Five Nights at Freddy’s (2023) – Behind the Scenes – MAKING OF & Filming Secrets (Fan Documentary)

Welcome to Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria. This movie is basically about a guy who gets a job working at this pizzeria from the 80s that's abandoned and once inside, madness ensues. We wanted to make sure we were doing the fan-based justice in every decision that we made along the way. They were really at the forefront of our minds. There's a lot of attention to detail. What sets this movie apart from others is the care that was taken with the story to create something based on a beloved game. So I think for those hardcore Five Nights at Freddy's fans out there, they can rest assured that we are taking care of their world, taking care of their game, and taking care of these characters. This film is going to be a fan favorite. I mean, we have such an incredible region of fans out there and I think one of the exciting things is that we are making this movie for them and I think they're going to really respond to that. We knew that the visibility from the fan base was super high. There's so much in the movie that speaks to the fan base. Scott Cawthon is heavily involved and is watching every single shot. Scott Cawthon, the creator of the game, was very specific about, you know, wanting to link this movie to the first game and I was getting the direct download from him in terms of what elements of the lore we were, you know, going to be folding into our story for the movie. And so I did dip into that fan space a little bit, but I also tried to stay focused on the elements that I knew we were diving into. As you said, the fan base is not just large, which it's enormous, but it's also really, really vocal and participatory and like all the things you would hope and love for a fan base to be. But they've been wanting this movie for a long, long time and, you know, if we didn't have, I think, the expertise of Scott going into that, just like knowing the fan base so well, obviously knowing the lore in and out, it would have been, I think, easier to make some missteps and it was really a comfort to know that he had eyes on the project throughout. They've had Jim Henson Studios create these puppets. Who have an incredible history of building amazing puppets. Every department on this movie played such a crucial and important role and all the animatronics had such a personality. Sometimes it's the subtlety that really sells the character. They're really terrifying. I think they're doing their job. They're supposed to be eerie and terrifying. Foxy, Bonnie, Chica and Freddy. You know, we had these amazing designs from the game themselves to bring to life, but they had never been brought to life in a three-dimensional practical way and to figure out how we wanted them to feel and, you know, in terms of like the fabric and the textures. And then, as you were saying earlier, like we had all the samples up on a board and we were putting them together and like really getting a sense how the ensemble felt in terms of the color palette. Well, they were all kind of following a similar schedule of like design phase, prep phase, build phase. So they were all kind of coming to life together. Each one posed different challenges in terms of the specifics that we needed to get right, but I would say the first time I went blew my mind because there's amazing puppets all over their creature shop from other movies and TV shows that I'd grown up on and, you know, Dark Crystal's over here and Muppets are over there and it's, you know, just incredible. Every time I went to check in on the process, a new part of the design and build phase was happening. So it was all exciting to me. I would say the biggest standout moment was when we came for the final show and tell and we got these animatronics on their feet for the first time and that was a real mind explosion moment for sure. I mean, the creature shop, that's what we do is world building. These things have been sitting around for a long time and you want to convey that. Like, the second you see it, you want it to read. Like, this thing's old, it's been around, it's falling apart. And that was, to me, was one of the most exciting parts of the build was the textures. We spent a lot of time figuring out what fabric we were going to cover them with, the saturation of the colors, how dirty they get. Even playing with, like, the soft surfaces and the hard surfaces. Like, Chica's a great example with her feathers on top and her beak and her bib and then the skin on her clothes. The exact color palettes and dimensions and all that was really an exciting process. But then figuring out how they should move. And to your point, this whole team of puppeteers that is then required to actually make that happen was a whole other level in the process, which was amazing. And yeah, we had puppeteers off screen, you know, doing all different elements of the face and the arms. And we had full animatronic versions of the characters. And then we had some versions where there were suit performers inside. Some people who did an amazing job, again, bringing more, like, movement to the mix, but keeping the authenticity of an animatronic. Like, the noses, for