Skeet Ulrich From "Scream" Was Once a KILF
I saw Scream in theaters the year it came out (1996). That same year, I added "Skeet" to my list of baby names, which I fastidiously recorded in a notebook at the age of 13 ("Ulysses" was also on the list). Yes, I thought it was a good idea to name one of my 47 future children after Skeet Ulrich, the actor who played Billy Loomis, a killer, in Scream. I’m now 33 and childless. This is my story.
Skeet was hot. He had greasy hair, and I knew from watching Reality Bites and Romeo + Juliet, which came out a month before Scream, that greasy hair was a thing to lust after. Teen me desperately wanted to run her fingers through greasy hair, or at least pat at the matting. She wanted to brush away a strand of bang, no matter how clumpy or foul-smelling it was. She wanted to make out with hair right in her face, even if the oils gave her pimples that same night. If that meant having a crush on Billy Loomis (a killer), Troy Dyer (a narcissist), or Romeo (an obsessive), so be it.
To be fair, I spent much of Scream, like everyone, not realizing Skeet was playing a killer. I’d seen a lot of horror movies by then, and none of them featured hot bad guys (or even many hot good guys). There was Jason, Freddy, Leatherface, ’80s bros with feathered mullets (including Johnny Depp). Scream cast a real heartthrob. And so I did what I had to do: I hung a poster of him on whatever surface area of wall I could find that wasn’t already covered by Leo and I memorized his face. I can still close my eyes and see the exact shape of Skeet Ulrich’s teeth. What’s your talent?
Now I watch Scream and feel embarrassed for myself. (I’d still like to ride Troy Dyer’s melt though.) Billy was an asshole, a whiner, and, as Sidney pointed out, a mama’s boy. He pressured his girlfriend to have sex, complained that their relationship wasn’t "NC-17" enough, and asked her to do "over the clothes stuff," which adult me knows he’d suck at.
He was also a killer. And while greasy hair will always be to die for, I know it’s not, like, literally to die for. Perhaps one day I’ll pass that wisdom on to my children. I still have their names all picked out.
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