It’s been over 25 years since Wes Craven’s The People Under the Stairs came out in 1991. Despite grossing nearly 4x its budget, the film is rarely mentioned among Craven’s best work. The film is marketed as a pure horror film, the poster featuring an ominous skull over a creepy house, and even the title triggers visions of monsters in the basement. What the film is though, is way ahead of its time. The film is brimming with social commentary that fits much better in 2017’s America than it did perhaps in the early ’90s. This weekend at the New Jersey Horror Con and Film Festival in Iselin, NJ, stars of the film reunited to meet fans, sign autographs, and take pictures. On Saturday morning, Sean Whalen (Roach), Yan Birch (Stairmaster), Brandon Adams (Fool) and Kelly Jo Minter (Ruby) took the stage for a Q&A discussion with fans.

More below.

The People Under The Stairs
Blu-ray (Collector’s Edition)
Director: Wes Craven
Screenwriter: Wes Craven
Cast: Brandon Adams, Everett McGill, Wendy Robie, A.J. Langer, Ving Rhames, Sean Whalen
Scream Factory
Rated R | 103 Minutes
Release Date: August 11, 2015

“In every neighborhood there is one house that adults whisper about and children cross the street to avoid…”

Written and directed by Wes Craven (A Nightmare on Elm Street, Scream), 1991’s The People Under The Stairs stars Everett McGill and Wendy Robie (Twin Peaks) as bible-thumping psychos who live in a house of unspeakable horrors. Brandon Adams (The Mighty Ducks) stars as Poindexter “Fool” Williams, a streetwise kid from a Los Angeles ghetto. With his family facing eviction, Fool agrees to assist Leroy (Ving Rhames) and his associate Spenser (Jeremy Roberts) in breaking into their landlord’s home in search of riches.

Things take a sinister turn when the robbers find themselves trapped inside a suburban fortress, held captive by the masochistic doppelgängers of Ronald and Nancy Reagan. Robie and McGill, known only as “Mommy” and “Daddy,” are a pair of fundamentalist maniacs who have imprisoned their daughter Alice (A.J. Langer) for her entire life. Their darkest secret, however, lurks within the homestead’s walls… and under the stairs.