In They/Them, Kevin Bacon and Carrie Preston play a couple who runs Whistler Camp, a conversion therapy camp for LGBTQ teens, where a killer starts picking off victims.
The Golden Globe winner, 63, stars in Peacock and Blumhouse’s upcoming LGBTQ horror film They/Them (pronounced “They Slash Them”), which boasts a “queer empowerment story” with some classic horror vibes, premiering Friday, Aug. 5 on the streaming platform.
In addition to serving as an executive producer, Bacon plays Owen Whistler, who along with his wife Cora (Carrie Preston), runs Whistler Camp, a conversion therapy camp for LGBTQ teens. Anna Chlumsky (My Girl, Inventing Anna) plays Molly, the camp’s medic and newest employee.
The movie follows Bacon’s character as “several queer and trans campers join Whistler for a week of programming intended to ‘help them find a new sense of freedom.’ As the camp’s methods become increasingly more psychologically unsettling, the campers must work together to protect themselves. When a mysterious killer starts claiming victims, things get even more dangerous,” according to a synopsis from Peacock.
Theo Germaine (The Politician, Work in Progress), Austin Crute (Booksmart, Call Your Mother), Monique Kim (What/If), Anna Lore (Faking It, All American), Cooper Koch (Power Book II: Ghost) and Darwin del Fabro (Brazil’s Dangerous Liaisons) also star as the movie’s doomed campers.
They/Them serves as the directorial debut for writer/director John Logan (Gladiator, The Aviator, Skyfall) who explained the film’s personal significance.
“They/Them has been germinating within me my whole life. I’ve loved horror movies as long as I can remember, I think because monsters represent ‘the other’ and as gay kid I felt a powerful sense of kinship with those characters who were different, outlawed, or forbidden,” said Logan.
“I wanted to make a movie that celebrates queerness, with characters that I never saw when I was growing up,” he continued. “When people walk away from the movie, I hope they’re going to remember the incredible love that these kids have for each other and how that love needs to be protected and celebrated.”
