 |
Ari Lehman | |
|---|---|
| Born | May 2, 1965 |
| Occupation(s) | Actor, musician |
| Years active | 1978–present |
| Notable work | Jason Voorhees in Friday the 13th (1980) |
Ari Lehman (born May 2, 1965) [1] is an American performing artist, composer, and actor. He is known for playing the child Jason Voorhees in the Paramount horror film Friday the 13th , becoming the first actor to portray the horror film icon. As of 2018, Lehman performs in a punk rock/heavy metal band, First Jason. [2] [3]
A native New Yorker, Ari Lehman grew up in Westport, Connecticut, [1] [4] where he trained in Classical Music and Jazz Piano. Lehman was presented with an All-State Award for Excellence in Jazz Piano and a scholarship to Berklee School of Music by jazz educator, Dr. Billy Taylor. [1] [2]
Lehman heard about an audition being held in Westport for the movie, "Manny's Orphans", [5] about a group of inner-city orphans who play soccer, directed by Sean S. Cunningham. Lehman snuck into the audition and landed the role of "Roger". [6] This role led to Lehman getting the call to play Jason Voorhees in Friday the 13th from Sean S. Cunningham. [7] [8] "For his audition Lehman was asked one key question by the director, ‘Can you swim?’" [1] [3] [6]
After the release of Friday the 13th, Lehman returned to New York City, where he enrolled at New York University and concentrated on Big Band Orchestration and Jazz Piano, "where he studied with the likes of Vladimir Shafranov". [1] Lehman's career led him to become a keyboardist for artists of Reggae and African music of the time, with whom he toured throughout the US, Europe and West Africa, and recorded with at Tuff Gong Records and Interscope Records. [9]
Lehman went on to form his own world rock and reggae band Ari Ben Moses Band, [10] [11] and gained acclaim [1] when, upon moving to Chicago in late 2002, he was contacted by horror fans who invited him to attend an East Coast horror convention. [3] [10] Lehman then created First Jason, a punk metal band specifically for horror fans, especially the fans of Jason Voorhees and Friday the 13th. [1] [3] [12]
Lehman made his film debut in Sean S. Cunningham's film Manny's Orphans. He then played the role of a child Jason Voorhees in Friday the 13th , appearing in Pamela Voorhees's flashback [13] and Alice Hardy's dream – the final scene of the horror film. [13] [14] [15] [16]
Lehman also appears in archive footage, uncredited, in Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981) and Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter (1984). [17] [18] [19]
Since Friday the 13th, Lehman has appeared in a number of independent films and short films.
In 2004, Lehman formed his punk metal band whose name, First Jason, is based upon his role as Jason Voorhees. [20] First Jason has independently released two albums: Jason is Watching! (2009), with Chuck Lescewicz "Nefarious" from Chicago death metal band Macabre playing bass, and Amit Shamir "Cleaver" from New York hardcore punk band Cro-Mags on drums; [3] [21] [22] and "Heed My Warning,"(2013), described by Uber Rock (UK) as "a brand of thinking man's horror-themed rock." [23] In 2019, he performed vocals for the acoustic version of the song Thank God It's Friday from Ice Nine Kills album The Silver Scream Final Cut
Lehman has also composed, performed and recorded a number of soundtracks for independent films, including Alexia Anastasio's critically acclaimed all-female "Salome", [24] [25] and Vamp Films "Vampire the Movie", "which won the 2007 Rondo Award for Best Independent Feature." [26] [27] [28] [29]
| Title | Year | Role | Notes | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Manny's Orphans | 1978 | Roger | Also distributed under the name Kick | |
| Friday the 13th | 1980 | Jason Voorhees | Possibly Alice Hardy's imagination as Jason Voorhees was still a child in that scene. | |
| ThanXgiving [30] [31] | 2006 | Delbert Eaton | ||
| Three Thug Mice [32] | 2008 | voiceover | Animated short | |
| Hell-ephone [33] | 2008 | Professor/Circuit Maker | ||
| Terror Overload [31] [34] | 2009 | Ray Rae | ||
| His Name Was Jason: 30 Years of Friday the 13th [1] [35] | 2009 | Himself | Documentary | |
| Night On Has Been Mountain [36] | 2010 | Invisible Man | ||
| The Girl [31] | 2011 | The Man | ||
| House of Forbidden Secrets [37] [38] | 2013 | Building Crewman | ||
| Easter Sunday [39] [40] | 2014 | Postman | ||
| The Wicked One [31] | 2014 | Count Creepy | ||
| Pi Day Die Day [41] | 2016 | Principal Hayward | ||
| The Barn [41] | 2016 | Rock | ||
| Camp Killer [42] | 2016 | Joe | ||
| Rock Paper Dead | 2017 | Jason | ||
| The Lurker | 2019 | Dr. Stratton | ||
Friday the 13th is a 1980 American independent slasher film produced and directed by Sean S. Cunningham, written by Victor Miller, and starring Betsy Palmer, Adrienne King, Harry Crosby, Laurie Bartram, Mark Nelson, Jeannine Taylor, Robbi Morgan, and Kevin Bacon. Its plot follows a group of teenage camp counselors who are murdered one by one by an unknown killer while they are attempting to re-open an abandoned summer camp with a tragic past.