example, we went back and forth over textures and we finally landed on a rubber. If these were built in the 80s, what materials would they have used? That was kind of a thought process. Yeah, and getting, like, the weathered quality right was really, like, a trial and error process. We started slowly so that we could keep adding and adding, but not go too far either. And that was, like, such a fun process. And then getting it under the lights and in front of the camera and seeing how it was reading, which was sometimes different than how it felt when we were standing in front of it. With the actual animatronic elements, we were leaning into the imperfections and we loved when it stuttered and we loved when things felt not quite right. Because, of course, nothing is quite right in Freddy's. Chica, she looks happy and then boom, she gets really scared. There was a moment in the shop when we were building, I think it was Chica. The eyes. And we had some interference with the signal and the eyes started twitching. And we recreated that, actually. There's a moment. Anyway, something happens to Chica and we wanted to replicate exactly what that, like, powered down eye, you know, role was because it was so phenomenal. Again, a happy accident that we were able to recreate, which is cool. These full-size animatronics. So, yeah, there were, I think, Foxy at full movement capacity took like six puppeteers to operate. So we were, you know, using a lot of really, really talented people to make these characters come to life in the most nuanced and detailed of ways. Foxy, in particular, his cylinders, you see all the cylinders. So we really wanted to be as accurate as we could, but also have that shiny look, but, you know, make it dirty. Foxy is fully deteriorated where you see through him, you see through the arms, through his chest. So to put an actor in a green suit and a costume and then remove it all would be very cost prohibitive to have a full puppet, full animatronic on set. You get it all in camera and you get to see through it. So I think trying to stand him up on two legs and have him walking around, that was kind of the biggest challenge. Yeah, the physics of getting Foxy able to move around in a physical space is challenging. And was it Foxy the one that physically lit on fire on set? That's the big rumor. Walk me through that. When we were on set, we were five feet, it was probably this far away from him. And I was talking to someone, they'd finished the shot. And someone on my team said, Foxy's smoking. I was like, yeah, Foxy's smoking. And they're like, no, no, it's smoking. I look back and I'm like, oh, it's smoking. The servo overheated and there was a little fire. Now, it did not burst into flame. There was some smoke. That had only ever happened once before, the servo overheating at the shop. It's not totally terrifying. You just lose time. And so that was good that we had like a trial run to go off on that. But it could have happened all the time and only happened once on production. That was amazing. It was a testament to you guys. When I was younger, I would watch behind the scenes footage and think, oh, the crew is so cool. Like everyone's having such a great time. But I had no idea that I could ever be doing something like that. The first thing I do when I get here is I get my sound card ready. And then it's time for a marking rehearsal, which is when we watch the actors do their blocking. So I need to watch closely and be planning in my head how I'm going to wire them. The most exciting days for me working in sound are when we have music playback. I feel very proud to be able to say that I work consistently in sound. I think that being a woman in sound is very important. It's definitely a male-dominated industry. So this will definitely be a time in my life that I look back on and I'm very proud of. You know, it's such a wild world, FNAF. And Josh brought this really grounded approach to the character of Mike, who's bringing us through the pizzeria and then these five nights. He brought such admiration for the franchise and the characters of the animatronics and the world, but also knew he was forging new ground here with this character and was so dedicated to finding the truth in Mike and making sure it was just a really awesome movie. So he's our conduit going through the whole story. So he knew he needed to land it, and he really did. There's something so inherently humorous about the animatronics and embracing that is, like, the best part about it, you know? But we didn't want to go full camp either. Like, it was a really fine line of taking the animatronics seriously, if you will. That's such a weird way of putting it, but, like, really let them be deeply scary and creepy. If there's a time when Freddy should be scary or intimidating, he stands tall, the movement is slow and ominous. And also let their quirkiness come out and let that humor breathe, as you say. So there's something so inherently humorous about the animatronics and embracing that is, like, the best part about it, you know? I think just as a tonal blend, too, with the film, we really thought humor was an important thing to incorporate. So we've tried to do that with our human characters as well.