Murdering teens to a disco beat: An interview with Prom Night's Michael Tough

The late 70's and early 80's were the adolescent years of what was to become the reigning era of the teen slasher flick, brought to life by a little 1978 film called Halloween. That classic also marked the beginning of a mini scream queen career for actress Jamie Lee Curtis, daughter of screen legends Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh. She would go on to star in other horror classics such as Halloween II, John Carpenter's The Fog, Terror Train and a film that went quite a bit outside the box from the usual "teenagers in peril" story lines that permeated slashers of the day. That film was 1980's Prom Night.

If you've forgotten this little gem, Prom Night is scheduled to air this Friday on Chiller TV. Check your local Riverside area listings for times and channels.

View slideshow: Prom Night Michael Tough Interview Photos

The film begins with a young girl being taunted by four other children during a game in an abandoned building. The game turns deadly, however, when the girl, Robin, falls to her death. The four vow never to speak of it again, and, with little evidence, an innocent man is falsely accused of assaulting and murdering the girl and sent to a mental hospital.

Flash forward eight years to the teenage years and the night of the high school prom. A killer is stalking the four teens responsible for Robin's death. Someone knows the truth. But who? Is it Robin's father, played with shocking seriousness by a usually-comedic Leslie Nielson? Her mother? Perhaps the man who was falsely accused and has recently escaped from the mental hospital? What about her older sister Kim (Jamie Lee Curtis) who is about to be crowned prom queen? Let's not overlook that her date, and prom king, is one of the original four who covered up the accidental death.

No, none of the above. In fact, it's Robin's twin brother, Alex, who returned the day of the accident all those years ago, just in time to witness his sister's grisly plunge to an untimely death. Having lived with the truth for years, he has finally snapped and, donning a pretty sparkly disco-era black hood and a fire axe, he spends the night of the prom carrying out his revenge. In a climactic fight to the death on the disco floor, Alex ends up with a fatal blow to the head by his own sister, who doesn't realize she's battling her beloved brother until it's too late.

17-year-old Tortono native Michael Tough was the lucky actor who was cast as Alex, slashing his way through a high school on prom night, accompanied by the thumping beat of the prom's disco soundtrack. To drive home the disco theme, the director, Paul Lynch, even saw fit to include a good three-minute, full-on disco dance routine between Jamie Lee Curtis and her Prom King love interest Nick, played by Casey Stevens. If you haven't seen it in years, grab the DVD or catch it on the tube. This scene is the penultimate advertisement for "don't do drugs."

In this exclusive interview with Examiner.com, Michael Tough, now 49, talks about what it was like to play a psychotic killer, bra shopping (yes, bra shopping) with Jamie Lee Curtis and what he's been up to in the years that followed. Still living in Toronto, Tough is now a real estate agent, married for almost 21 years and the father to three daughters.

EXAMINER: So Michael, tell us about your acting career and how you got started.

MICHAEL: I grew up as a child actor in Canada, doing my first commercial when I was about five. I remember meeting Colonel Sanders (KFC) when I was about 8 or 9. I acted on and off through the years, including a regular role in the NBC family show, Search and Rescue back around 1974-1975. When I was 16, I flew to L.A. to explore making a move there. In a matter of days, after several meetings and lunches, I recognized that L.A. was not where I wanted to be. Not sure why, just one of those gut things that becomes a life path definer!

I continued to act into my early 20's. I was accepted to attend the NYU Drama program when I was 18. I decided instead to study Film Production at home <in Canada>. The idea at the time was to allow me to better understand the entire industry. I fell in love with the behind the scenes and became a Location Manager (my first scouting job was to find a haunted house for a TV series “The Edison Twins”). I was a Location Manager full time until, in my mid 40's, I realized we all have a shelf life in production and mine had come and gone!!! I no longer wanted to work in production.

EXAMINER: So what have you been doing since then?

