Jordan Ladd
Scream queen is a label that usually flattens whoever it lands on. In Jordan Ladd's case it also happens to be accurate, and she has made better use of it than most.
She is the daughter of the actress Cheryl Ladd and the producer David Ladd, and she started in made-for-television films alongside her mother before taking her first lead, at nineteen, in the direct-to-video horror picture Embrace of the Vampire. The drama Nowhere followed in 1997 and the comedy Never Been Kissed in 1999, where she plays Gibby.
What she brings to horror is a very particular kind of likeability that can curdle. These films need somebody the audience trusts early so that the turn costs something later, and she does trust well: open, funny, a little too reasonable. Cabin Fever, Club Dread, Death Proof and Grace all use her that way, and Hostel: Part II puts her in the middle of a run that made her one of the recognisable faces of 2000s American horror. She appears in Grindhouse as part of the same Death Proof material.
She has also worked twice with David Lynch, in the short Darkened Room and in Inland Empire, which is about as far from a slasher as an American film gets. That combination, drive-in horror and one of the most difficult art films of the century, is the most interesting thing on her resume.
Movies (16)
- Death Proof (2007)
- Hostel: Part II (2007)
- Inland Empire (2006)
- Never Been Kissed (1999)
- Grindhouse (2007)
- Waiting... (2005)
- Cabin Fever (2003)
- Nowhere (1997)
- Embrace of the Vampire (1995)
- Club Dread (2004)
- The Specials (2000)
- Satanic Panic (2019)
- Grace (2009)
- The Christmas Contract (2018)
- Madhouse (2004)
- Air Collision (2012)
TV (1)
Where to start with Jordan Ladd
Her best showcase, by a distance, is Death Proof. She is in the half of the film built almost entirely from conversation, and the long talky stretch before anything happens is where you can actually watch her act rather than react.
Cabin Fever is the one that made her a genre fixture, cheap and mean and much stranger than its reputation. Grace is the toughest watch here and the closest she has come to carrying a horror film outright.
Inland Empire is the outlier and worth it, though be warned that it is three hours of pure Lynch and nobody is there to make you comfortable. For the lighter side, Club Dread is a horror parody with a real affection for the form, and Never Been Kissed is the mainstream comedy credit. Hostel: Part II completes the 2007 run.