Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff production of I Heart Radio, Hey Brainstuff,
Speaker 1: Lauren Vogelbaum. Here in nineteen seventy seven's Star Wars Episode four,
Speaker 1: a new Hope Luke Skywalker at one point blasts a
Speaker 1: stormtrooper who falls to his death. As the henchman plummets,
Speaker 1: he unleashes a blood curdling scream, a scream that would
Speaker 1: eventually become famous and featured in hundreds of Hollywood films.
Speaker 1: It even has its own name, the Wilhelm Scream. Here,
Speaker 1: we'll play it for you in case you're unfamiliar. Sound familiar?
Speaker 1: So what is this odd scream? And why would a
Speaker 1: death yell find its way into so many different movies?
Speaker 1: We spoke with Mike Miller, a film editor based in Ventora, California.
Speaker 1: He explained the Wilhelm Scream is nineteen fifties a d
Speaker 1: R or automated dialogue replacement recording for a B movie
Speaker 1: about a jungle safari. The recording was for a man
Speaker 1: getting eaten by an alligator. The movie that Miller is
Speaker 1: referring to is Distant Drums, starring Gary Cooper as a U. S.
Speaker 1: Army captain who fights seminoles and gun smugglers in Florida's Everglades.
Speaker 1: This wasn't one of Cooper's best on screen efforts, but
Speaker 1: it did service the genesis of the now iconic scream,
Speaker 1: which happens as an unfortunate soldier is dragged underwater by
Speaker 1: a hungry gator. To capture the scream, the film's producers
Speaker 1: asked various cast members to offer up their most terrifying shrieks.
Speaker 1: They reportedly recorded six screams, but it was the fourth
Speaker 1: that apparently most accurately captured the horror of being eaten
Speaker 1: alive by a ferocious reptile, and that's the one that
Speaker 1: made the final cut of the movie. Though no one
Speaker 1: is one certain who performed it, it's generally attributed to
Speaker 1: actor and singer Chev Wooley, But the movie and the
Speaker 1: scream didn't initially make much of a mark. In three though,
Speaker 1: a film titled The Charge at Feather River featured a
Speaker 1: scene in which a horse mounted soldier is shot in
Speaker 1: the thigh with an arrow. The character's name Private Wilhelm,
Speaker 1: and yes, the filmmakers dubbed in the scream from two
Speaker 1: years previous to express the character's agony. These kinds of
Speaker 1: reused and recycled sound effects are common in Hollywood. It
Speaker 1: saves time and money as studios crank out film after film.
Speaker 1: But even after the second movie appearance, the scream wouldn't
Speaker 1: have its brush with destiny for more than two more decades.
Speaker 1: Then along came Luke Skywalker and Company. Miller said, Ben Bert,
Speaker 1: the audio sound designer for the original Star Wars, was
Speaker 1: rummaging around for replacement audio when he was working on
Speaker 1: Star Wars and found the audio recordings of the voice
Speaker 1: actors screams and used one in Star Wars. He named
Speaker 1: the one he picked Wilhelm. Ever since then, sound designers
Speaker 1: and film have used the audio file as a calling card.
Speaker 1: Every Star Wars film up through the Force Awakens has
Speaker 1: used the scream, but Bert's on earthing of Private Wilhelm's
Speaker 1: painful yell has reverberated throughout countless other famous flicks. The
Speaker 1: list includes Toy Story, The Lord of the Rings, The
Speaker 1: Two Towers, Reservoir Dogs, Avengers, Infinity War, Venom, More, American Graffiti,
Speaker 1: and Willow, just to name a few. In Indiana, Jones
Speaker 1: and the Temple of Doom, the joke goes even further,
Speaker 1: deploying the scream as a character is torn to shreds
Speaker 1: by an alligator. All of them use the exact same recording,
Speaker 1: albeit tweaked by sound engineers, that was tucked away in
Speaker 1: the Warner Brothers archive so many years ago. There are
Speaker 1: numerous compilations online compressing dozens of instances of the scream
Speaker 1: into easy to view clips. It would be difficult to
Speaker 1: account for every use of the scream, but higher estimates
Speaker 1: guests that the blood curdling shriek has been used in
Speaker 1: as many as four hundred movies. Others placed the number
Speaker 1: it just over two d, still an amazingly long run
Speaker 1: for a single sound effect that originated seven decades ago.
Speaker 1: And of course, the scream is not limited to the
Speaker 1: big screen. It's also wormed its way into television, shows,
Speaker 1: video games, and other media. Once you know to look
Speaker 1: for it, you'll hear it everywhere. Today's episode was written
Speaker 1: by Nathan Chandler and produced by Tyler clang Or. More
Speaker 1: on this and lots of other curious topics, visit how
Speaker 1: stuffworks dot com. Brain Stuff is production of iHeart Radio
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