MICHAEL: When I decided to leave the production side, I became the Leasing Manager at Toronto Film Studios and found myself negotiating on the other side of the table from the same producers who had hired me for years as an LM <location manager>. Within a year of that, I recognized that sitting behind a desk and working 9-5 was not where I wanted to be. In 1988, I had originally qualified for my Real Estate license as something extra to do. Never really used it. I decided to blow the dust off it a few years ago while sitting behind my Leasing Manager desk, requalifed as a realtor while doing one last show as an LM (Warehouse 13 – Season 1). As soon as that show ended, I stepped into Real Estate full time, and I've been loving it ever since.

EXAMINER: So do you like horror films, and if so, what are some of your favorites?

MICHAEL: I do enjoy horror films. I grew up on the classic Vincent Price films and always loved to go see them. The Exorcist was a classic. And Halloween. As to modern day horror, I am a James Wan fan.

EXAMINER: I know you're in Real Estate, but would you ever like to go back to acting or get back into the entertainment industry in some capacity?

MICHAEL: I have one remaining dream in film – to write a screenplay. One day!

EXAMINER: You have daughters, and they clearly know you were in Prom Night. What do they think of their dad as an axe-wielding psycho killer?

MICHAEL: They laugh. Their friends think it’s funny. My kids got a kick out of a spaghetti western I had done in the 1970’s called The Phantom Kid. For my oldest daughter’s prom, one of her friends thought it would be cool if Alex the killer could show up. So I put the mask on and we took pictures when they were about to get into the limo to go to their prom. It was fun. <check out the slideshow in the left sidebar for photos>

EXAMINER: You haven't changed very much since that film. Are you ever recognized for the part, and do you look back on it fondly or wish people would forget you were in it?

MICHAEL: Rarely recognized and that is fine with me! Once, recently, as I left my daughter’s soccer game, a guy stared at me and asked if I was the guy from Prom Night. Wow, good memory. As it turns out, he had been an extra in both the prom dance sequence and the cafeteria fight sequence.

EXAMINER: Prom Night was quite a turn from the types of roles you had been doing. What made you decide to go out for that part, and did you prefer being the killer as opposed to the victim?

MICHAEL: I really didn’t decide to go after the part. Went to an audition, got a call back, was told I was their pick, then told they had changed their minds. It was a heartbreaker at first. Then a few days later, they changed direction again and came back to me.

EXAMINER: Where was Prom Night shot? Can you tell me a bit about the locations, the high school, etc.?

MICHAEL: Don Mills Collegiate, just around the corner from where I grew up, and another high school in Toronto. Don’t remember much of the locations.

Check out this newspaper article about the filming of Prom Night at Don Mills Collegiate, courtesy of Michael's personal collection

EXAMINER: The film had a relatively low budget. Did that seem to present any challenges on the shoot?

MICHAEL: No. We were all young Canadian actors for the most part. Work was always fun, and we made the best of each day whether there was money or not. Frankly, not many budgeted films were shot here back then!

EXAMINER: What was it like working with Jamie Lee Curtis and Leslie Nielson?

MICHAEL: It was fun. My first day meeting Jamie, she she insisted that we needed to get to know each other better so we headed over to the local mall to hang out. We ended up bra shopping in a department store. A bit odd but hey, when you’re a 17-year-old hormonal male out bra shopping with Jamie Lee Curtis, who complains!!

Leslie was a blast from the start. The first day I met him was the scene at the cemetery. I walked into his motor home, and the laughter never stopped the entire time he was on set. Same every day. He was such a pleasure to be with. One of my all time memories was out playing golf with Leslie one day. In fact, it was the day of my death scene. We went out and played a round of golf before I had to go into work around 7:00 that night. Both Leslie and Jamie were gracious and kind and both offered wonderful encouragement when we were in front of the camera together. Jamie was fantastic and supportive on the day of my death scene.

EXAMINER: You, Mary Beth Rubens (Kelly), Jeff Wincott (Drew), Sheldon Rybowski (Slick) and Casey Stevens (Nick) all appeared on some of the same TV shows, including The Littlest Hobo and King of Kensington. Did you all know each other, or did every actor in Canada end up on those shows at some point?

