Mckenna Grace Explains How The Bad Seed Returns Was Almost A Very Different Movie - Exclusive
When production for "The Handmaid's Tale" ended due to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, actress Mckenna Grace headed home to the United States with no idea what was in store for her next. But once she sat down with her father Ross Burge in their LA apartment, inspiration immediately hit. "We were like, 'We should write a script,'" the Emmy-nominated actress explained during an exclusive interview with The List.
As soon as these two heard that there was interest in a sequel to "The Bad Seed," they knew it would be the perfect project. Writing the rest of Emma's story only seemed to make sense, considering Grace had become so close with the character back in 2018. "It even felt different just because I'm older now," she told us. "I can have more of an understanding [of] the character."
But before "The Bad Seed Returns" became the film it is today, it started out as a much different script than we see on screen. "We did have to change a good bit so that the network would let us air it," the actress revealed.
There was a lot more blood and gore in the original script
When Mckenna Grace and Ross Burge shared their final script with producers (which happened to be the first script they ever wrote together), the father-daughter duo received a surprising response. "They did have Barbara [Marshall, who wrote the first film] come on to do a bit of a rewrite, because ours was too dark and too graphic and violent," Grace told us.
As a practicing surgeon by day, Burge knew exactly what would happen in some of the darkest situations that Emma gets herself into. However, the details of what the teenage version of "The Bad Seed" was capable of were deemed much too dark for network television. "It's just really funny to think about," Grace said.
Now that their very first script has turned into a finished film, Grace is excited to be able to put together more projects with her father. "We're hoping to have more things like this and to work on more scripts and films that we've created," she said. "I think it's really cool to be able to do that together."
"The Bad Seed Returns" premieres Labor Day (Monday, September 5) at 8/7 CT on Lifetime.