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Stab

2020

Stab (2020) poster
Status
Released
Released
November 26, 2020
Runtime
109 minutes (1:49:24 as posted on YouTube)
Filmed in
Manchester and Bedford, New Hampshire
Studio
StabMovies.com
Distributor
YouTube

New Decade. Same Game. No Rules.

Directed by
Joshua Patrick Dudley
Written by
Joshua Patrick Dudley
Produced by
Joshua Patrick Dudley
IMDbBONUS FEATURESSCRIPT

The Film

Read the screenplay (PDF) — Fourth draft, June 23, 2020.

Ten years after witnessing her mother’s murder, Claire Matthews returns to Manchester, New Hampshire, for her high school reunion. Old friends are waiting for her, and so is the Ghost.

On a stormy night, young Claire hears her mother, Meredith (Hannah Madison), being stabbed to death. A killer in a ghost mask chases her. She hides and calls 911, and he stabs through the door, then vanishes. Officer Ryan Kincaid gets her out and promises to find the killer. Claire asks how you find a ghost.

Ten years later Olivia Shaw gets a call from a blocked number. It's the same voice. The Ghost fades in and out as her boyfriend Seth Hudson tries to fight him. Olivia answers a trivia question right and is killed anyway, and Seth's throat is slit. Their bodies are found tied up outside the house. Ryan, now a detective, is sure the old killer is back. His brother, Officer Kevin Kincaid, is not. Piper Belmont, a former officer Ryan got fired, is writing a book about The Ghost. The Ghost calls Ryan, says he will kill Claire at the same hour and on the same day he killed her mother, and stabs him.

Cordelia Collins talks Claire into coming back by threatening to tell everyone about Spring Break 2011. Old friends Trevor Smith, Deidre Porter, Hollywood actor Lance Weston and a very high Jackson Duval catch up over video calls. Deidre and Lance have old bad blood. Piper makes a fake Facebook profile as a classmate named Alana O'Neil so she can get into Claire's welcome home party. A brick comes through her window with a note: "The truth will set us both free."

At the party at Cordelia's hotel, Jackson calls in on video, and The Ghost appears behind him and stabs him while everyone watches. Ryan ends the party. That night The Ghost pulls Ryan away from Claire's door, then gets into her room before vanishing again. Derek Hughes goes to an alley for a drug deal the Ghost set up and is stabbed in the neck. The next morning Claire feels drugged, sees demons on her phone, and finds "You're Next" on the mirror. She stops trusting Ryan and Cordelia and leaves the hotel.

Claire hides out at Trevor's house. Deidre tells Lance that one of her kids is his. Kevin visits Piper and learns the first case looked paranormal. At the hotel The Ghost sedates Ryan and kills Cordelia with a hook after a hard fight. At Trevor's, a man on a dating app gets his address. A tone blasts through Trevor's ear implants until his ears bleed, and The Ghost stabs him over and over with a modified Buck knife. Lance drops off $500,000 in child support. The Ghost stabs Deidre, then kills Lance in his car.

Claire tries to drive out of town. The Ghost steps in front of her car, she crashes, and he carries her off. She wakes tied to a chair at Olivia and Seth's house with Ryan and Kevin. The Ghost unmasks as Jackson, and Kevin reveals he is Jackson's partner and boyfriend. The fading was holograms, projectors and fog machines, and Jackson needed Kevin because he couldn't be everywhere at once. Kevin solved the case in two hours but sided with Jackson after hearing his story. Kevin shoots Ryan in the head.

Jackson explains his motive. Claire's mother sold drugs to kids at their school. His secret boyfriend, star quarterback Steven Harris, got hooked, and a bad batch from Meredith killed him. Claire admits she sold the rest of her mother's stash to pay for a new life. Jackson says those drugs could have killed half the state, so she has to die. Claire cuts herself loose with a box cutter, stabs Kevin, takes his gun and kills him. She shoots Jackson, but he gets up in a bulletproof vest and stabs her. Deidre, still alive, shoots him. Piper arrives and keeps firing until Deidre tells her to aim for the head, and Jackson finally dies.

Release & Reception

  • Distributor: YouTube (StabMovies channel) and StabMovies.com

Premiered on YouTube on Thanksgiving Day, November 26, 2020. The site thanked fans by releasing it that day.

The channel posted a thank-you video for 10,000 views on December 9, 2020. By September 2026 the full movie had about 361,000 views.

