Ari Aster said in a Q&A after a screening of Hereditary (via Gold Derby) at the Egyptian Theater that he has written a prequel to the 2018 horror hit but has no plans to film it.
“I wrote a prequel to this,” Astor said Sunday night. “It just doesn’t feel like the right time. This is a prequel, not a sequel, so we don’t know what’s going to happen next.”
Hereditary was Aster’s feature directorial debut, and it put him on the map as a notable filmmaker in the horror genre. Starring Toni Collette, Alex Wolff, Milly Shapiro, and Gabriel Byrne, Hereditary follows the Graham family whose modest life begins to fall apart when their reclusive grandmother dies.
Since then, Aster has directed Midsommar, Never Afraid of Bo and Eddington, all released through A24.
Aster’s films, along with those of directors like Jordan Peele and Robert Eggers, are often referred to as “high horror,” but Aster rejects this. He explained in the same interview, “I hate the term highbrow horror, especially because it’s like a box I’ve been put in and horror fans resent it.”
Aster later explained that Danny DeVito tried to finance “Hereditary” but was unable to find the funding. He explained that his final choice, Astor, an unknown investor, pushed him into “one of the darkest times of my life.”
“What can I say, it’s just been put into the hands of financiers, and it’s even worse,” Astor explained. “I’m scared to say his name because he might come into my life. He’s a real nightmare and I gave away my life, but he also signed the movie to me. He held me in the palm of his hand. It was one of the darkest times in my life actually finishing this movie and trying to protect it and just keep it from blowing up.”
