and it's the fire escape door). However, the piece does include this:

"In another one of those Blu Ray interviews, David Hess [mentions that Sandra] suddenly got this look in her eyes, like she had really gone somewhere else mentally, and he says, 'At that point, I knew that if I'd really wanted to, I could have f****d her, and she wouldn’t have done anything.' What??? [...] I found myself wondering how Craven found a career after this movie."

The quote from the music featurette is – why is this so unsurprising? – incorrect in the words inside the quotes, though at least more or less accurate in terms of the impression Hess gives.

All in all, while there are perhaps more mentions of Sandra Peabody's treatment in these pieces than in the more general or academic texts, there is still a serious dearth of pieces that cover it at any length. She really does deserve better.

¹ Waddell, Callum. The Style of Sleaze: The American Exploitation Film, 1959–1977. Edinburgh University Press (2018). p124.
² Zinoman, Jason. Shock Value. The Penguin Press (2011). p77.