The knife-wielding masked killer is poised to be a box office hit when Ghostface returns to screens. “Scream 7,” the latest installment in the long-running horror series, has grossed a frighteningly strong $45 million to $50 million in North America. These estimates would be the best kick-off for the series and highlight Paramount and Spyglass’s success in revitalizing a building that just a decade ago would have killed more people than one of the many victims of the infamous street bug.
But the film’s return to theaters was a bumpy one, with dramatic layoffs, high-profile cast members, and creative exits that required major script revisions, leading to vocal backlash from fans.
In late 2023, Melissa Barrera, star of the 2022 Scream reboot and 2023 Scream VI, was fired from the seventh film by Spyglass over social media messages that the production company deemed anti-Semitic. When war broke out in Gaza that year, Barrera reshared posts accusing Israel of “genocide and ethnic cleansing” and a magazine article claiming the Israeli government was distorting “the Holocaust to promote Israel’s arms industry.”
Shortly after Barrera’s firing, his sister Jenna Ortega, whose profile skyrocketed after joining the Scream team with Barrera, announced that she would not be returning to Scream 7. She cited scheduling conflicts with the popular Netflix series “Wednesday.” Amid the turmoil, the film’s original director, Christopher Landon, left the project after receiving death threats over Barrera’s firing, despite not making the decision to fire him.
At a creative crossroads, the producers of Scream turned to series veteran Kevin Williamson to take over as director of the seventh film in the series. He and Guy Busick, the screenwriter for the previous two movies, co-wrote the script, which required a major overhaul given the departure of Ortega and Barrera, who had starred in Scream VI in favor of Sidney Prescott, the resilient heroine played by Neve Campbell. Officials say the rewrite cost is estimated to be about $500,000, which is not a huge expense for a series of this size.
For the sixth film, Paramount executives were concerned about making a Scream movie without Campbell, who did not return due to salary issues. However, the studio’s say in the matter was limited, as Spyglass had the final say on creative decisions. All fears were put to rest when Scream VI grossed $161 million at the global box office, becoming the biggest box office hit since the first two films.
But even without high-profile Ortega on board for the sequel, Paramount and Spyglass knew they needed a killer marketing hook. Spyglass head Gary Barber, known as one of Hollywood’s toughest business partners, had more influence on Campbell’s return this time around. The actor was able to earn a contract worth nearly $7 million, a big raise, and a huge salary in the horror genre. Courteney Cox, who has appeared in every Scream movie since the original 1996 slasher, was given a $2 million salary.
“Neve Campbell will play Scream, kind of like Jamie Lee Curtis in the Halloween series,” says Sean Robbins, director of film analysis at Fandango and founder of Box Office Theory. “She’s a big draw, especially to the older generation who grew up on the original movies.”
Paramount and Spyglass are banking on nostalgia as well as horror’s enduring popularity to propel the slasher franchise to new box office heights. (The studio is tempering expectations, predicting a debut closer to $40 million, while rivals and independent tracking services are predicting the initial figure could exceed $50 million.) That’s because the cost of making “Scream 7” began to balloon as the film was delayed a year. The budget for Chapter 7 was $45 million, a significant increase from the $35 million for the sixth film. One source cited inflation, which has affected everything from set construction to travel costs, as a contributing factor to the budget increase.
“Initially, it was thought that we might lose the momentum of the first two films, and there’s certainly a segment of the audience that is upset that no one is coming back,” Robbins says. “But now the pendulum has swung back. This has created a lot of interest in how certain characters will return.”
And this probably won’t be Ghostface’s last reign of terror. Sources have hinted that plans are already in place for the killer to make a deadly comeback in the eighth movie. Tell survivors to hide their families.