In March 2021 StabMovies.com uploaded all the raw footage, scene by scene with every take, and invited fans to cut their own versions. David Vigil sent the first fan edit (script pages 86 to 89), posted May 18, 2021 and shared on the site the next day. An end sequence edit by Woodsboro Slasher followed May 25, 2021. Nightmare Fuel Films made a fan trailer, posted March 2, 2022.

The raw footage came with rules for fan editors. Sound effects were left out, so editors had to find or make their own, and nothing copyrighted could be added. StabMovies.com adds the film's soundtrack unless the editor writes their own music. Every edit has to keep all of the film's credits, with an added "edited by" credit allowed. Fans send their files in, and the channel posts every edit with credit. There is no due date. The script was posted as a free PDF on StabMovies.com to go along with the footage.

The raw footage runs from script page 1 through page 110, split into 24 uploads. The longest, pages 91 to 109, runs almost two and a half hours of takes. A separate upload collects every one of The Ghost's lines.

Deleted Scenes & Trivia

  • Extended scene with Piper and Ryan, uploaded November 26, 2020 (about four minutes) and promoted on the site December 19, 2020.
  • Alternate ending, uploaded November 26, 2020 (under a minute) and promoted December 30, 2020 as the reboot's original ending.
  • About a minute and a half was cut from Piper's scene with Jackson about the ghost, including EVP and ghost hunting terms and more about the night Meredith died. The scene was written around Rachel Alexandria Arnold's real experience running a paranormal investigation team.
  • A scene with Stephanie Maheu was cut because the actors weren't prepared enough for its long dialogue.
  • The original ending had Claire getting pancakes in bed. It was filmed but scrapped.
  • Early drafts had many victims drugged before their attacks to make The Ghost seem supernatural. Most of that was cut as implausible, though Claire's water is still drugged. Piper was also going to hide a camera in her purse at the party, a nod to Gale Weathers.
  • Trevor's ex was first going to be named Billy and the man he cheated with Stu, a nod to the theory that the Scream killers were a couple. The names were cut.

Trivia

The reboot came out in StabMovies.com’s tenth anniversary year. The channel went live on YouTube on June 24, 2010.

This film resets everything. The meta setup that ran from Stab 5 through Stab 7, where the cast played themselves, is gone, and so is Ghost Face. The killer here is a new figure called The Ghost.

Extras followed quickly: an extended Piper and Kevin scene on December 19, 2020, an alternate ending on December 30, 2020 and a commentary track on January 1, 2021.

The screenplay came out as a 153 page paperback on December 5, 2020. Joshua Patrick Dudley re-edited the whole script and wrote a new foreword for it.

  • This film resets the StabMovies.com series. The meta setup from Stab 5 through Stab 7, where the cast played versions of themselves, is gone. So is Ghost Face, replaced by The Ghost.
  • Young Claire is played by Arianna Prescott, Hannah Madison's real daughter.
  • Behind the Mask, Part 19 has interviews with Joshua Patrick Dudley, Hannah Madison, Mark Haggett, Christopher Jacques, Nicole Linton, Ashley Swank, Ethan Rodgers, Adam Preston, Sheri Lee, Michael Chaisson, Jack Stanis, Arianna Prescott, Corey Dudley, Zachary Wally and Brendon Antel.
  • Joshua's first idea for The Ghost was a costume that gave whoever wore it supernatural powers. The final version uses holograms, which he calls a throwback to the original ending of Stab 7: Knife of the Hunter, where his character faked being a ghost with holograms.
  • The opening pays tribute to Maureen Prescott's murder, the death fans never saw in the Scream films. Olivia's death flips Casey Becker's: she dies first and her boyfriend Seth gets the big scene.
  • Detective Ryan Kincaid is based on Ryan Hardy, the drunk detective from The Following, which Kevin Williamson created. Claire Matthews is named after the main girl of The Following, Cordelia after Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Trevor after Scream 4. Cordelia was first going to be named CeCe. Joshua posted a list of about 45 references on Facebook and YouTube.
  • Mark Haggett and Christopher Jacques, who play the Kincaid brothers, are brothers in real life.
  • Adam Preston is deaf and has a cochlear implant, which Joshua wrote into Trevor's death with Adam's blessing. Trevor is stalked through a dating app, which Joshua says he had never seen a killer do.
  • The obituary of Steven Harris on screen uses a photo of Joshua's real ex, Steve, who died of a heroin overdose. Joshua says two of the lead actresses also lost exes to heroin, which is why the film deals with the opioid crisis.
  • Cordelia's death with a hook and the "You're Next" message on the mirror are tributes to I Know What You Did Last Summer.
  • The motel room 237 named in the instructions Piper receives is a reference to The Shining.
  • Hannah Madison was used to playing the quirky sidekick, and Joshua pushed her into the lead. Mark Haggett was given a drunk detective instead of the party boy parts he had played before.
  • Piper's yearbook search shows names borrowed from earlier StabMovies.com characters, including Sarah Campbell.
  • The commentary cut runs about 89 minutes, twenty minutes shorter than the film as posted.
  • The full movie is listed on IMDb as tt12675920.

