Trivia / Freaked

• Billing Displacement:
  • In some foreign markets where Alex Winter isn't as known, Brooke Shields is heavily played up on the covers. The Brazilian VHS release goes as far as to only mention her and Randy Quaid on the whole box.
  • In spite of playing a fairly minor role and going uncredited in America, Keanu Reeves is top billing on the Argentina release.
• Box Office Bomb: Budget, $12 million. Box office, $29,296. Alex Winter and Tom Stern's directorial debuts was this absurdist sci-fi comedy. A regime change at Fox occurred during post-production and the new executives slashed the budget, then pulled the film from national release after poor test screenings and slashed the advertising budget. The end result debuted in two theaters and vanished pretty quickly.
• California Doubling: The scenes set in South America were filmed near Los Angeles.
• Colbert Bump: The film is a cult movie that is not available on streaming and out of print, but reviews by some online critics such as James Rolfe and re:View have given it more exposure.
• Completely Different Title:
  • Argentina: The Circus of Horror
  • Brazil: Freaklandia: The Park of Horrors
  • Bulgaria: Mutants
  • France: The City of Monsters
  • Germany: Freaks
  • Japan: Mutant Freaks
  • Spain: The Crazy Stop of the Monsters
• Copiously Credited Creator: Alex Winter is co-director, co-writer and star of the film.
• Creator Backlash: According to the DVD commentary, Mr. T did not enjoy working on the film at all and considered it an embarrassment. Lee Arenberg (who played "The Eternal Flame") had to redub a few of his lines in ADR after he walked off the set near the end of shooting.
• Creator Killer: Alex Winter was a somewhat hot commodity after coming off of the Bill & Ted films, giving him the cred he needed to get this film made as co-director, co-writer and star. The film was tanked by executive meddling, however, and Winter's career as a feature film star and director ended instantly. He didn't work on another major film project until Bill & Ted Face the Music almost 30 years later.
• Directed by Cast Member: Alex Winter co-wrote and co-directed this movie.
• Enforced Method Acting: The make-up job on Ricky did not allow Alex Winter to shut his mouth, so the drool that is frequently streaming down his face is real.
• Executive Meddling: Originally pitched as an independent gross-out comedy in the vein of Pink Flamingos, the studio forced the makers to deliver a PG-13 movie. The original script was a lot filthier, and many of the freaks had to be rewritten or cut out completely. For example, the "Human Flame" was originally written as the "Human Bong." Also, they made the filmmakers change the name of the movie from Hideous Mutant Freekz to Freaked, which Alex Winter and the director hated because it sounded too much like Tod Browning's Freaks. The studio ultimately dumped the film into a few theaters after they realized it wasn't anything like the Bill and Ted movies.
• Playing Against Type: Certainly, both Alex Winter and the uncredited Keanu Reeves are playing much different characters than they were in the Bill & Ted movies, and Ortiz is also radically different from The Stoic Typecasting Reeves later fell into. In addition, Mr. T as the Bearded Lady is not what many people expected.
• Production Posse: The film is a giant reunion for The Idiot Box. Directors Alex Winter and Tom Stern as well as co-writer Tim Burns were all in it. Many cast members also appeared in the series, including John Hawkes and Lee Arenberg. The film also reunites Alex Winter with his Bill & Ted compatriots Keanu Reeves and William Sadler.
• Screwed by the Network: During filming, a regime change led to Joe Roth, the CEO who greenlit the film to be replaced by Peter Chernin, who hated the movie. Consequently, the budget was slashed, the title was changed and the film was dumped in a handful of test markets with Invisible Advertising.
• What Could Have Been:
  • This was originally pitched as a horror movie featuring the band Butthole Surfers.
  • Before the rewrites Stuey was going to be a serial killer who was obsessed with Ricky.
• Written by Cast Member: The film was co-written by Alex Winter, who also stars.

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