The sequel will have a running time of three hours. (Picture: Bros/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock)

Jessica Chastain believes the brutal homophobic hate crime in It Chapter 2 is still too relevant today.

The sequel opens with a scene of a gay couple walking home when they are suddenly attacked by a group of teens hurling offensive slurs, before one of the gay men is thrown over the bridge into the river.

Jessica told Variety: ‘[Stephen King] wrote the novel It because a hate crime was committed in his childhood town. That darkness, he wanted to explore and that’s the first scene in our film… It’s going to be hard to talk about this without crying.



‘I think you need that scene because he writes about the darkness that’s under the surface. The dirt under the fingernails of these small towns or of mankind. That’s what It represents. It’s the darkness of human behavior.’


As it so happens, the event in Stephen’s novel was inspired by Charlie Howard, a real gay man who was killed by a group of teens in the author’s hometown of Bangor, Maine in 1984.

The man who got thrown over the bridge was then dragged out the water by Bill Skarsgård’s Pennywise and the boyfriend watches in terror as the clown bites down on the lifeless body.

The actress finds the scene extremely important to our culture. (Picture: Birdie Thompson/AdMedia)

The green dress complimented her hair and creepy balloon. (Picture: Birdie Thompson/AdMedia)

The 42-year-old actress, who shined in an emerald green dress at the premiere at the Regency Vollage Theatre, thought it was extremely important to keep the scene exactly the way it was described in the original novel as it is ‘very much a part of our culture’.

‘I think it was important to see Adrian’s scene and not to change it from what it is in the novel because we’re living in a time right now where it is very much a part of our culture and part of our conversation and we haven’t moved past it. So, we can’t pretend that it doesn’t still exist because it’s part of our every day,’ she continued.

Jessica, who plays an adult Beverly Marsh in the sequel, complimented Stephen’ King’s writing skills as he focuses on the horror ‘inside of us’.

The man thrown over the bridge is played by gay filmmaker Xavier Dolan while his on-screen boyfriend was portrayed by Taylor Frey, who is also gay.

Meanwhile, the actress paired her green gown with the iconic IT balloon during the premiere of the sequel in Los Angeles.

Like a trooper, she took the time to sign endless autographs and take many selfies with her loyal fans.

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