Connections

  • Reboot of StabMovies.com's Stab series, which ran from Stab 4: Fresh Blood (2010) to the unfinished Stab 7 (2017).
  • Hannah Madison, Mark Haggett, Sheri Lee, Stephanie Maheu and Rachel Alexandria Arnold all come back from the original run.
  • Agent of Death plays on TV at the welcome home party, and the friends act out an Agent of Death 3 scene.
  • Followed by Stab 2 (2022). In that film the reboot cast play themselves after the "real" Claire Matthews says the movie stole her life.
  • Michael Chaisson was also announced in 2022 as the killer's voice for the planned Stab 7 re-release.

Sources

Cast & Production

Cast

Hannah Madison

Claire Matthews

Hannah Madison

Meredith Matthews

Claire's mother in the opening

Mark Haggett

Detective Ryan Kincaid

Christopher Jacques

Officer Kevin Kincaid

Stephanie Maheu

Piper Belmont

Joshua Patrick Dudley

Jackson Duval

Nicole Linton

Cordelia Collins

Ashley Swank

Deidre Porter

Ethan Rodgers

Lance Weston

Adam Preston

Trevor Smith

Sheri Lee

Olivia Shaw

Jack Stanis

Seth Hudson

came from New York for the scene; creator of the YouTube Scream series Slash. The part had been recast twice before him

Rachel Alexandria Arnold

Miranda

Claire's therapist

Brendon Antel

Derek Hughes

Arianna Prescott

Young Claire Matthews

credited as Young Claire Matthew; Hannah Madison's real daughter and, per the commentary, the only actor under 18 StabMovies.com had worked with

Corey Dudley

The Goblin

Joshua's cousin, under the Goblin mask in the Agent of Death 3 scene the friends act out, which was the last scene filmed

Matt Sullivan

Henchman #1

Adam Preston

Henchman #2

Livia Austin

News Anchor

the fifth person cast as the news anchor; filmed on a green screen at Joshua's house

Zachary Wally

Police Officer

Beth-Anne Mason

911 Operator

Michael Chaisson

The Voice of The Ghost

voice; known online as Weeping Mask

Brendon Antel

The Ghost

in costume for the opening, Jackson's fake death video and more; also filmed most of the final sequence, per commentary

Zachary Wally

The Ghost

in costume for Seth's death, per commentary

Christopher Jacques

The Ghost

in costume for the hotel scenes, including Cordelia's death, per commentary

Joshua Patrick Dudley

The Ghost

in costume for three or four scenes, including one reshot close-up in Cordelia's death, per commentary

Crew

Joshua Patrick Dudley

Writer

Joshua Patrick Dudley

Director

Joshua Patrick Dudley

Executive producer

Joe Walker

Music

Ghoulish Productions

The Ghost mask (Creepy Face)

@screamrobes

Custom Ghost robe

Burkbench Designs (Clive Barzillia)

Prop knives

Jose A. Sepulveda Jr.

Custom prop knives, including the one used on Trevor

Brendon Antel

Camera for most of the final sequence; stunt performer in the Ghost costume

Michael Chaisson

Voice of The Ghost

Rachel Alexandria Arnold

Helped develop the Piper Belmont character, per commentary

Production

On July 11, 2019 StabMovies.com asked fans if it should reboot Stab. On June 7, 2020 it confirmed the reboot was going ahead with a new mask. The first reboot poster went up June 15, and the one-line plot was posted June 17, 2020.

On June 21, 2020 the channel posted the Stab movie-within-a-movie clips from Scream 2 and Scream 4 to show fans the history of the Stab films.

The new mask was forced by the rights situation. StabMovies.com explained on June 29, 2020 that its old agreement with Fun World only covered Stab 4 through 7. Fun World's newer contract with Spyglass meant Fun World couldn't give any fan film permission to use Ghost Face, and it asked StabMovies.com not to make the reboot with that mask. The killer became a new figure called The Ghost.

