AfterElton recently had the opportunity to question the Texas native about creating a new genre--the gay horror pic!

AfterElton.com: Where did the idea of HellBent come from?
Paul Etheredge-Outzts: Well, the producers had made up their mind to do a gay slasher film. A “gay Halloween” is how it was pitched to me. The rest of it… Well, there were stipulations like the killer had to wear a mask and it had to take place on Santa Monica Boulevard during the Halloween festival. Aside from those mandates, the story was up to me.

Instead of reinventing the slasher movie, I was interested in doing a familiar slasher pic populated with different characters. It follows a very familiar model. But I thought it would be a kick to see characters representing people I know. Like to see at the beginning of the film two guys making out instead of typical couple. I was also interested in making characters more dimensional then they typically are in these type of movies. Hopefully, I succeeded.

AE: Were you conscious of trying to portray gay men in a certain light? How about the drag queen?
PEO: I wasn’t interested in presenting stereotypes we’re all used to seeing on Will and Grace or to a lesser extent, Queer as Folk, both of which I haven’t seen in years. I am gay and was out by 14. I was raised by lesbians. I’m comfortable with my sexuality. I wanted to see guys who were also. That being gay not an issue for them. But, no, there was no pressure to portray the gay men in a particular way.

I wasn’t interested in the same old stereotypes. I was interested in trying to show a cross section of different kinds of gay culture. To demonstrate variety. We have a leather bar that is filled with bears. We used genuine drag queens and one of our leads dresses in drag. We portray that we come in all kinds of varieties which is something we don’t see in typical entertainment. Apparently, we’re all hair dressers.

AE: What about the gay character who does drugs and has lots of sex? Isn’t that a stereotype?
PEO: Hey, there certainly are drug-doing promiscuous guys out there. This character is a character who for the night is out to party, yet he’s still a good guy. He’s more dimensional than a hound dog.

AE: What do you think of the gay horror genre? Why does gay/horror fit so well together?
PEO: I am very excited to see what happens to the gay horror genre and to see if it does have a life. There are a number of gay horror films in the works. here! TV has a gay horror series. Horror has for a long time been known for having a subtext that is gay. Now the subtext is becoming the main text. Well, I don’t entirely agree with that. It’s an interesting point of view. I think we as a culture and gay people in a whole are ready to see something beyond the issue films--some sort of classic genre film. Also horror is very big right now. They’re two money makers.

AE: What are your hopes for the film?
PEO: We’re getting internationally released. In the US, it opens 16th of September, I think. I hope people see it. God willing… That’s the dream. Time will tell. We’ll certainly be trying to gain visibility in the horror community. And there are plenty of gay people in the horror community, so it’s not a stretch.

AE: How was it working with straight actors playing gay?
PEO: There really aren’t stories about them playing gay. My basic direction on how to be gay man was be yourself--be a human, not a gay… It’s not like they’re performing some kind of clown role.

AE: Was there pressure to put lots of skin/sex in it?
PEO: Interesting question… when I was writing the script, I had two sets of producers, one with a horror background, one with a gay film background. The gay film guys were saying “More skin” and the horror was saying “OH MY GOD, they’re kissing”. I struck with the medium… the skin is not exploited. I know T and A is very typical of the slasher genre but I didn’t want to make a soft-core, typical gay film. No one even gets laid in this film!