A Ted Bundy Survivor Thinks Zac Efron’s ‘Extremely Wicked’ Glorifies The Killer, But Wants Everyone To See It

Focus Features

Following the sudden re-interest in Ted Bundy, with Netflix’s lusty Conversations with a Killer series and the Zac Efron-starring Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil, and Vile, one of the serial killer’s surviving victims told her side of the story.

Kathy Kleiner Rubin was attacked by Bundy in 1978 while sleeping in her dorm at Florida State University. “I saw the club, saw him lift it over his head, and slam it on me,” she told Rolling Stone. “And then he hit me again. And I think that’s where he hit me in the face and broke my jaw in three places and I passed out. But that’s what I remember the most: him lifting the club and bringing it down on me.” Before he could deliver the death-blow, however, a car light flooded the room. “I saw the light, it was like God’s light,” Rubin said.

Despite this horrifying encounter, Rubin is supportive of Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil, and Vile, even with the off-beat casting of Efron as Bundy, as she told TMZ:

“I don’t have a problem with people looking at it, as long as they understand that what they’re watching wasn’t a normal persom. I believe that in order to show him exactly the way he was, it’s not really glorifying him, it’s showing him. And when they do say positive and wonderful things about him, that’s what they saw, that’s what Bundy wanted them to see… The movie does glorify him more than I think he should be, but like I said, I think everyone should see it and understand him as what he was, even when he was the perfect son.”

In other words, the world didn’t see a serial killer — they saw Zac Efron (so to speak), because “that’s what Bundy wanted them to see.” Rubin’s hope is that the film will make “women more aware of their surroundings and be cautious.”

Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil, and Vile does not have a release date yet.

(Via Rolling Stone & TMZ)

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