BEHIND THE SCENES
Just the Behr facts
by Louis B. Hobson
Calgary Sun
HOLLYWOOD — The horror film The Grudge is scaring up big bucks at the box-office. Made for $10-million US, this story of vengeful ghosts grossed four times that much on its opening weekend and looks certain to spawn a sequel or two.
Jason Behr, who starred as Max Evans on TV’s Roswell, plays an American studying in Japan who, with his girlfriend (Sarah Michelle Gellar), is drawn into this web of terror.
“I’m not afraid of ghosts, but I can bet this movie is going to make millions of people believe in hauntings,” says Behr.
“I am terrified of sharks and I owe my phobia to Jaws, which I saw when I was five years old.”
Behr, 31, says he “had nightmares well into my teens. There are lots of lakes in Minnesota where I grew up and, even though I knew sharks didn’t live in lakes, if something brushed up against my leg I was out of there in flash.”
He confesses he was even “scared to go in the swimming pool in our backyard.
“I’ve got the better of my fears but I am still mesmerized by sharks.”
Behr faced another fear when he was filming The Grudge in Tokyo.
“Sarah and the other Americans and I kept hearing about blowfish sushi.
“The blowfish is poisonous, but if the flesh is sliced properly, you only get enough of the poison to give you a tingling sensation in your mouth.
“If it’s sliced the wrong way, you’ll get too much of the poison and it’ll be your last supper.”
Behr recalls that one night Gellar and he and friends went to a sushi restaurant that featured blowfish.
“Sarah watched as I ate a piece. She waited to see if I turned blue and fell over or kept on eating before she was brave enough to try it.”
He says they were so intrigued by the taste and the numbing sensation they ordered several plates of the delicacy.
“It’s very expensive, which means surviving blowfish is considerably more expensive than succumbing to it.”
Next up for Behr is the dark psychological drama Shooting Livien, in which he plays a tormented musician.
He has just been added to the cast of D-Wars, in which he will play a reporter investigating the claim that dragons are returning to devastate the planet.