Auditions opened June 20, 2020. The post asked for more diversity and actors closer to their thirties. The new mask was revealed June 22, and Michael Chaisson was introduced as the killer's new voice on June 23. A close look at the Ghoulish Productions mask came out July 9, and a video of Burkbench Designs props on July 25, 2020.

Filming was kept quiet. On September 9, 2020 the site announced that shooting had already started. Teaser trailers came out October 2 and October 4, 2020.

Filming wrapped October 20, 2020. The edit was already finished that day, and the only holdup was the score from composer Joe Walker. The film came out on Thanksgiving, November 26, 2020, in StabMovies.com's tenth anniversary year.

Joshua Patrick Dudley says in his commentary that the reboot came from wanting to give fans something big for StabMovies.com's tenth anniversary after both versions of Stab 7 and the original film Theta were shut down. He wanted it to feel like a finale and a beginning at the same time. Most parts were written for the actors who played them.

The shoot happened during the COVID pandemic. Actors were kept apart on set as much as possible, and nobody caught the virus during production. The video call scene was one way to keep people apart. Ethan Rodgers and Ashley Swank filmed their sides first, then Joshua drove to Adam Preston's house in Massachusetts with a recording of them and filmed Adam's side.

Piper Belmont was written for Rachel Alexandria Arnold, who came up with making her a crime scene analyst. A cancer scare forced Rachel to pull out, so Stephanie Maheu took the part with only a few days to learn her lines. That also left Joshua without his usual on-set assistant. After Rachel's tests came back negative she returned for a short cameo as Claire's therapist, Miranda, a part first planned for Stephanie as a new version of Shannon Nightingale.

Dave Allen was first cast as Lance Weston but left for family reasons, and Ethan Rodgers replaced him. Kia Powell was first cast as Deidre Porter and left production. Joshua says losing the film's only Black actress was hard on everyone. Ashley Swank took over the part. Seth Hudson was recast twice before Jack Stanis, who has his own YouTube Scream series called Slash, came from New York to play him.

The team first rented a small motel that looked like the Bates Motel, but it ran into problems and wouldn't allow all the actors in the room. They moved to a Super 8 without telling the hotel they were filming. They wanted room 237, a nod to The Shining, but that floor was under renovation. Nicole Linton shot all her hotel scenes in one weekend, and she was pregnant at the time, so her scenes were rushed and the killer's hook was kept away from her belly.

Most actors only got sides, the pages with their own scenes, and people not involved in the ending didn't get to read it. The opening with Olivia and Seth runs 15 or 16 script pages and was shot in one night until about 3 or 4 in the morning. Every scene at the house used for Ryan and Kevin's home was filmed in a single day. The news anchor was the hardest part to cast. Livia Austin was the fifth person cast. Before her, Lindsey Klossner was going to cameo as an anchor named Kylie Scott but couldn't get it done in time.

The first official teaser came out October 2, 2020 after fans kept asking for one. It went over so well that a second teaser with new footage followed two days later.

Behind the Mask, Part 19: Stab is the making-of, posted January 20, 2021. It mixes cast interviews with footage from the set and runs about two and a quarter hours, longer than the film itself.

Filming locations

  • Manchester, New Hampshire: Main filming location and the story's hometown
  • A Super 8 hotel: Cordelia's hotel. The team moved there after a small motel that looked like the Bates Motel fell through, and didn't tell the hotel they were filming
  • Adam Preston's house in Massachusetts: Trevor Smith's house
  • A house in Dover, New Hampshire, about an hour and a half away: Deidre's house and the scenes with Deidre and Lance
  • Joshua Patrick Dudley's office: Jackson's staged death on the video call
  • The end of Joshua Patrick Dudley's driveway: Derek Hughes's drug deal and death, in place of a downtown alley
  • A single house used for many sets: Ryan and Kevin's house, with every scene there filmed in one day
  • Livingston Park, Manchester, New Hampshire: An outdoor scene that was first scheduled as the very first day of filming, back when Kia Powell was playing Deidre

Effects and makeup

The Ghost appears to fade in and out and teleport. The ending explains it as holograms, Halloween projectors and fog machines.

The knife through young Claire's hand in the opening is fully digital. Some fog in the opening was also added digitally after the crew forgot to use the real fog machine.

Olivia and Seth crashing through a glass door was done on set, then more glass was added digitally.

