The Hidden Truth Of Terrifier's Art The Clown, David Howard Thornton

As horror fans are well aware, the success of the "Terrifier" franchise can be attributed to its central antagonist, Art the Clown. A circus-costumed serial killer with a knack for murdering victims in creative and oh-so-gruesome ways, Art continues to delight horror aficionados with his gleefully gory mayhem.

Directed by Damien Leone, 2016's "Terrifier" was a crowd-funded slasher movie made on a shoestring budget of $35,000. Instead of being doomed to join the long list of hilarious low-budget films, the film made its money back, and then some, leading to a far bigger — albeit hardly substantial — budget of $250,000 for the 2022 follow-up "Terrifier 2." When the sequel did even better, bringing in more than $15 million — 60 times what it cost to make — Leone was reportedly given $2 million for "Terrifier 3." Released in October 2024, the film outperformed expectations by raking in nearly $44 million, capturing the No. 1 spot at the box office from the hugely anticipated and widely panned sequel "Joker: Folie à Deux."

Now that Art is on his way to joining the pantheon of genre-defining horror-movie villains such as Jason Voorhees, Michael Myers, and Freddy Krueger, attention is turning to the actor underneath the chilling clown mask: David Howard Thornton, who's portrayed the killer clown in all three movies. But there is more hidden truth behind the up-and-coming horror icon, Art the Clown, and the man behind it, David Howard Thornton.

Growing up in Huntsville, Alabama, David Howard Thornton was a shy kid. He was first introduced to theatre by his mother, who encouraged him to audition for his school's production of "Mickey's Christmas Carol" in the hopes it would bring him out of his shell. He wound up cast in the lead role, playing Walt Disney's famed creation, Mickey Mouse. "I found my love for acting, especially comedy, because things went wrong on stage and I started improvising on the spot and just started cracking jokes," Thornton recalled in an interview with USA Today. "For the first time ever at that school, people were laughing with me instead of at me.

Realizing he thrived onstage, Thornton began landing roles in Huntsville's Fantasy Playhouse children's theater and wound up appearing in several productions. "That's where I learned," Thornton told AL.com. "I didn't go to school for acting. But I considered the stage my college and that's I learned from so many fantastic actors there growing up in Huntsville."

When his mother was diagnosed with cancer and died while he was attending college, Thornton had an epiphany. In the midst of attaining a degree in education, he decided to follow the dream that he'd lain aside and set out to pursue a career as an actor. "Life's too short not to do what you really want to do," he told USA Today. "That was my last conversation with my mom."

After college, David Howard Thornton headed to New York City to pursue an acting career. Success did not come overnight, and he embodied the time-honored cliché of a struggling actor scrambling to land bit parts in whatever he could. "I'd also been waiting tables," he told The Hollywood Reporter, recalling his career had hit a particularly low ebb. "I had been up for five or six different Broadway tours, and every single one of them had fallen through at the last minute during final callbacks. So I was getting discouraged, and I was like, 'I'm so close to getting something.'"

Thornton had been working primarily in theater when he learned of a low-budget horror movie looking for an actor to portray a sadistic, murderous clown. "I had never auditioned for any film roles before, and I wanted to get into film," Thornton explained. "I then came across this audition for 'Terrifier,' and I was like, 'Oh, well that looks like fun.'" As he told AL.com, he felt that he definitely fit the criteria, at least in terms of his physical attributes. "They were looking for a tall skinny guy that had clowning or physical comedy experience to play Art," he said. "I just submitted myself to the audition, and I booked it off my first audition," he said.

Having nailed his first-ever audition for a movie and landed a major role in a horror film, David Howard Thornton felt that he had a great handle on what he could do with Art the Clown, as he was already familiar with the character from another Damien Leone film, "All Hallows' Eve." As Thornton told The Hollywood Reporter, "I was like, 'Oh, he's like an evil Mr. Bean. I would love a chance to play a character like this. I feel like there's something I can do with him.'"

However, Thornton encountered resistance from his agent, who felt that playing a masked maniac in a slasher flick was beneath him. "She was like, 'This is such a low-budget independent film. You really don't need to do stuff like this.' And I was like, "Well, I want to get experience in front of the camera, and this could be something I can add to a reel one day. I just want this experience,'" he recalled. 

