Sylvia Soska
Identical twins, writers, directors, actors, and even stunt players, the Soska sisters have always loved twisted film. Even at an early age, they devoured Stephen King novels, one after another as fast as they could read - and would sneak into the over 18 sections at video stores, to critique the bloody images on the backs VHS horror movies and in gore magazines.
They both entered the film industry, acting and doing background work - and were soon unsatisfied with stereotypical roles that were commonly offered to identical twins. To expand their horizons, they trained in martial arts in hopes of picking up stunt roles and briefly attended a film school that included an intensive stunt program. For one of the school's final film projects, their prepared short film had its funding misappropriated and their short was pulled from the program. Undeterred, they decided to go ahead with it anyway, getting a new cast and crew and paying for it out of their own pockets. The title of that project was 'Dead Hooker In A Trunk'.
'Dead Hooker In A Trunk' is their debut film, which the twins wrote, directed, produced, starred in, and preformed the stunts. Using Robert Rodriguez's book, Rebel Without A Crew - a bible for how film-making could be done on a modest budget, armed only with creativity and ambition. Even following the spirit of El Mariachi, the twins' story reached the original El Mariachi, actor Carlos Gallardo - who not only gave the ladies advice, but appeared in the film - as God. The completed film - embraced by horror fans, film festivals, and critics - became an underground sensation, called "a hidden gem in indie film-making" and "a cult classic in the waiting", and won multiple awards: Pollygrind's Favorite Feature, Best Screenplay, City of Death's Best Director Award, and Cinefantasy's Audience Favorite Prize.
In 2008 the twins incorporated, Twisted Twins Productions -- to create their own label for many future projects to come, including their highly anticipated second feature, American Mary, an analogy of their own struggles in the film industry. American Mary has gone on to win numerous praise and awards. The film has gone on to become a cult classic and the various costumes of the lead character Mary Mason a Halloween and horror convention favorite for cos-players.
The Soska Sisters have gone on to be very outspoken about equal rights across the board including but not limited to gender equality and equal rights for the LGBT community. They're actively involved in promoting blood donation and create a new PSA for it every February. And they are only just getting started.
2014 was a big year with the Soska Sisters bringing a new life to See No Evil 2 where they resurrect the WWE Studios franchise with WWE Superstar Glenn "Kane" Jacobs reprising his role as Jacob Goodnight and scream queens Danielle Harris and Katharine Isabelle appear together for the first time. As well, the Twins will be one of the all star director lined up for ABCs of Death 2 in a segment that will shock and be destined for cult status. Their segment, T is for Torture Porn, has since been banned in Germany.
In 2015, the twins did a genre jump, teaming again with Lionsgate and WWE Studios, with a action revenge thriller called Vendetta to star, Dean Cain, Paul 'Big Show' Wight, and Michael Eklund. The high action, ultra gory nature of the film proved that the sisters are not one trick ponies as they expand their sensibilities to this Justin Shady written, men's prison revenge flick.
Avid comic book fans, the Soska Sisters have teamed up with Daniel Way (Deadpool, Daken) to create their own very graphic novel entitled Kill-Crazy Nymphos Attack! with artist Rob Dumo & cover artist Dave Johnson which is a pitch black satire on patriarchal society and women's roles within it. The very graphic novel is set with a 2017 release date.
September 16th, 2015, also marks the release of Jen & Sylvia Soska's first collaboration with Marvel comics with their Night Nurse story line 'The Risk of Infection' featured in Secret Wars Journal #5. The Soska twins have been long time fans of Marvel Comics and been quite vocal in their interests to tackle the adaptation of one of their stories for the big screen with them at the helm as directors. In April it was announced that the twins would be teaming with Marvel again, this time writing 'The Ripley' as a Guardians of the Galaxy story featured in Guardians of Infinity #8.
The media that the twins take on ever expanding, the Soska Sisters are the hosts of the survival horror game-show called Hellevator that premiered October 21 2015 on GSN. The show is a creation from Blumhouse, GSN, Matador, and Lionsgate. The show just enjoyed its second season and received even more attention when it was made available on VOD through Netflix and Hulu proving that evil twins continue to have a rich history with elevators and scaring people.
In February 2016, the directing duo of Jen and Sylvia Soska came on board to direct a remake of David Cronenberg's 1977 zombie thriller Rabid. John Vidette's Somerville House Releasing entered into a joint venture with Paul Lalonde and Michael Walker to produce a feature film and original TV series based on the 1977 Canadian horror film.
December 11, 2016 will mark the twins' company, Twisted Twins Productions' 8 year anniversary which will have them with 4 feature films, 2 graphic novels, a series of blood donation PSAs, and a television show. Not too shabby for a pair of twins from Canada who set their sites on shaking up the entertainment industry playing by their own rules and leaving a hefty cinematic body count in their wake.