David Carradine also wrote and performed the closing credits song for Sonny Boy, "Maybe It Ain't."

Carradine lost his upper teeth shortly before filming Sonny Boy while shooting a Mexican film, Open Fire (1988), and had to wear false teeth. During filming he would hang out at a local motel bar with truck drivers and federal agents, often while still wearing his nail polish. According to his autobiography, he also joined the American Legion in New Mexico and helped with a charity shoe drive for the Federal Order of Police, "mostly in various stages of drag."

Actors Sydney Lassick and Russian-born Savina Gersak also appeared together in Curse II: The Bite, another Ovidio G. Assonitis-produced film from the same year. That film also shares the same shooting locations and music composer. Gersak primarily worked on films with Assonitis, whom she was dating at the time, and retired from the screen in 1990.

Paul L. Smith is most famous for his role as Bluto in Robert Altman's critically-slammed cult favorite Popeye (1980) and as a brutal jailer in Midnight Express (1978). He got his start as an actor at the University of Florida at the urging of Faye Dunaway and was discovered by one of Otto Preminger's talent scouts for a role in Exodus (1960). After serving in the Israeli army, he appeared in such diverse films as David Lynch's Dune (1984), the made-for-TV classic 21 Hours at Munich (1976), The Protector (1985) with Jackie Chan, Sam Raimi's Crimewave (1985), and Euro-cult favorites like Pieces (1982) and Gor (1988).

Playing the role of kidnapper Weasel, actor Brad Dourif had already mastered the art of colorful supporting characters including his acclaimed breakthrough role in Milos Forman's One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975) and an underrated but masterful turn in John Huston's Wise Blood (1979). "I thought it was the first real heavy-metal fable," recalls Dourif in a Psychotronic Magazine interview. "It was just wild... I didn't really quite understand it but I was drawn to it." Still in demand, Dourif went on to cult film immortality as the voice of killer Chucky in the popular Child's Play (1988), along with memorable supporting turns in such diverse films as Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings trilogy, Dario Argento's Trauma (1993), Alan Parker's Mississippi Burning (1988), and a genuinely searing turn in William Peter Blatty's The Exorcist III (1989).

Michael Griffin, who plays the adult Sonny Boy, had never made a feature film before and was mainly known for appearing in commercials for Chevy and AT&T. He later changed his screen name to Michael Boston and wrote the screenplay for the 1997 film Little Boy Blue, starring Ryan Phillippe.

The film's screenwriter, Graeme Whifler, directed many music videos for such bands as Oingo Boingo and The Residents. He later pursued a career as a feature director, most recently with the 2005 horror film Neighborhood Watch, which was retitled Deadly End for its DVD release.

Whifler also wrote the original screenplay for the late-entry slasher film Dr. Giggles (1992), which was considerably changed by director Manny Coto and given a much higher body count.

In 2000, Robert Martin Carroll released his second (and last to date) feature, Baby Luv, which was subsequently issued on DVD under the title Babies for Sale.

by Nathaniel Thompson

Sources:
Psychotronic Magazine, Brad Dourif Interview with Dennis Daniel
The Unknown Movies (http://www.badmovieplanet.com/unknownmovies)
Fangoria, "Graeme Whifler's Warped World" by Michael Gingold
Endless Highway, David Carradine (Journey Editions)
"Paul Smith: The Reddest Herring," video interview for Pieces (Grindhouse DVD)
Internet Movie Database