[Interview] Lydia Hand on Stunt Doubling for Andi Matichak in ‘Halloween Ends’
Lydia Hand is one of only a few people who can say they’ve appeared in three Halloween movies, helping to bring the recent Strode Trilogy’s most vibrant new character, Allyson, to life as Andi Matichak’s stunt double for various scenes, and with Halloween Ends currently in theaters, we talked to Lydia this week about her experiences in Haddonfield over the most recent films, what it was like to not only face but fight Michael Myers, and what being a part of this legacy means to her.
In our video conversation, looking back on first getting the job for the 2018 Halloween requel, Lydia tells HDN, “I just got a call one day, out of the blue, which is what happens sometimes in stunts. You just get a call from an unknown number or a text and it’s a coordinator or assistant coordinator being like, ‘Hey, are you available? Send me your sizes.’ So this wasn’t really any different. I’m kind of a dead ringer for Andi. When we’re wearing our costumes, nobody can tell the difference. Like people would try to give me her coffee., and I’m like, ‘I’m not Andi’, which is very flattering. She’s so beautiful inside and out. So I submitted the photos, the sizes, all that kind of stuff, and they were like, ‘Alright, you’re coming up’, and I did.Â
“I believe the first scene that we filmed that I was in was the gate hopping, where she gives the finger, which was actually me.”Â
Hand explains that Matichak was instrumental in bringing her back for the sequels Halloween Kills and Halloween Ends. “I found out (about Kills) from Andi,” she said. “We stayed in touch, so she let me know that they were doing another show. They went with a different stunt coordinator, so she texted me and was like, ‘Hey, do you know the new stunt coordinator and are you coming back out to double me, because I would like you to?’ The stunt coordinator was Airon Armstrong, who’s also a friend of mine, and I believe it was Andi who sent him my information, and was like, ‘This is who doubled me in the first one and who I want to double me in the second one’.”
She says it was only after she showed Armstrong a stair fall that she had just performed while doubling for Rebecca Hall in The Night House that she got her return ticket back to Haddonfield. “I was able to shoot him that right over, and he was like, ‘Fantastic’,” she said.
On shooting Allyson’s climactic fight with Michael in Halloween Kills, Lydia said, “James (Jude Courtney, who plays Myers) is really big on meditation and stuff like that, and so he gets into this Michael state. It’s really quite phenomenal. You can feel it like radiating off of him when he’s in character.
“Doing that fight scene with him, when he smashes my head – smashes Allyson’s head into the railing and then sort of throws her down the stairs, felt very real. You’ve got the adrenaline going, you know what’s about to happen, and then at the same time, it’s Michael Myers. It’s Michael Myers about to smash your head into something and throw you down the stairs.”
Digging into other scenes and memories from set, we also discussed celebrating Halloween itself, as Hand recalls that she once dressed as Michael Myers for the holiday, a prescient moment foreshadowing The Shape of things to come, and we talked about her work stunt doubling as Dollface in The Strangers: Prey at Night and as the witch in The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It, and much more.
You can watch our full exclusive interview with Lydia Hand below.
Halloween Ends is now playing in theaters and streaming on Peacock.
Watch our interview with Marteen on playing bully Billy in Halloween Ends here.
Watch our interview with Joey Harris on playing bully Margo in Halloween Ends here.
Read our Halloween Ends review here.
See all of our Halloween Ends coverage here!
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