Interview: The RATS Are Coming! Geretta Geretta is Here!

SHOCK talks shop with actress Geretta Geretta about her days with Bruno Mattei in 1984’s RATS.

Notorious Italian exploitation guru Bruno Matteis most infamous work might be 1981s HELL OF THE LIVING DEAD (aka ZOMBIE CREEPING FLESH aka NIGHT OF THE ZOMBIES aka VIRUS akawell, aka lots of titles) but that outrageous DAWN OF THE DEAD rip-off isnt his best picture by a long, lurid shot.

No, Matteis crowning achievement is a greasy little post-apocalyptic trash-fest called RATS: NIGHT OF TERROR, released in 1984 (and shot on some of the sprawling sets used for Sergio Leones masterful ONCE UPON A TIME IN AMERICA) and co-starring none other than DEMONS legend Geretta Geretta. In it, a ragtag gang of post-nuke toughs fight both each other and a horde of blood-sucking steroidal vermin, with both camps fighting for supremacy in a world gone wild. Plenty of Mattei goofiness and ultra-violence ensue.

RATS is cheap, cheesy, bloody and packed with lunatic action and Geretta Geretta steals the show as the limber, arse-punishing Chocolate.

But the lady herself is more than just a gorgeous (and seemingly ageless) face found in 80s Eurohorror. Shes an artist, filmmaker and award-winning master of multi-media; a real renaissance woman whose time spent in Mattei-ville was a mere footnote in a long, storied life.

But man, WHAT a footnote!

SHOCK cornered Geretta Geretta and snapped her up in our chat trap

SHOCK: What was a nice American girl like you doing flitting around Italy in the 1980s?

GG: Well even nice girls gotta eat! In actuality, my roommate at the time who has gone one to be a rather renown script supervisor, Dale Wyatt, was offered the role first… Guess Chocolate was ‘Dark Chocolate” in the first draft? Hmmmmanyway she was horrified when she heard the pay. It was beyond low. Actually it was low for us, we were being paid like studio players or contract players. We got lunch, we got our name in lights we got a very small check each week. I think it was my second film in Italy. I did not really speak a word of Italian at the time. I translated the entire script with a travelers pocket dictionary, The set ups, the dialogue, everything… and low and behold it became a breakthrough for me.

SHOCK: What kind of man was Bruno?

GG: Oh, Man, the best! The absolute best. He had this funny little crooked smile. He used to yell at me from the moment I got on set until I left. The spats we got into! This was during my “difficult actress” stage! I didn’t know anything! I thought you were supposed to be like that! Actually, a kind Ad later told me “Uh, you’re picking up bad habits. Actresses as a rule don’t talk back like you do to Bruno.” I was thunderstruck! I mean, really, I had no idea.

SHOCK: People often mumble that writer Claudio Fragasso really directed much of RATS. Any truth to that?

GG: Hell no. And that’s a quote for the dopes! What people don’t get – and trust me. I hear the same crap regarding Dario and Lamberto when we were all on DEMONS – is that really talented people like Bruno, allow other people to have opinions, chime in, come up with stuff. But RATS is Bruno’s film. It’s classic Bruno.Come on. The rubber rats on the conveyor belt thing? So Bruno. On second thought, maybe I SHOULD say that it was all Claudio’s idea (laughs)! Only Bruno came up with that kinda of no-budget but brilliant kinda stuff. And no one knows or knew more about camera angles and set ups and how to get two for one and do 20 set ups a day than that old Italian veteran. Claudio had lots of good ideas and Bruno would sort of pull on his chin in silence then if he liked it he’d say ‘Va Bene”. And plenty of times he did not say “Va bene. A nice girl cant repeat what he would say when he thought the idea was “stupido.”

SHOCK: Did you think the fact that the sole African actress in RATS being called Chocolate was a bit lazy? Did you have any reservations about the role?

GG: Claudio came up with that name. I have been called worse. Didn’t even think about it twice. “Chocolate” .”Negra”. “Ragazza De Colore”. “Colored Girl.” “Foxy Lady”. At least they’re “calling ya” is how I felt about it. At the same time in the States, with the exception of Susan Seidelman, who cast me in SMITHEREENS, I wasn’t getting called anything so yeah, you go where the work is. We, meaning all of us in the film, felt it was tongue in cheek, I mean, there was “video” too, We all had those post apocalyptic names. It was an 80’s thang, ya had to be there!

SHOCK: The rats themselves are nasty. Did you ever get bitten?

GG: No, but Bruno was all about saving money so he re-used the dead ones for days! That was nasty and smelled!

SHOCK: What did you think of the flick when you finally saw it?

GG: I have to tell youI never saw it! I dont think it even had a premiere! Years – and I mean years – later I saw a VHS copy of it in those old arthouse rental stores. I never in a million years even knew anyone knew anything about those films. Shoot, I forgot about them! But every now and then an old friend from Rome would contact me in the States and say “Sis, they messed up your voice in the Italian dubbed version. It’s too sweet.”

SHOCK: Did you have any off-screen romances with any of your co-stars?

GG: Of course. I had big hair and a big heart! I was dating Gianfrancco Gianni before the film started and I had some sort of “special friendship” with Claudio for a minute. He used to come to my place and I helped him write the movie he got his directorial debut on. I even introduced him the money people. Bruno used to always say “Fuck, Janna (which was my name back then), if you were gonna help somebody why didn’t you help me?” Right up until almost the end when I saw him last around 2002, he would still laugh and say that. He was like an Uncle to me. When I had my directorial debut, man, it was so low budget, even using the roll outs, I didnt have enough footage to get it to 80 minutes never mind 90 for distribution. He was Like “Come here give it to me. And I let him, without even questioning it, splice my negative! He hooked that sucker up in like 20 minutes and then told me to run the credits real long thank everybody then put a surprise at the end. Bingo, bitches! My film was now 90 minutes. I loved him!

SHOCK: On that note, you did evolve into a very interesting artist but do you look back fondly on those wild days in Italy?

GG: Of course! I arrived as a Greenhorn model and I left… well, a name in that genre. Not bad for a knocked kneed girl from Oregon!