Why Bill Skarsgard & The Losers Club Were Kept Separate During Stephen King’s It

Casting is such a crucial component to crafting a great film that last year the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences rightly deemed the profession worthy of Oscar recognition. There will now be a Best Casting trophy handed out every March, which has avid Oscar viewers wondering what films would’ve won the top prize each year prior to 2025 –- and whether that winner would’ve had to be in the running for Best Picture. Would this have been a way to make sure star-studded romps like “It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World,” “Casino Royale,” or “The Cannonball Run” were represented on Hollywood’s biggest night? Would a critical misfire like “Heartburn” have been acknowledged just for bringing together the heavyweight acting duo of Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep for the first time? Could films like “The Outsiders” or “Stand by Me” (which should’ve been a Best Picture contender) have taken home the hardware for bringing together an absurdly talented ensemble of young talent?

If it’s a yes to that last question, then it’s not hard to imagine Andy Muschietti’s 2017 blockbuster “It” getting its Academy due with at least a Best Casting nomination. The Losers Club of Jaeden Lieberher, Finn Wolfhard, Jeremy Ray Taylor, Sophia Lillis, Jack Dylan Grazer, Wyatt Oleff, and Chosen Jacobs were a natural fit; they didn’t have to force laughing at in-jokes because it felt like they’d all grown up together. That’s an incredibly hard dynamic to nail.

Also difficult: getting kids to feign terror in the face of unimaginable monstrousness. This is in part because directors like to keep the mood as light as possible on set so as not to leave scars on their young charges’ psyches. And then there’s the fact that they get to see the monster as a real, hopefully nice person every day at work. How do you whip up terror in an environment like this? For Andy Muschietti, it was a matter of keeping the actor (in this case, Bill Skarsgård) away from the kids until it was time for him to be said monster.

According to a featurette produced by Warner Bros., Muschietti allowed his young actors to meet co-star Bill Skarsgård at the first table read. After that, however, he went away until it was time for him to don his makeup as the murderous clown Pennywise. As producer Seth Grahame-Smith notes in the promotional video, this was done to get as “authentic” a reaction as possible from the kids.

It worked! All you have to do is watch the movie to see that, but Jack Grazer wanted to make this absolutely plain while speaking to the press. “One minute he’s asking if I’m okay,” said Grazer “And the next minute he’s trying to choke me.”

Keeping cast members separate is nothing new. John Landis famously did this with the Deltas and the Alphas during the shooting of “National Lampoon’s Animal House,” while, more recently, Celine Song didn’t allow “Past Lives” actors Teo Yoo and John Magaro to meet until they had to play their respective roles as Greta Lee’s childhood sweetheart and her husband. This might sound like a stunt, but once you get the perfect cast together, you’ve got to place them in the best possible situation to succeed.