From writer/director Ryan Spindell, the horror fantasy The Mortuary Collection tells the tale of Montgomery Dark (Clancy Brown), the eccentric undertaker at the Raven’s End Mortuary. Passionate about his work, the unusual man chronicles the strange and twisted history of the town for a young woman (Caitlin Custer) that turns up on his doorstep with secrets of her own.
During this 1-on-1 phone interview with Collider, Brown talked about the evolution of this character, the fun in playing Montgomery Dark, performing the funeral services, and how he felt about his character’s final moment in the film. He also talked about joining the revival of Dexter, and playing the only decent man in Promising Young Woman.
COLLIDER: This is certainly a character that has a very specific look and manner about him. Did you know all of that when you signed on? Was that always part of the deal or was that something that developed once you had agreed to play him?
CLANCY BROWN: Well, [writer/director] Ryan Spindell is an artist as well. He had a lot of drawings and renderings of this world. And then, of course, he had the short "The Babysitter Murders," so you got an idea of the tone and his sense of humor and his expertise, as a filmmaker. I saw the pictures that he had for Montgomery and for the house and for the mortuary, and we had long conversations about it. And then, finally, we went to Amalgamated Dynamics, who did the design and put the makeup on. Once you put the makeup on, put the teeth in and do the hair, it all falls into place. You do a little experimenting with the voice and you settle on something that tickles you, and it’s off to the races.
What is it like to have to replicate that every day when you’re shooting?
BROWN: That’s just the gig. That’s what you have to do. When you do heavy makeup like that, it’s a little bit easier because you’ve got two and a half hours that you have to sit there and do nothing but think about getting into character. That part of it was easy. And then, you’re relieved when you’re finally up and ready to go. Once you’re up out of the chair, then it’s all about making him live and breathe. That was a lot of fun.
Aside from the transformative aspect of the character, what did you like about playing this guy? What did you find fun about Montgomery Dark, as far as things that you hadn’t gotten to do before with a character?
BROWN: I never expected that I would be allowed to do a character this much fun and this extreme, so that was a blast. What is so great about Ryan’s writing and how he tells the story is that you can tell that both Montgomery and Sam have secrets that they’re not letting on. They’re not telling everything they know. They’re not telling everything about themselves. Of course, by the end, we find out something about something about both of them, but we don’t find out that much about Montgomery. We find out a little bit about Montgomery in reference to everything else, but we don’t find out any specifics about Montgomery, which I think is very cool. You can just make up whatever you want about that creepy old guy and what he did to deserve his life as the mortician at the Raven’s End Mortuary.
He definitely seems like a guy who also gets very into his funeral services. Was it fun to get up there and do that?
BROWN: That was actually all Ryan and Ryan’s direction. He said, “He has to lose it and get carried away because this is the only time he ever sees people, and it has to freak out the people and make them not want to be part of it. He has to go over the top and go a little bit too far.” So, he kept pushing me to go farther and farther and farther, and that was a lot of fun. We didn’t freak anybody out. Everybody was giggling throughout the whole thing when we were doing it. He’s a little bit too much into his own voice and his own ideas. He’s from a different time. He’s from the time of oration and performance, and he doesn’t get to do it except when somebody dies. What does he do when there is no audience? He can’t scratch that itch.
What was your reaction to learning about your character’s final moment, and then also seeing how that would play out?
BROWN: Well, we weren’t sure exactly what that final moment was supposed to be, and whether it was supposed to be relief or horror, or whether it was supposed to be painful. We just weren’t sure. Ryan chose the apprehension and the, “Oh, my God, it’s not what I thought it was gonna be. This hurts more than I thought. It was more of a surprise to Montgomery.” I wanted it to be more poetic and final, but that’s just me. I’m not the filmmaker. He made it much more interesting, I thought.
I actually would have been perfectly fine with him shuffling off to a tropical island somewhere, after all of the things he’s been through.
BROWN: Yeah, I think that’s what he thought was gonna happen. He thought he was gonna walk out and pop on his hat, stroll down the road, and go off into the sunset because he’d paid his debt to the universe and now everything was fine, but that’s not the way it works. Now that I see what it is, I would’ve loved to try to turn around and run back into the house before what happens, happens.
It was also announced that you would be playing the primary villain on the revival of Dexter. What made you want to join that show?
BROWN: The pandemic quarantine and isolation. I got sick of sitting at home with nothing to do.
Had you been a fan of the original run?
BROWN: I hadn’t actually watched. Once they started knocking on my door, I started watching it and I really liked it. I think it’s an interesting show, especially considering the time and place that it was on. I liked what they tried to do with every season. They had this overarching theme that they were exploring and I liked that idea. I don’t think this is any different. They’re doing that same thing. I don’t know why everybody was so upset with the ending. I thought it was okay.
I also loved the work that you did in Promising Young Woman. How did it feel to play the only decent man in that film?
BROWN: I thought that was really clever on Emerald [Fennell]’s part. I’m known as a movie heavy and bad guy, and all of the other guys are known as nice guys and funny guys and charming guys. I just thought that was really clever. I was just impressed with her and Carey [Mulligan] and Jennifer [Coolidge]. I was just trying to stay out of their way and let them have fun. Bo [Burnham] was hilarious. He was great. I just tried to keep my head down and let them have the show. It was a blast to do, but I was very intimidated by all of that power and talent.
What did you think when you read that script for the first time, compared to then seeing the finished product?
BROWN: Very similar. It made me very angry, that script. At the end, I was so pissed off. It was very familiar, all of those situations. I was like, “This script really pisses me off. I really wanna do it.” Every father of a daughter that I know has said the same thing. They’re angry, too. I’m a father of a daughter.
You’ve played good guys, you’ve played bad guys, and you’ve played some questionable guys. Do you like your bad guy characters as much as your good guy characters, or is it more about understanding their motivations and their actions more than actually liking them?
BROWN: Yeah, it’s just about understanding what’s going on. They’re all good guys in their own minds. Very few of them are bad guys. Even if they know they’re bad, they have a good reason for it. There’s some something underlying the rationale. We’re really good at rationalizing ourselves and rationalizing our behavior, as human beings. The story makes them what they are. If you look at the ‘80s when Schwarzenegger and Stallone and those guys were just going around and murdering people, right and left, who’s the bad guy? For crying out loud, what are they doing? Somebody punches their wife in the nose or did something bad to their family, and it gives them license to murder everybody. We don’t do that so much anymore in films now. People are more sophisticated.
The Mortuary Collection is available on VOD, Digital HD, Blu-ray and DVD.