THE PEOPLE UNDER THE STAIRS (1991)

Note: from Oct 2021-June 2022, the podcast was known as 21 Jump Scare and was organized in a slightly different fashion, with different awards.

Background (spoiler-free) 0:00-9:00
Discussion (spoiler-heavy) 9:01-31:13
Awards (spoilers for days) 31:14

Director Wes Craven
Screenplay Wes Craven
Featuring Brandon Adams, Bill Cobbs, Everett McGill, AJ Langer, Kelly Jo Minter, Ving Rhames, Jeremy Roberts, Wendy Robie, Sean Whalen

Opened: November 3, 1991
Budget: $6,000,000 (estimated)
Opening Weekend USA: $5,522,250
Gross USA: $24,204,154
Cumulative Worldwide Gross: $31,347,154

SPOILER-FREE SYNOPSIS

After learning that his family is about to be evicted from their squalid inner-city apartment AND that his mother is in desperate need of an operation to save her life, young Poindexter, better known as Fool, decides to accompany family friend Leroy to rob the home of the landlords who are making their lives miserable.  Little do Leroy and Fool know, their landlords are the Robesons, a racist and oddly overprotective couple who live in a palatial home full of booby traps that have ensnared everyone that’s crossed its threshold over the years.  Successfully gaining entry, Fool and Leroy are instantly set upon by Mr. Robeson, or Daddy, as he’s called by his partner, who wears bondage gear, carries a shotgun, and fires indiscriminately into the house’s walls.  They also find themselves facing Prince, the couple’s vicious Rottweiler, who’s able to pursue Fool through the house’s many hidden passageways between the walls.  Fool soon learns he is not the only child in the house – the Robesons have a daughter, Alice, who apparently has never been outside. As Fool uncovers the secrets of the house, he comes to realize he is up against an evil way bigger than just a couple greedy landlords looking to make a buck off the downtrodden residents.

EPISODE NOTES

Music from “The People Under the Stairs” soundtrack by Don Peake (main theme), and Redhead Kingpin & the FBI.

TRAILER

AWARDS

The Tom Six Award for Most Disturbing Scene
Bradford:  Mommy “going all Joan Crawford on Alice” in the bathtub
Eric:  Daddy in gimp outfit self-soothing in the attic
   
The Seth Brundle Award for Most Likable Character
Bradford: Roach
Eric:  Fool
    
The Ellen Ripley Award for Character that Most Deserved to Live
Bradford:  Leroy
Eric:  Roach
    
The John Doe Award for Character that Most Deserved to Die (and Does)
Bradford:  (tie) Mommy and Daddy
Eric:  (tie) Mommy and Daddy

The Gaspar Noe Award/Ken Russell Award for Most Gratuitous Screen Moment
Bradford:  The death of Prince
Eric:  The disemboweling of Leroy