Olivia Holt & Froy Gutierrez Discuss Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse in THIS IS NOT A TEST
- Mar 2
- 4 min read
By Shannon McGrew
In Adam MacDonald’s latest film, THIS IS NOT A TEST, based on the New York Time best selling novel from author Courtney Summers, Sloan (Olivia Holt) and a small group of her classmates take cover in their high school to escape their suddenly apocalyptic hometown. As danger relentlessly pounds on the doors, Sloane begins to see the world through the eyes of people who actually want to live and takes matters into her own hands.
For the release of THIS IS NOT A TEST, Creepy Kingdom’s Shannon McGrew spoke with actors Froy Gutierrez and Olivia Holt, who play Rhys and Sloane, respectively, who find themselves seeking shelter in a high school during a zombie apocalypse. During their chat, they discussed everything from adapting the book for the screen, exploring the emotional weight of survival, and what it truly means to want to live.
Thank you both for speaking with me today. Before coming onto the project, had you both read Courtney Summers's book? If so, what did you connect to? And if not, what surprised you most about the script?
Froy Gutierrez: I hadn’t read the book, and I don’t think I’d work with something that had been adapted before. Having this script and then reverse-engineering it into the book was really cool and layered. You have two different interpretations, and you can borrow pieces from both. It was awesome.
Olivia Holt: It was such a quick read for me. It was a wild ride. These characters are what made me fall in love with it. Courtney Summers is such a fantastic writer and genuinely created a world that I think is really heavy, but beautifully done. Heartbreakingly beautiful, you know? We really enjoyed breathing life into these characters and creating a vision for this book that has been around for a minute now.
Froy, Rhys feels more like an optimist than Sloane, who is much more guarded. For both of you, how much of yourself did you see in your characters? Or was it a completely new experience to step into the shoes of these characters?
Froy Gutierrez: There’s a sequel novella from Rhys’s perspective, so we both had a piece of literature that was from the perspective of the character that we were playing. I think Rhys, in particular, was a witness to all the other characters. He observed everything like a mediator, and I’ve been in that role a few times. Even when he was dealing with his own demons, what got him through it was the people that he loves and the people around him, wanting other people to be well, and wanting to take care of them. For me personally, whenever I’m fighting my own demons, I have to think about others, so that was my kind of “in’ for Rhys as a character.
Olivia Holt: I think Froy’s character, Rhys, really helps bring out an optimism in Sloane that I think she’s lost, and you start to feel that as the story unfolds. These two characters really find a way to believe in each other, and Rhys really drives that for Sloane.
You are both no strangers to the horror genre. What did this project push you guys to do that you hadn’t been pushed to do prior?
Olivia Holt: I always try to choose projects that really push me outside of my comfort zone and challenge me in a real way and make me feel like I’m stepping into a space that I haven’t explored yet, and a lot of these subject matters I hadn’t explored in other characters before. This one felt different. This one felt deeper and heavier. I hadn’t stepped into zombie territory before, and this movie really lives in a quiet element, so I think really sinking our teeth into that space and leaning in and just accepting that this is the world we’ve created. There’ll be moments of chaos, but it’s not going to be constantly all over the place. It was very important to us that people feel integrated into this world, emotionally as well as physically, not just physically.
Froy Gutierrez: The biggest horror factor of this film is actually about these different characters' perspectives and takes on what it is to want to live and want to survive, and what you choose to live for. I think there was some heavy subject matter in both the original book and the screen adaptation, and I always try to pick projects that kind of push me to figure something out about both me as an actor and also me as a person. I had a similar experience with someone in my life who had passed away from a similar thing, and this film really helped me process it in some new ways.
THIS IS NOT A TEST is now in theaters.
