WHAT'S THE BIG DEAL? It's the sequel to Scream 2, the sequel to Scream.

THE CAST

NEVE CAMPBELL: Sidney Prescott from the first two installments of the series. Other horror credits include The Craft, the scary Three to Tango, and the even more frightening Party of Five. Neve also got to see more than six degrees of Kevin Bacon in Wild Things.

COURTNEY COX-ARQUETTE: Reporter Gale Weathers from the first two installments. Other credits include the TV series Friends and Family Ties, the movie Ace Ventura: Pet Detective and the Bruce Springsteen video "Dancing in the Dark."

DAVID ARQUETTE: Deputy Dewey from the first two installments. David's been in lots of interesting movies lately, including Ravenous and Never Been Kissed, and he's also done some deep indie work like Johns. So why does he do those annoying AT&T commercials? Don't ask us.

LANCE HENRIKSEN: What's a man like you doing in a movie like thus? Genre great whose prolific credits include Aliens, The Terminator, Pumpkinhead, and the TV series Millennium.

SCOTT FOLEY: The brunette Scott from Felicity. Here he plays the director of the fictitious movie-within-a-movie "Stab 3."

THE CREW

KEVIN WILLIAMSON: Fallen-from-grace screenwriter whose only really good credits are the Screams. Bad genre stuff includes The Faculty, I Know What You Did Last Summer and Halloween: H20. Couldn't finish his Scream script on time because of his (now canceled) series Wasteland, the grown-up version of his greatest horror work yet, Dawson's Creek.

EHREN KRUGER: Hee hee last name funny. Screenwriter Kruger was given Scream 3 after Williamson departed; his other credits include Arlington Road and the upcoming Reindeer Games.

WES CRAVEN: If you have to ask, you're at the wrong website. Director of Last House on the Left, The Hills Have Eyes, Nightmare on Elm Street, Serpent and the Rainbow, the first two Screams, and many more. Best known for continually revitalizing and reinventing the horror genre, Craven now makes movies involving Meryl Streep and violins.

OTHER

Scream 3 is a Dimension Films production produced by Kevin Williamson, Cathy Konrad, and Julie Plec.

THE PREMISE: Someone dies violently. A person in the ghostface mask likely killed them. No one knows who the killer is. Someone else dies. Ironic banter and a solution to the mystery ensue. This time around, the plot revolves around the making of the second sequel to the original "Stab" (seen in Scream 2), "Stab 3".

GOSSIP and USELESS FACTS:

• The cast for the "Stab 3" movie is as follows: Emily Mortimer as Sidney (Campbell), Jenny McCarthy as Tatum (Rose McGowan), Parker Posey as Gale (Cox-Arquette), and Patrick Dempsey as Dewey (Arquette).
• The violence is said to be toned down and the comedy emphasized as a result of the furor over the Columbine tragedy.
• The film was originally slated for December 10, but due to problems ranging from casting to Williamson's inability to complete the script, compounded by a heavy December release schedule (Green Mile), the film was moved to February, right near Pitch Black, Final Destination, and Ninth Gate.