Cordelia's shower is all digital water and steam. A stock demon clip stands in for Miranda turning into The Ghost, which Joshua couldn't pull off with his own effects skills.

Derek's neck wound used a foam head for the knife. His sweatshirt was already bloody when filming started, so the blood was digitally reworked to look like it spreads.

The fog machine for The Ghost's appearances was loud and had to be timed so it wouldn't be heard. The ringing in Trevor's cochlear implant was turned down in the edit.

Props and costumes

The Ghost mask is the Creepy Face mask by Ghoulish Productions, shown in a July 9, 2020 video. The mask was revealed on the site on June 22, 2020.

The robe was custom made by @screamrobes on Instagram and mixes elements from the Scream, Scream 3 and Scream 4 robes. StabMovies.com first showed it on May 14, 2020, and fans could order the StabMovies.com version.

Prop knives came from Burkbench Designs, shown in a July 25, 2020 video. Jose A. Sepulveda Jr. also made custom prop knives for the film.

Trevor's killer uses a custom knife made by Jose A. Sepulveda Jr. Clive of Burkbench Designs made other props, and Scream Robes made the costumes, per the commentary.

Joshua made most of the props himself, including the prop check.

Claire was first going to have a large scar on her hand, but it took too long to apply before every shot.

Production

Auditions opened on June 20, 2020. A new mask for the reboot was shown on June 22, 2020, with a video about it on July 9.

Filming started on September 9, 2020 and wrapped on October 20, 2020, so principal photography took about six weeks. The edit was already finished on the day they wrapped. The only thing holding the film back was the music, which Joe Walker was still writing.

Teaser trailers went out on October 2 and October 4, 2020, and the film was released on Thanksgiving.

It was shot on a Sony NEX-F3.

Killers & Deaths

The killers

Jackson Duval (The Ghost)

Illustrated reconstruction of Jackson Duval final aftermath
Played by
Joshua Patrick Dudley
Motive
Revenge. Claire's mother, Meredith, sold his secret boyfriend Steven Harris the bad heroin that killed him. After killing Meredith he went after Claire, who sold the rest of her mother's drugs to leave town.
Death
Shot by Claire and Deidre, survives in a bulletproof vest, then is shot in the head by Piper Belmont.

Kevin Kincaid (The Ghost)

Played by
Christopher Jacques
Motive
Jackson's boyfriend. He solved the case, heard Jackson's story, and decided he deserved revenge. He also resented his brother Ryan.
Death
Stabbed with a box cutter and shot dead by Claire.

Deaths

Meredith Matthews

How
Stabbed to death
Where
The Matthews house, ten years earlier
By
Jackson Duval
Played by
Hannah Madison

Olivia Shaw

Illustrated reconstruction of Olivia Shaw fatal aftermath
Played by
Sheri Lee
How
Killed after a trivia call
Where
Her house
By
The Ghost (Jackson Duval and Kevin Kincaid)

Seth Hudson

Illustrated reconstruction of Seth Hudson final aftermath
Played by
Jack Stanis
How
Thrown through a glass door, then throat slit
Where
Outside Olivia's house
By
The Ghost (Jackson Duval and Kevin Kincaid)

Derek Hughes

Played by
Brendon Antel
How
Stabbed in the neck
Where
An alley, at a drug deal
By
The Ghost (Jackson Duval and Kevin Kincaid)

Cordelia Collins

Illustrated reconstruction of Cordelia Collins fatal aftermath
Played by
Nicole Linton
How
Stabbed with a hook
Where
The hotel
By
The Ghost (Jackson Duval and Kevin Kincaid)

Trevor Smith

Played by
Adam Preston
How
Ear implants overloaded, then stabbed repeatedly with a modified Buck knife
Where
His house
By
The Ghost (Jackson Duval and Kevin Kincaid)

Lance Weston

Illustrated reconstruction of Lance Weston fatal aftermath
Played by
Ethan Rodgers
How
Stabbed to death
Where
His car outside Deidre's house
By
The Ghost (Jackson Duval and Kevin Kincaid)

Ryan Kincaid

Illustrated reconstruction of Ryan Kincaid fatal aftermath
Played by
Mark Haggett
How
Shot in the head
Where
Olivia and Seth's house
By
Kevin Kincaid

Music & Home Media

Score by Joe Walker. Post-production waited on his music after the edit was finished.

Joshua says Joe Walker volunteered and gave the film a new sound compared with the earlier StabMovies.com films.

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