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Tobias Jelinek was just 15 years old when he was cast in Hocus Pocus.
“It was surreal,” Jelinek, now 48, told PEOPLE. He was particularly wowed by being on set with Bette Midler, who played Winnie Sanderson, the eldest of the three Sanderson sister-witches.
“Bette Midler was and still is larger than life,” the actor said. In the film, he played Jay, a teenage bully and best friend to Larry Bagby’s Ice. “She’s remarkable, her presence, and she has a lot of that live performer beauty and grace.”
When Jelinek and Bagby did their brief scene with the Sanderson witches — Sarah Jessica Parker played Sarah and Kathy Najimy played Mary — the actor said they knew they had to bring their “A game.”
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“It was remarkable to see her and a young Sarah Jessica Parker and Kathy Najimy — who’s hilarious, perhaps my favorite in the film — to watch them do all of their witchy stuff and the choreography,” Jelinek, who stars in this monther’s Netflix series Monster: The Ed Gein Story, remembered. “And Bette really running that, [that] was a learning experience.”
As for his younger costars, including Omri Katz, Thora Birch and Vinessa Shaw, he said, “We all loved each other. We had a blast.” He praised legendary director Kenny Ortega, calling him “brilliant when it comes to getting the best performance out of children and nurturing their natural talents.”
“He really knew how to push you further than you thought you could go,” he remembered. “He would bring up that energy and he allowed us to play. That’s what I really remember, is feeling very safe to go the distance.”
Making the movie “was so fun,” he said. “You’re jumping up behind a tombstone and yelling and playing in Salem, Massachusetts. It was surreal. I grew up in Santa Barbara, and they pick us up in a limo, you fly first class, they hand you cash for per diem. . . . And you’re wearing a leather jacket with a reverse flannel, it’s like, ‘Okay, let’s do this.’ ”
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Though fans love the film now, the movie flopped when it was released, bizarrely given its Halloween setting, in July. “They put it up against Jurassic Park,” he remembered. “But that’s the cream rises. The story really has a wonderful balance. It took me years to realize it.”
Jelinek said it was only during the mid-2010s that he realized Hocus Pocus had developed a huge following of fans who had spread the movie to younger generations. “It has something for everyone,” he says.
Jelinek, Bagby and other stars often meet up at fan conventions and speak to fans, and Jelinek remembers one particular story a fan shared. “Her parents chose to use Hocus Pocus to have the birds and bees conversation,” he said.
In the movie, the Sanderson witches come back when Katz’s Max, a “virgin,” lights the Black-Flame Candle, and the woman’s parents used that moment to explain. “She’s like, ‘Not Hocus Pocus, don’t ruin Hocus Pocus for me,’ ” Jelinek remembered with a laugh.
Nowadays, Jelinek and his castmates reunite for a yearly event in Salem called It’s Just A Buncha Halloween, which includes a huge screening with live commentary, trivia and trolley rides. Next year will be their third event, and it will also mark the 400th anniversary of Salem, which was first settled in 1626.
The actor notes, “It’s really cool just to see that [Hocus Pocus is] still very much alive and it continues to be passed down through the generations.”
