MacColl had recently made her film debut in the title role of the manga adaptation "Lady Oscar", and would be cast as the lead in Fulci's later films "The Beyond" and "The House by the Cemetery". When she was approached for the film, she felt that the script was "badly written" and almost declined taking part. "It seemed to me like a series of special effects without a story", she said in an interview in 2011. She called her agent from her hotel room to seek his advice; he told her to take the role, because "nobody was going to see the film anyway". MacColl said her agent turned out to be wrong about that.