P. J. SOLES
THE PRE-INTERVIEW
It was 1979 when I went to downtown Chicago with some Art Institute friends
of mine to the Oriental Theater. A place which had seen better days and now
showed triple bills of Black and kung fu films for a couple of bucks. The carpet
squished when you walked down the aisles. The audience was black and we were the
only whites in the theater. The occasion for our venture was the last film in
the triple bill. Rock 'n' Roll High School. We had no idea how the
audience would react to the Ramones or the film, the Ramones had released their
first album to critical acclaim but lackluster sales. The world was not yet
ready for the boys.
The audience loved the film and bonded with the star P. J. Soles who portrayed Riff Randell immediately. They even cheered when the high school at the end of the film was blown up. Pamela Jane started her career as a model (Crisco was her first big account) and all of us agreed she was one hot woman. PJ would appear in several huge cult films - Carrie, Halloween and Stripes. When I heard she would be at Flashback Weekend [www.flashbackweekend.com] I spoke with her over the phone to set up an interview - and we chatted for almost two hours!
I asked her about Howard Stern's plan to re-make the Rock 'n' Roll High School (say what you will about Howard, there is no question he is a true Ramones fan) and she has been in contact with the film company involved in the production. It would be sweet if she was in it. She even has a script.
Turns out she was raised in Venizuela and Morrocco . Her dad was Dutch and worked for an insurance company. Her mom married him after a two week whirlwind romance. PJ took classes at the Actor's Studio trading off doing lights to attend classes. Her modeling work led her to a part in the soap opera Love is a Many Splendored Thing (man I wish I had an episode of her on that show). She became known in the industry as the beautiful girl who went to auditions wearing a baseball cap. When Brian DePalma saw her audition he asked her to bring the cap with her to call backs. Call backs was everyone reading the script out loud. She was signed for a six week shoot. Carrie was on the way to jolting the American public in general and horror fans in particular.
From there she would appear in Halloween as Jamie Lee Curtis' best friend. For my money, none of the other Halloween films have come close to matching the impact the first had. As if being in Carrie wasn't enough having Halloween under your belt is formidable indeed. Then she worked with Bill Murray (a personal hero and he once hosted a party in his home for the Psychotronic Film Society) in Stripes and has managed to escape the stigma of just being a scream queen.
So come to Flashback Weekend and meet her. There are rumors she will be signing autographs, hers is the hardest to get of all the casts in the films she has done. I will be interviewing her about the experiences and movies she has done and I had a delightful time talking to her. Watch this space.
Cheers,
Michael Flores
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