Looking back at Thornton's audition, "Terrifier" director Leone recalled the actor winning him over with "Jim Carrey-esque, over-the-top theatrical mannerisms" that were exactly what he was looking for. "He was born to play this character," Leone told USA Today of finding his Art the Clown.

With "Terrifier" under his belt, David Howard Thornton garnered another screen role, this time in an independently produced web series pulled from DC Comics' Batman mythos: "Nightwing: Escalation." The series follows the adventures of Dick Grayson, who followed up being Batman's sidekick, Robin, by morphing into a new superhero called Nightwing, and like "Terrifier," the crowd-funded show relied on fan contributions for its budget. Thornton jumped at the chance to join the list of people who played one of comics' most iconic villains, the Joker.

Playing the Joker was so enjoyable for the actor that he's expressed his desire to reprise the role in an official DC production. "The Joker is my favorite villain of all time, and that's a character I would love to play myself one day," Thornton told GamesRadar+. "So hopefully someone like [DC Studios head] James Gunn gives me the opportunity to tackle that character because I would like to do a lot of fun things with him."

As Thornton told USA Today, he was hopeful that Gunn had taken note of the success of "Terrifier," believing that he and the director/producer were kindred nerd spirits. "He is a fellow geek and truly values the source material of the films that he makes," declared Thornton, who once treated attendees at a fan convention to a monologue as the Joker.

Over the course of three "Terrifier" movies, David Howard Thornton's Art the Clown has committed some wildly heinous acts, ranging from slaughtering an entire family on Christmas Eve while costumed as Santa to interrupting a showering couple's steamy tryst with a chainsaw. Both those kills took place in "Terrifier 3," as did another that Thornton admitted was easily the most difficult faux murder he'd ever committed on camera.

"I, unfortunately, was not able to tag in my double because my face was shown the whole entire time in the shot, and I was like, 'Oh, no, no, no.' It deals with something that I just do not like in general, and it's something that always makes me nauseous when I see it," Thornton told The Hollywood Reporter of the scene, which involved Art feeding live rats to a helpless victim through a tube. 

"I feel that [director] Damien [Leone] specifically put that element into this one kill scene just to see if he could break me, and it worked," he added with a laugh, recalling that he had to muster up everything he had to not vomit all over his clown makeup. "My makeup artist had spent hours doing it, and she was standing there on the side, saying, 'Don't you dare, David! Don't you dare.'"

Shortly before being cast as Art the Clown in the first "Terrifier" movie, David Howard Thornton had recently returned to New York after being on tour with "Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas The Musical." As Thornton told The Hollywood Reporter, "I understudied the fantastic Stefán Karl, who played the Grinch, and I also played Grandpa Who." 

His experience portraying the classic Dr. Seuss character no doubt came in handy when he was later cast in the 2022 horror film "The Mean One." In that role, Thornton didn't drift far outside his Art the Clown lane, portraying a maniacal killer with a strong resemblance to the Grinch. "I went nuts when I first saw myself in the mirror in full makeup," Thornton said to Screamboat Movie in a short video about the making of the movie. Thornton clearly had a good time starring in a horror spoof of the classic animated holiday special. "Like a fun twist on one of your favorite Christmas stories," he added.

One of the key factors — and key challenges — in David Howard Thornton's performance as Art the Clown in the "Terrifier" movies is that the character has no dialogue and wears a featureless mask, expressing himself entirely through movement. For inspiration, Thornton drew on his love of silent film comedians from the early days of Hollywood, actors who likewise created characterizations through physicality, not their voices. He was also inspired by the later work of actor Andy Serkis, whose gift for embodying a character through movement was on full display when playing Gollum in the "Lord of the Rings" movies. 

Meanwhile, Thornton also finds playing the role to be a great way of relieving stress by releasing any underlying rage that might be bubbling under the surface. As he told USA Today, whenever he's instructed to add a bit of additional verve to one of Art's murders, "They're like, 'Wow, Dave, you really have a lot of pent up-anger there.' This is my therapy. Art therapy, I guess you could say."

When growing up, David Howard Thornton immersed himself in movies and video games, with "Legend of Zelda" becoming a particular favorite of the latter class. The "Terrifier" star is also a fan of Lego, something he revealed — appropriately enough — when he appeared on the "Building Friends" podcast, in which guests are interviewed while building stuff with Lego bricks.