MICHAEL: I don’t ever recall meeting any of them prior. And yes, most Canadians ended up on those shows at one time or another. Jeff and I hung out for a couple of years after that, but I haven't seen any of the other actors since.

EXAMINER: I know you still have the mask from the movie. Do you have any of the other props?

MICHAEL: Just the mask. I did have the original Cast and Crew shirt, but one of my kids started wearing it and it gradually faded away.

EXAMINER: What were some of your favorite scenes to shoot?

MICHAEL: The cafeteria fight scene and the death scene. Both were fun and challenging. On my first day of filming at the cafeteria, they had actually tried to straighten my hair. They wanted me to have straight hair in the film. It took them a couple of hours to get my hair straight and about five minutes of Toronto summer humidity to make it all curly again. So they went with my lovely afro look for the film.

EXAMINER: Were there ever any mishaps during shooting, especially the kill scenes?

MICHAEL: Other than a kidney shot that put me down for a few minutes in the fight scene, all was good.

EXAMINER: Were there any scenes that were cut?

MICHAEL: I would have to re-watch the movie. Don’t really remember.

EXAMINER: Actors from horror films usually say they are some of the most fun to work on. Did you find that to be the case?

MICHAEL: Yes, it was a lot of fun. The set, by the nature of the work, tends to not take itself too seriously. And having a movie filled with late teens to early 20s makes for a lot of fun. There was always fun on the Prom Night set.

EXAMINER: So every fan of this film wants to know what is UP with that disco dance number between Nick and Kim, though it was certainly the era for it! How long did that shoot take?

MICHAEL: Classic music, huh? And those dance moves. The scene took a couple of days. I hung out through most of it because, as the DJ, I always had to be on the stage just in case one of the cameras panned across. It was a painful couple of days cause there was no real acting to do. But I did get to check out a lot of teenage extras! Hey, I was 17!

EXAMINER: It was a bunch of teens/early 20's kids shooting a horror movie. Any practical jokes or craziness behind the scenes?

MICHAEL: Just a great deal of fun. The best gags were always from Leslie and his antics on set. He was a wonderful man and we are all blessed by his great career.

EXAMINER: Did you ever want to do more horror after Prom Night?

MICHAEL: My agent called me and asked to if I wanted to do a movie a few months later. I read the script and turned it down. I did not want to do only horror. Shortly after Prom Night, in fact, my career shifted behind the camera. Not really sure how or why that happened. I just didn’t want to act anymore!

Oh, in the original script for Prom Night II, Alex was still alive and catatonic in a hospital bed. When the killing started again, there were various clues that Alex was on the loose! Never saw the script, just heard through sources that they were hoping to have the whole Alex sub-plot at work. But then a re-write left me out!!

EXAMINER: You mentioned you're going to start working the horror convention circuit! I know fans are going to be thrilled to see you. Any news on your upcoming appearances?

MICHAEL: Yes, I was tracked down through Facebook. An actor I had worked with had tracked me down. She friended me which then led to one of her friends sending a friend request leading to one of his friends sending a friend request. That woman approached me on FB and asked if I would do a convention. I wasn’t really interested at first but my kids talked me into it. I will do ONE convention only. It is not something I wish to do on a regular basis. Stacey originally set me up to appear at MM19 in August, but a friend’s wedding came up on the same weekend so I postponed. (It was also the same weekend as our youngest daughter’s birthday and she was happy when I postponed!!)

So now it has been announced that I will appear at MonserMania 20 in Baltimore the weekend of September 16 – 18. I am very excited to do the show. I know it will be a lot of fun. And from what I understand, the announcement of Alex coming to a convention has been received with great enthusiasm.

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My sincerest thanks to Michael for agreeing to this interview and talking about his long-ago appearance in this classic 80's slasher film. For more information on MonsterMania 20 in Baltimore, check out their official web site.

A fan of the film has created a fantastic web site about Prom Night that includes some great info and pictures, including:

You can read more from Michael Tough in author David Grove's biography Jamie Lee Curtis: Scream Queen.
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