It's some time after midnight on the back lot of Universal Studios in Los Angeles' San Fernando Valley. All around are New York-style buildings, storefronts and stoops, along with a large church and a City Hall-type edifice with oversized columns (and, adding to the movie ambience, just around the corner, there's a prop storage area with a giant toilet and a grocery cart big enough to carry a cow).

In the midst of these dimly lit structures is a small island of light, where the crew of "Scream Play," E! Entertainment Television's entry into the reality-contest genre, is setting up a competition based on the 1993 thriller "Judgment Night," which will likely air on July 11.

The one-hour, 13-episode series premiered on June 13, and the basic idea each week is to take a famous movie or TV sequence, create a physical challenge based on it, and give three teams of two contestants a chance to face three such challenges in hopes of winning a cash prize.

The show airs at x p.m. Sundays on Channel 60.

On this night, a crane has hoisted a ladder up between the roofs of two buildings. Suspended above the ladder is a series of paint cans. Strapped into a safety harness, contestants must walk along the ladder, unhooking and dropping the paint cans (which land with a very satisfying splat) along the way.

"This stunt is inspired by 'Judgment Night,'" producer Joel Klein says. "It's a film where they're escaping, being chased, so they have to get from one building to the next. They throw this ladder down, and they have to go across it, and the ladder's all creaky."

Throwing in the paint cans not only forces the contestants (which include a cute blond couple wearing matching baggy camouflage pants) to cross standing up, but it also offers a way to score the event. Adding to the look of being lost in an urban jungle, Klein has crew members huddle around fires lit in barrels.

"It's an alley," he says, "People are hanging out in the alley, paper wrapped around their shoes, warming their hands, huddled together. Maybe they can break into song, like in 'Rocky."'

Other challenges include a window ledge walk ("The Bourne Identity"); a horse drag and obstacle course ("Animal House"); a dumpster dive for body parts ("CSI: Crime Scene Investigation"); a hot chili pepper eating contest ("Dumb and Dumber"); a tricycle race ("Revenge of the Nerds"); naked broom ball ("Slapshot"); a buffalo-spleen buffet ("Dances With Wolves"); and a water rescue ("Baywatch").

Each episode also includes the movie or TV clips that inspired the challenges.

Since Klein and his producing partner, David Hurwitz, worked on NBC's "Fear Factor," you knew there had to be something gross and slimy involved.

"Yesterday," Klein says, "we did a stunt based on a scene from 'Stand by Me,' where the boys swim through the pond and come out with leeches on them. We put a tank out in the woods, at Santa Anita racecourse. We had a big, Plexiglas tank filled with 50,000 leeches."

For host Matt Iseman, a comedian (and licensed general practitioner), it's more about bringing movies to life.

"We are doing a 'Karate Kid' challenge," he says. "It's going to be the crane stance. They're going to be standing on a pole, trying to balance themselves. I'm going to be down there, throwing out every Cobra Kai line I can think of.

"That's me in a candy store. I remember going to see that in the theater six times, bought the VHS when it came out, own the DVD. That movie meant a lot to me. That challenge will mean a lot to me when it comes out."

Iseman hits on what E! hopes will be the appeal of the show - a blend of movie-fantasy wish fulfillment and that particular joy that comes from watching someone mess up in an entertaining way.

"I get to sit there," Iseman says, "watch all these people do these crazy stunts and challenges, and my job is to have fun and throw out movie quotes, which I would be doing on my couch anyway."

On this night, though, the contestants seem extremely good at crossing that ladder and unhooking those paint cans. And even if one or more eventually take the plunge, they won't fall far.

"We're here to have fun," Klein says. "The last thing I want is somebody hurt on this. I want to see a good fall, but I don't want to see anybody get hurt."

Contestants go through the usual reality-show casting route of videotapes, interviews and questionnaires before being accepted, along with a medical exam. But, if it seems like you'd have to be crazy to want to walk across ladders hundreds of feet in the air, or swim with leeches, that's OK with Klein.

"They can be crazy, sure," he says. "And throwing up's OK. We don't mind throwing up."

Despite his medical background, Iseman insists he's only there for the laughs, no matter what happens on set.

"I am very qualified to go up to a contestant and dial 911," he says.

But he would do a challenge, if only he could. "I volunteered," Iseman says. "When I was up for the show, and they were debating what they wanted, I kept calling my manager and telling him, 'Look, call these people, tell them I will walk into the E! studios and light myself on fire. I will launch myself out of a cannon, leap off a building, whatever they want, because I would love to do this show.'

"Then as soon as I got it, they're like, 'Listen, we can't have you doing any of the stunts for liability reasons.' That's what they said, but I think my mom might have called them up and said, 'Don't let my son get hurt!"'