Jason Voorhees is a character from the Friday the 13th series. He first appeared in Friday the 13th (1980) as the young son of camp-cook-turned-killer Mrs. Voorhees, in which he was portrayed by Ari Lehman. Created by Victor Miller, with contributions by Ron Kurz, Sean S. Cunningham and Tom Savini, Jason was not originally intended to carry the series as the main antagonist. The character has subsequently been represented in various other media, including novels, video games, comic books, and a crossover film with another iconic horror film character, Freddy Krueger.
Kane Warren Hodder is an American actor, stuntman, and author.
Freddy vs. Jason is a 2003 American slasher film directed by Ronny Yu and written by Damian Shannon and Mark Swift. It is a crossover between the A Nightmare on Elm Street and Friday the 13th franchises, being the eighth installment in the former and the eleventh in the latter. The film joins the two series in a shared universe and pits their respective antagonists, Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhees, against each other. Freddy is weakened and forgotten because the citizens of his home town Springwood have defeated him by using medications that repress dreams. Freddy awakens Jason to stir up fear and grow his powers so that he may return and kill again. Jason turns out to not be as easily controlled as Freddy initially thought, and the two supernatural mass murderers come into conflict. The film is chronologically set after Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare (1991) and Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday (1993), and is the last film in each franchise before their respective reboots.
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Friday the 13th Part 2 is a 1981 American slasher film produced and directed by Steve Miner in his directorial debut, and written by Ron Kurz. It is a direct sequel to Friday the 13th (1980), and the second installment in the franchise. Adrienne King, Betsy Palmer, and Walt Gorney reprise their respective roles from the first film as Alice Hardy, Pamela Voorhees, and Crazy Ralph. Amy Steel and John Furey also star. Taking place five years after the first film, Part 2 follows a similar premise, with an unknown stalker killing a group of camp counselors at a training camp near Crystal Lake. The film marks the debut of Jason Voorhees as the series' main antagonist.
Pamela Voorhees is a fictional character and the overarching antagonist of the Friday the 13th series of horror films. She was created by Victor Miller, and first appeared in Sean S. Cunningham's Friday the 13th (1980), played by Betsy Palmer. Pamela is the main antagonist of the first film, in which she is known only as Mrs. Voorhees, and remains an antagonistic presence in its sequels, in which she is seen mostly as a severed head or a figment of her son's imagination. In Friday the 13th Part III (1982), the character appears as a reanimated corpse in a hallucination, played by Marilyn Poucher. Paula Shaw played Pamela in the crossover Freddy vs. Jason (2003); according to Palmer in Friday The 13th Reunion, she was asked to reprise her role in the film, but turned it down after reading the script. Nana Visitor played Pamela in the 2009 reboot.
Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday is a 1993 American science fiction supernatural slasher film directed by Adam Marcus, written by Jay Huguely and Dean Lorey, and produced by Sean S. Cunningham. The ninth installment in the Friday the 13th franchise and a sequel to Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan (1989), it stars John D. LeMay, Kari Keegan, Steven Williams, and Kane Hodder as Jason Voorhees; the latter reprising his role from the previous two films. It is the first film in the series to be distributed by New Line Cinema. Set after the events of Jason Takes Manhattan, the film follows Jason's spirit as it possesses various people to continue his killings after his death. To resurrect himself, Jason must find and possess a member of his bloodline, but he can also be permanently killed by one of his surviving relatives using a magical dagger.
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Friday the 13th is an American horror franchise that comprises twelve slasher films, a television series, novels, comic books, video games, and tie‑in merchandise. The franchise mainly focuses on the fictional character Jason Voorhees, who was thought to have drowned as a boy at Camp Crystal Lake due to the negligence of the camp staff. Decades later, the lake is rumored to be "cursed" and is the setting for a series of mass murders. Jason is featured in all of the films, as either the killer or the motivation for the killings. The original film, created to cash in on the success of Halloween (1978), was written by Victor Miller and was produced and directed by Sean S. Cunningham. The films have grossed over $468 million at the box-office worldwide.
Alice Hardy is a fictional character in the Friday the 13th franchise. Alice first appears in Friday the 13th (1980) as an artist working as a camp counselor. She is portrayed by Adrienne King—who reprises the role in the sequel Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981) and the fan film Jason Rising (2021). Alice's creator, Victor Miller, scripted her as a flawed character, envisioning her in an affair. Once production began on the original film, budgetary constraints limited the deeper exposition intended for Alice's character.
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Texas Fear Fest was a horror-oriented for-profit media event held in the Dallas, Texas, area. Guests included actors, directors, and producers from classic and upcoming horror films. Texas Fear Fest was organized by John Gray and presented in conjunction with horror websites "Pit of Horror" and "Dread Central". Despite the apparent success of the first three events, the organization collapsed in 2011 due to internal issues which forced the cancellation of scheduled and future events.
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Friday the 13th: The Game is a 2017 asymmetrical survival horror game developed by IllFonic and published by Gun Media. It is based on the Friday the 13th franchise. The game was released on May 26, 2017 as a digital release and later released on October 13, 2017, as a physical release for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. A Nintendo Switch version was released on August 13, 2019.
Ginny Field is a fictional character in the Friday the 13th series. She first appears in Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981) as a child psychology student working as a camp counselor assistant trainer, in which she was portrayed by Amy Steel. Writer Ron Kurtz conceptualized the character, while director Steve Miner intended to utilize Ginny to carry further installments as the main protagonist. Ginny has subsequently seen representation in other media such as novels and fan labor.
| Authority control databases: Artists |
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