Longlegs Director Osgood Perkins on How His Father Anthony Perkins’ Secret Shaped His Films

Longlegs director Osgood Perkins recalls that when was eight, in 1982, People magazine put his father, Psycho star Anthony Perkins, on its cover to promote his new film Psycho 2.

"Like the mama's boy he plays, he was scared of women (even Fonda and Bardot), until a good wife turned his life around," the People cover said of his dad.

Speaking Friday night at the Chilliwack Independent Film Festival, following a screening of his phenomenal horror hit Longlegs, Osgood Perkins recalled how the cover affected him.

"It was this whole thing about, 'Tony Perkins is scared of women,'" Osgood Perkins recalled. "At the time, I'm eight years old, I'm like, eh?"

The cover was hinting at Perkins' homosexuality, something of an open secret in Hollywood at the time: "Now some X percentage of the population reading that were like, 'He's gay. We all know that,'" Osgood Perkins explained.

But no one had explained the situation to Osgood, including his mother — the wife who, according to People, had turned Tony Perkins' life around.

Osgood Perkins explained Friday that he grew up with a sense that his mother, actress and model Berry Berenson, wasn't honest with the kids about the family dynamic. But at the same time, even without being told what was happening, he knew that something in the household was unusual.

That tension between what was said and wasn't said has informed his films since, including Longlegs.

"I'm the kid in the house, so I know everything, right?" Perkins explained. "Those of you who have kids know your kids know everything. And so that juxtaposition of, 'I think I understand everything, but I don't understand anything' — that essential kind of taffy — that becomes real interesting fodder for art forever."

Osgood Perkins has spoken before about how much his parents have influenced his work. As he told MovieMaker earlier this year, he believes people make horror movies, in part, to cope with death. His father did in 1992, at the age of 60, and his mother died less than a year later when she was a passenger in one of the planes in the 9/11 attacks.

Perkins delved into his family's history in response to an audience member's question about his thoughts on the importance of femininity in horror films.

Longlegs was the opening film of the Chilliwack Independent Film Festival, and the talk was another sign of how seriously Chilliwack, a British Columbia mountain town of about 100,000, takes film and the creative process.

Osgood Perkins on Femininity in Silence of the Lambs and Longlegs

A minor spoiler about Longlegs: Late in the story, FBI agent Lee Harker (Maika Monroe), who is hunting the serial killer Longlegs (Nicolas Cage), Lee discovers that her mother (Alicia Witt) has been keeping a secret.

Longlegs uses Silence of the Lambs as a reference point, and in that 1991 masterpiece, underestimated FBI trainee Clarice Starling (Jodie Foster) discovers late in the film that serial killer Buffalo Bill (spoiler, but have you seriously not seen Silence of the Lambs?) is making a suit out of his female victims.

The reveal in Silence of the Lambs parallels one in Psycho in which Anthony Perkins' character, Norman Bates, becomes (another spoiler, and strong recommendation that you see 1960's Psycho) the original gender-bending Hollywood killer.

Osgood Perkins explained to the Chilliwack audience that in Longlegs and his previous films — including his 2015 debut as a writer-director, 2015’s The Blackcoat’s Daughter — he drew inspiration from complicated feelings around sexuality.

Being a teenager, he said, is "hard enough when you're not in the taffy of like Tony Perkins in Psycho."

It's hard to apply hard labels to feelings, half-feelings, and confusion — which is exactly what Perkins gets across in the often-shifting Longlegs.

But tension and uncertainty are better sources of storytelling inspiration than simple, straightforward stories about his life. It's one of the reason he enjoys writing female protagonists, he said.

"As you're writing, you've got kind of tools to keep yourself interested. And one of those is, maybe write women protagonists, because what the f--- do I know about a woman protagonist? I don't know," he said. "And so that curiosity becomes part of the mystery, becomes part of what's interesting about what you're doing, and it keeps you kind of alive to the process."

Longlegs is now available on video on demand from NEON. You can learn more about the Chilliwack Independent Film Festival, including another Osgood Perkins' event today, here.

Main image: Nicolas Cage as Longlegs. NEON.