Amanda Righetti earned her place in our hearts and teenage fantasies through a supporting presence in guilty television pleasures such as The O.C. (oh, Aunt Haley), North Shore, and Reunion. Following her debut as a scream queen in Return to House on Haunted Hill, Righetti takes on the slasher genre as Whitney in Friday the 13th. She plays sister to Clay (Jared Padalecki), and good girl gone missing in the woods of a certain famed psychopathic murderer. She took a moment from shooting CBS’s The Mentalist to tell BlackBook about the softer side of Jason.

What was the first movie that you were ever really scared by?Gremlins. I was too young to be watching it, but it used to just freak me out.

How has working on horror films changed your perspective on the fear factor of horror films? Has it desensitized you to scary movies? I don’t know if it desensitizes me, but watching the movies that I’m working on is a little bit easier because at least I know what happens. But I don’t like the really torturous horror movies like Saw and Hostel ... that kind of stuff I cant even bring myself to watch. It’s a little bit too much.

After filming Friday the 13th, do you think you’ll send your kids to summer camp? I don’t know! I never actually went to summer camp myself, but I think summer camp in general can be kind of creepy. But then again, I think for most kids it can be kind of fun, if their friends are there. I think it will depend on where summer camp is.

Not at Camp Crystal Lake? Definitely not at Camp Crystal Lake.

There are too many bad movies about things that can potentially happen at summer camp. With Friday the 13th, I’m like thank god I never went to summer camp. I would have been the girl that was creeped out by everything. I wouldn’t have wanted to leave my room to even go to the bathroom at night.

Which do you prefer? Your work in horror films, or on TV series? They’re both very different mediums. I personally prefer doing film because you kind of know what you get when you see the script, and with TV it’s a constant evolution. Which is not bad, it’s just different. It kind of keeps you on your toes, and you’re kind of jamming through it a lot because you don’t get the script until a couple days before you start shooting ... so it’s a lot of cramming and a long run. If you’re going for a full season, you’ll shoot for eight or nine months, and you’ll be working five days a week and almost 16 hour days every day. So I think that you get burnt out a little quicker on TV. You have to pace yourself endurance-wise. With doing Friday the 13th, I had a really great time, a great experience, a great cast, and I really enjoyed working with Platinum Dunes.

I know that there is a lot of running and screaming and physicality in the film. Did that take a toll on you at all? Yeah, it did. The cast and everybody was great, but in terms of shooting the film itself, it was challenging to say the least. Physically, emotionally, there was -- I did a lot of my own stunts and damaged my body in ways that I’m still recovering from. And of course, emotionally, you have to dive into the abyss a little bit. To stay in that fearful place. But it was great for what it was. It was a great experience, and I hope that the film does well.

How many Friday the 13th films did you watch to prepare? I stuck to the original with Kevin Bacon. Where the mom is the killer. And then I did more research on the director [Marcus Nispel] I was working with and his style of horror, because he did the Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake with Jessica Biel. I was focused on Marcus' work and what his vision was and trying to get into his head a little bit about what he saw for the movie, so that we could all be on the same page for the movie while we were shooting it. Which was a challenge.

The film was shot in Austin; is it reminiscent of Texas Chainsaw Massacre at all? Yes, it was. Being in the woods and having the light shafts coming through the trees, and that serene kind of beautiful portrait-like shots, and of course, something really terrible is happening in them, but in that same sense, the flow is very beautifully set up. It’s a very visual film. So yeah, it has (parts reminiscent) of Texas Chainsaw. Where would you shoot your ideal horror film? I’m currently working on one. The script is in the works right now. It’s in Hawaii. Not a bad place to shoot a movie.

Did anyone visit you on set? My husband came one day.

Was he blown away by the gore and dramatic effects? His face resembled a kid in a candy shop. He didn’t stay very long; he saw Jason and saw how they were shooting stuff. He was really intrigued by it. He’s a director, so for him, that’s his game. So he wasn’t shocked by any means, but he was into it.

Did you ever try on Jason’s hockey mask? No. I didn’t. I looked at the back of it, but never put it on.

Were you ever tempted? I can’t say that I was. I was more just fascinated with Derek Mears. The amount of makeup and prosthetics that they were putting on him, and then they put the mask on over it -- it was all really intriguing to me. It was a long process for him, and the way that they really transformed him was incredible.

Did you form a relationship with Derek on set? Yeah. And with all the cast. It’s kind of really goofy, we’re all friends.

Did that change once he made the transformation into Jason? Working with Derek was really lovely because he has a stunt background, so he’s very conscious of space and choreography and safety. So when we were doing a lot of the stunt work, all joking and playing around aside, he was very focused in that regard in making sure that in what we were doing, we were going to be safe and no one would get hurt. And he was conscious of where you were in relationship to him and always asking, "Are you all right?" and "Is this comfortable for you?". So there was that, which was sometimes hard to turn it back on that he was this big, creepy guy. He was so sweet about it and really with you in making sure that everything was going to be well planned out. And of course, we would sit and have giggle fits about stupid stuff. and I’d be like, "Shut up, stop making me laugh. We have to be scared now." There were certain times, the first day when he walked out in the whole garb, I definitely got chills up my spine. It was really creepy. Once he put that mask on, he totally would just be Jason. He was in it.

In your opinion, what is the best on-film death? The Last King of Scotland. When Forest Whitaker’s character finds out that his girl has been fooling around with James McAvoy. That was pretty gut-wrenching.

How did you unwind every day after screaming your head off? I decompressed by spending a good 20 minutes in the shower scrubbing all of the dirt off my body. Then taking a long, hot bath with Epsom salt with either a glass of wine or a cup of tea. Music? Usually by the end of the night I was ready for quiet. Once in awhile, I’d listen to classical music. I was in a race to get to bed before the sun came up.

Are you superstitious at all? Not particularly. I think I was more when I was younger, but not much now.

Any nervousness about the release date? Friday the 13th, 2009? No, I think its kind of cool. Of course they wanted to do it on a Friday, and I think if anything was going to go wrong, it would have gone wrong on set. There were plenty of Murphy’s Law things that we dealt with onset. That was more danger than the release date. It could really go either way. It just depends on how audiences respond to the film.

Does your character, Whitney, turn out to be a heroine? Yes. She’s kind of a little bit of both. She can be the damsel in distress and the heroine. They’re both colors to the character.