"You're one of the few actual Lego fans that I've had on the show," host Jon Sosis told Thornton, noting that former "Full House" star Jodie Sweetin, who'd previously been on the podcast, was also enamored with Lego. Thornton responded with surprise, before admiring a small replica of Art the Clown that had been constructed with Lego bricks. "It's amazing," Thornton declared. "I love it, because, you know, they're probably never going to actually release a Lego version of Art the Clown."

As viewers who have watched any of the "Terrifier" films can attest, there don't appear to be any limits on the level of murderous depravity to which Art the Clown can sink. There is, however, one line that David Howard Thornton refuses to cross. He's made it very clear that Art may kill with gusto and glee, but the character will never commit sexual assault. "It disturbs me and disgusts me," Thornton told The Hollywood Reporter, "and I just think that something like that has no place on film."

Thornton elaborated while appearing on the "Jake's Takes" podcast, explaining that he's come to a very specific take on Art's sexuality — or lack thereof. "I don't see him as a sexual creature," Thornton said of why Art is a murderer but not a rapist. "I see him as very asexual," Thornton added. "I feel like sexuality is something that's beneath him. That is like, that's something that he's just not interested in, that does not appeal to him."

Growing up in Alabama, David Howard Thornton was decidedly not one of the cool kids in high school. Becoming famous, however, has brought him to a status he certainly didn't have in high school — something that came into play when he encountered a former classmate who used to bully him when they went to school together. 

While appearing on the "Building Friendships" podcast, Thornton recalled recently attending his 20th high school reunion, where he met a woman who used to look down on him during their school years. "I could tell she still had that mentality from back in the day ... that very condescending [breaking into an exaggerated Southern accent] 'Oh what are you doing?'" Thornton recalled. "And I was like, 'Oh, signing autographs.'" 

When Thornton explained his role in "Terrifier," and she recalled having noticed it on Netflix, she immediately began singing a different tune. "Her personality changed," he recounted, noting that her entire demeanor grew far friendlier upon realizing she was speaking with a celebrity. "I kid you not, I looked up at her and I was like, 'Oh, I'm sorry, I don't remember you.'"

There's no surer sign that Art the Clown has permeated mainstream pop culture than the character's appearance in "Bupkis," the quasi-autobiographical comedy series starring controversy-prone "Saturday Night Live" alum Pete Davidson. In the brief scene, Davidson, playing a skewed version of himself, envisions a hallucination of Art waving at him. He looks away in disbelief, and when he turns back, he then sees Art pointing at him and laughing maniacally, seriously freaking the comedian out.  

As David Howard Thornton explained when appearing on "Reel Appreciation with David Clair Bennett," Davidson was a huge fan of the "Terrifier" franchise, so much so that he used to show clips of Art's murderous mayhem to other members of the cast. "He'd show them, like, the hacksaw scene, just to mess with people," he said. Interviewed by Cinefied (via Horror Geek Life), Thornton confirmed his "Bupkis" cameo came about at the request of Davidson himself, adding, "And it works so well, because it's a hallucination, so it totally works in the whole scheme of things. That was just a lot of fun."

David Howard Thornton's talents extend beyond portraying crazed killers on film. As he revealed during an onstage appearance at the Galaxycon fan convention, there's a whole other side to him of which "Terrifier" fans are very likely unaware. "I'm a musician as well," he said. "I was a musician before I was an actor ..."

Thornton is an accomplished voice actor who's appeared in various audio-only projects, including radio commercials and an array of character impersonations, as well as having lent his voice to several video games, including "Two Worlds II" and "Invizimals: The Lost Kingdom." Thornton is also a talented impressionist; more than a decade ago, Thornton posted online a video in which he whips through more than a hundred impressions in just nine minutes, including several "Family Guy" characters, cartoon character Yogi Bear, and comedian-turned-director Woody Allen.

As Thornton told AL.com, he was originally inspired by the legendary Mel Blanc, who provided the voices of numerous cartoon characters, ranging from Bugs Bunny to Barney Rubble of the classic cartoon "The Flintstones." "I was like, 'Wow, there's this one guy that has all these voices. I would like a job like that,' and so I started teaching myself how to do character voices. Now I do over 200 of them, which is ironic since I'm known for playing a silent character."