HIGH-TECH FEAR
Updated ‘Child’s Play’ resonates with its star
Aubrey Plaza was haunted by Chucky long before she ever toyed with joining the new “Child’s Play” movie.
The slasher film series about an evil killer doll left an impression on the actress at a young age, and now she’s at the center of the franchise’s latest flick — a modernized retelling of the 1988 original in which Chucky is now a high-tech robot who learns from humans rather than a toy possessed by an evil spirit.
“It’s something that I just remember so vividly as a child traumatizing me that I was really excited when I saw the script,” Plaza, who plays Karen Barclay, told the Daily News.
“When I read it and I realized what they were doing with the updated version of Chucky and how they were reimagining the character, I thought it was really clever. I’m not someone that believes that all movies need to be remade, but I thought it was a really smart way to kind of bring Chucky into 2019 and scare the s—t out of a whole new generation of children.”
The new “Child’s Play,” which hits theaters Friday, introduces lifelike Buddi dolls as the hottest toys on the market. The Buddis are capable of having indepth conversations with people and controlling many household electronics.
Plaza, 34, portrays a hardworking single mom who brings a Buddi doll named Chucky (voiced by Mark Hamill) home for her 13-year-old son, Andy. Little do they know this doll is different from the rest, and it quickly adopts brutally violent behavior.
“Having technology really be the villain was something that I could get behind,” Plaza said. “There are some scenes and messaging in the film about how reliant we are on these smart devices, and I thought it was really interesting to have Chucky be an AI smart doll connected to the cloud so that it’s less about Chucky being a malicious killer and more about him learning through human behavior and kind of copying our own toxic behavior, and having that turn on us.”
The chance to play a young mother in the movie excited Plaza, who had never played a mom before. “One of the reasons why I was so drawn to it is because my mom in real life is a really young mom. She had me when she was 20, so I felt a connection with the character,” Plaza said, noting the age difference between her and her mom is the same as that of Karen and Andy. “I really kind of thought a lot about that while I was preparing for the part,” she said. “Karen, she’s working at Zedmart, which is a Walmart kind of a store, and she’s struggling and doing the best she can. Growing up, my mom was always working really, really hard.”
Plaza rose to fame for her portrayal of April Ludgate on the NBC sitcom “Parks and Recreation” and has appeared in several comedy films. She doesn’t consider herself a big horror movie fan and had passed on offers to do other scary movies before the opportunity to star in “Child’s Play.”