Bruce Visits "Bubba Ho-Tep" Screening in So-Cal

The finally-released horror-comedy "Bubba Ho-Tep" debuted in San Diego at the Ken Cinema this weekend. Most of the shows quickly sold out, with the biggest crowd by far lining up for Saturday night, when horror legend Bruce Campbell (Elvis his-self in "Bubba") made an appearance. After the lights came back on from the screening, the man who will forever be known to horror fans as Ash from "Evil Dead" appeared to scattered chants of "Bruce - Bruce - Bruce".

If you've seen Campbell in person before, you know he's a sarcastic bastard - funny but harsh. A Bruce Campbell question and answer session is sort of like the opposite of a stand up comedy routine, or maybe it's like some strange British TV gameshow - the star heckles audience members and fans as they ask questions and futilely attempt to impress him with their knowledge of his movies.

Here are a few of the audience questions and Bruce's answers, all from memory, so the wording may not be exact:

Question From Audience: Can I have your autograph?
Campbell: No

Q: Can I have a picture with you?
Campbell: No.

Q: It's my birthday, will you sing me happy birthday?
Campbell: If I was your little monkey, I might.

Q: Will you accept this "Bruce For California Governor" shirt?
Campbell: Only if you grope me first. (He then let the guy grope him before taking the shirt.)

Q: Would you rather Bubba Ho-Tep was done by a major studio?
Campbell: If a big studio did this movie, the first questions they would have asked would have been: 1) Does it have to be Elvis? 2) Does he have to have cancer on his penis? Can't he just have, like, general cancer?

Q: What would you have changed about the movie?
Campbell: What can you change about a story like this? Should we make him normal? What's the point?

Q: Why don't you go to Comic Con in San Diego?
Campbell: I have in the past, but back then no one cared about me.

Q: Did you get to keep the Elvis jump suit?
Campbell: Why? Do you really think I would wear one around? They were made by the actual company that made the real suits for Elvis.

Q: What make you consider doing one indie over another?
Campbell: In this case, the fact that they were shooting it in six weeks, rather than one week like some small productions do, made it more interesting.

Q: Do you like doing movies or TV better?
Campbell: TV is easier to shoot. Movies are more in depth, but boring to shoot because they take so long.

Q: How did it feel to audition for the X-Files?
Campbell: It felt like a loser situation. They didn't pick me for the part.

Q: Have you gotten any feedback from the Presley family about the movie?
Campbell: Yeah right. We haven't been sued - it's a parody. He's dead, that's why we can do a movie like this.

Q: When are you going to do Evil Dead 4?
Campbell: Tell you what, contact Sam Raimi and tell him to do "Evil Dead 4" instead of "Spiderman 2" - see what he says.

Q: Will you be in Spiderman 2?
Campbell: Yeah, I play a snooty usher.

Q: Have there been any Oscar rumblings over Bubba Ho-Tep?
Campbell: The people at the Oscars don't even know who I am.

There were a number of people who did that super-fan thing where they don't really ask a question, so much as mention some obscure fact or quote from one of his previous movies. Refreshingly, he shut them down quickly and moved on to people with other questions he could make fun of.

As Campbell's time ran out for the night, he made some serious comments thanking fans for supporting his movies and independent movies and reminded people that the way to encourage and support quirky cool low budget movies being made is to buy tickets to them and DVDs. He said that indie fans have a lot more buying power than they realize and they should use it to influence what is being produced.

I would have had some cool close up pics of Bruce for this article, but I brought the wrong camera for a dark room. If you squint really hard, maybe you can pretend that the tiny brown splotch standing in front of the white screen looks like him. Next time, I'll bring the commando camera!

It was a fun horror-night-out. If you have a chance to see Bruce (or "Bubba") in your town, go for it!