Sadie Sink is opening up about what it was like working with Jamie Campbell Bower on season four of “Stranger Things.” Bower plays four characters in one, including the horrifying Vecna. Sink explained that Bower was just as scary on set because he never stopped doing the creepy villain’s menacing voice between takes.
“He liked to kind of stay in character a lot, and there would be times and longer setups and stuff where he would filter in and out of it, but for a lot of the Mind Lair stuff, there was not a lot of talking going on between us,” Sink told The Hollywood Reporter in a new interview. “It was mostly just him as Vecna, standing in the corner and like growling or something like that, and he was just very, very, in it. And he would kind of talk in that voice a lot.”
Sink said it all helped her performance as Max, especially in season four’s episode four, “Dear Billy,” when she fights Vecna’s curse. “So, to have someone as committed as Jamie in a role like that, just made it really believable. I think that was probably the key,” she explained.
Sink also gave credit to the production team for making Vecna so believably terrifying. “Just being the prosthetics and having it be mostly practical effects was really helpful,” she explained. “We’re so used to working with stunt guys and stunt-women in green bodies and tennis balls in their hands, or something like that, so having Jamie actually there was very helpful because he was genuinely just horrifying. It’s just not normal what you’re looking at, so you’re kind of tricking your mind in a way, and it makes stepping into Max’s shoes that much easier.”
Sink said that season four was “definitely the most emotional weight that I’ve ever had to carry on this show.” She explained in the interview, “So, to have the Duffer Brothers just kind of trust us with that – not only me but just everyone on the show – as the show matures, they begin to dig deeper into the darker stuff that I think they’ve been wanting to explore for a really long time. So, finally having us at that age and also I think, collectively, at the right skillset, too, to carry this plot, it was satisfying for us all to watch and also just kind of emotional, looking back at how young we were and how far we’ve all come as actors and as human beings; it’s incredible.”
Sink’s costar Winona Ryder also opened up about the fourth season in an interview with Harper’s Bazaar and spoke about working with her younger cast members. “I want the kids to understand, this does not happen,” she said of the show’s success. “This is really unusual. And I’m always telling them, ‘The work is the reward!’ Because when I was that age, it was so hard to enjoy the fruits of my labour.”
