Evan Peters Opens Up About How He Escaped Jeffrey Dahmer After Method Acting For Months

Evan Peters Opens Up About How He Escaped Jeffrey Dahmer After Method Acting For Months Netflix

Evan Peters stayed in character as serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer “for months,” according to creator Ryan Murphy (via Variety). Perhaps unsurprisingly, this started to take a toll on his mental state, so the actor had to find a way to disconnect. How did he do it? Peters shared just that during a panel for the show on Saturday.

evan peters as jeffrey dahmerNetflix

  1. Playing Jeffrey Dahmer meant spending time on the dark side for Evan Peters. As he explained: “I wanted to give it 120 percent the whole way through, so I brought in a lot of darkness and negativity. And so really, it was just having that end goal in sight. You know, knowing when we were going to wrap.”
  2. When it was all over, he was glad to step away. It’s hard to come out of such an intense headspace, but Peters was relieved to be able to do so. “Finally being able to breathe and let go and say ‘okay, now it’s time to bring in the joy and the lightness and watch comedies and romances and go back to St. Louis and see my family and friends and just watch ‘Step Brothers’ [helped],” he revealed.

The transformation didn’t happen overnight

  1. It was a long and arduous process. Not only did “Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story” shoot for six months, but there was four months of preparation leading up to production as well. This gave Peters a chance to change his physical self to match that of the killer. “He [Dahmer] has a very straight back. He doesn’t move his arms when he walks, so I put weights on my arms to see what that felt like,” Peters explained. “I wore the character shoes with lifts in them, his jeans, his glasses, I had a cigarette in my hand at all times.” He even listened to lengthy recordings of Dahmer on a daily basis.
  2. Peters’ co-star, Niecy Nash, worried about him a lot. While she attempted to chat with him cheerily as production began, she soon realized he was “in his process” and decided to back off. “I wanted to respect that and I wanted to keep him there. I prayed for you a lot, for real, because this is weighty. And when you stay in it, and you’re tethered to the material, like bone to marrow, your soul is troubled at some point,” she said. “And I could see him getting tired. I just said, ‘Well, I’m just gonna make sure I keep him in my prayers, because this is a lot and he wants to do it justice.'” Luckily, Evan Peters seems to have truly left Jeffrey Dahmer behind now.

Jennifer Still is a writer and editor with more than 10 years of experience. The managing editor of Bolde, she has bylines in Vanity Fair, Business Insider, The New York Times, Glamour, Bon Appetit, and many more. You can follow her on Twitter @jenniferlstill
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