Following his "very dark" roles in John Wick and Nosferatu, Bill Skarsgård "was a little hesitant" to play Pennywise again in It: Welcome to Derry

It: Welcome to Derry sees Bill Skarsgård reprise the role of Pennywise the Clown, over 20 years (27 years, in fact…) before the events of the 2017 horror movie It – but the actor initially had his reservations about returning to the franchise.

"I think he was a little hesitant at the beginning to play It again because he is something that he did in the past," the show's director and executive producer Andy Muschietti says in the new issue of SFX magazine, which features It: Welcome to Derry on the cover and hits newsstands on Wednesday, October 8.

"Also, at that point, when we started talking about the series as something that was real and tangible, he had played a lot of very dark characters, and he was a little hesitant to go into it again. Because, obviously, for someone that takes his work and his art so seriously as him, it takes a toll to live in the head of those characters for a long time. So he was a little hesitant at the beginning – and then something changed. I guess that we started again, going into it and discussing all the virtues of this new story and he decided to do it."

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Since It, Skarsgård has starred in movies like Barbarian, The Crow, and Nosferatu, as well as playing the villain John Wick: Chapter 4 – not exactly a bundle of laughs. However, it was Welcome to Derry's exploration of Pennywise's origins as Bob Gray that convinced him to don the Dancing Clown's makeup again.

Executive producer Barbara Muschietti adds, "Because there was a lot more Bob Gray exploration, which we had talked to in the past, and we even had discussed making a third movie about Bob Gray before he was taken over by It and became Pennywise. This became a good little piece of candy to play with. We saw him having a really good time doing it. So it was nice to see him, especially in the Bob Gray moments when he's more distended, have fun."

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It: Welcome to Derry releases on HBO on October 26. Read more in the latest issue of SFX magazine, which will be available from Wednesday, October 8. Here's the It: Welcome to Derry cover you need to be looking out for on newsstands below...