6 7 by Greg Mank HORDES of HORROR... Spawned by THE
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strange places in their lives. The “Mad 594-seat Rialto Theatre. It Doctor” was suffering a late-mid-life per- will be the Rialto’s horror sonal and professional crisis. The “Wolf hit of the year, earning Man,” violent when drunk, had recently $42,000 in four weeks. thrown a bag of excrement at Maria Mon- Wednesday, April 7: tez’s dressing room door. “Dracula,” an epic “’Arsenic’-Karloff Wow 30G imbiber, announced one night that he was in 9 Days, Seattle,” headlines Jesus and tried to walk across the pool at the Variety. Garden of Allah. The pitiful “Hunchback” Karloff is starring in the was in fact whispered to be a “brawling national company of Arsenic roisterer.” Hollywood-at-Large regarded and Old Lace, playing mad “the Inspector” as a “sex maniac.” And Jonathan Brewster, the role the “Monster,” listed at the tail bottom of he created on Broadway in the final credits, was a cowboy heavy most 1941. Variety calls the Seattle horror fans had never heard of. run “Socko all the way.” Yet make no mistake. When House of Tuesday, April 13: Frankenstein played New York’s Rialto The- RKO’s Cat People, Val Lew- atre and Hollywood’s Hawaii Theatre on the ton’s premiere production, nights before Christmas 1944, this film was supported by Warner Bros.’ a record-breaking powerhouse. Panned by The Gorilla Man, wraps up the New York World-Telegram as “a carnival an amazing thirteen-week of monstrosity,” it was, in fact, a three-ring run at Hollywood’s 1,100- Horror super circus, hell-bent on showcasing seat Hawaii Theatre, taking Universal’s terror genre supremacy, zestfully in a walloping $68,731. Jean Adair, Josephine Hull, and Karloff in the original Broadway delivered by an all-star cast of villains rarely Universal finally has a Arsenic and Old Lace, 1941. (MFTV Photo Archive) surpassed in Hollywood history. worthy competitor in the As with the new Frankenstein’s Monster, horror film arena. to round up Boris Karloff, Bela Lu- what was missing, primarily, was a soul. Wednesday, June 9: Variety reports: gosi, Peter Lorre, Lon Chaney, Jr., Or was it? George Zucco and other goosepim- Chiller-diller to end all chill- plers in a ghostly rodeo with Fran- Part I: Rivalry – and the Secret Weapon er-dillers is being whipped up by kenstein, Dracula, the Wolf Man, Friday, March 5, 1943: Universal’s Universal with an appropriate the Mad Ghoul, the Invisible Man, Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man, starring title, Chamber of Horrors. Idea, and kindred spirits prowling in one Lon Chaney as the Wolf Man and Bela Lu- evolved by George Waggner, when cinematic nightmare. gosi as the Monster, opens at Broadway’s he has finished Cobra Woman, is George Waggner, a Univer- By Greg Mank Monster, who just keeps galumphing along. cries Kenton. The lift rises. Strange emerges. sal dynamo, has been producer/ Gaunt, gray, suffering from severe back Karloff does not. director of The Wolf Man, and HORDES OF HORROR... trouble, Karloff has been at work for four- The company stands by breathlessly, fear- producer of The Ghost of Franken- Spawned by THE DEVIL...! teen hours (with two hours off for meals). ing it might be witnessing the on-the-job death stein, Frankenstein Meets the Wolf –Trailer Quote, He watches from the sidelines as the marsh of the King of Hollywood Horror. At last, the Man, and the soon-to-be-released House of Frankenstein, 1944 explodes into flame and the 6-foot 5-inch star arises, trembling with cold, covered with Phantom of the Opera. Strange lugs Karloff’s double, Carey Loftin, gunk—and explaining he did not want to risk Monday, June 21: Work Tuesday, April 25, 1944: It is the night into the “quicksands.” ruining the take by surfacing too early. wraps up on Cobra Woman, star- they feared Boris Karloff had drowned—be- For the final shot, however, Karloff must Everyone goes home at 3:00 a.m. House ring Maria Montez as good and low the mountains of Universal City, against join Strange in the eight-foot-deep pit of goo... of Frankenstein is right on schedule. evil twins—in Technicolor. Lon a background of blazing torches, and in the and sink for the film’s close-up fade-out. In 1931, when Karloff’s Monster piti- Chaney plays a mute servant. The shadow of Frankenstein’s Monster. Living legend Karloff does not need fully raised his scarred arms and hands to vainglorious, red-haired Montez The film is House of Frankenstein. The this. His three years as star and investor in the skylight, it was a profound moment— has antagonized the volatile, company is shooting the movie’s climax Arsenic and Old Lace, on Broadway and on “Looking at God!” as Mae Clarke, Franken- hard-drinking Chaney. He has on Universal’s back lot. It is after 2:30 a.m., tour, have made him a very wealthy man. stein’s leading lady, recalled. responded coarsely. cold, with frost on the ground. And he resents how House wastes his “dear Nobody was looking at God in House Monday, July 5: Lionel Karloff is the Mad Doctor of this “mon- old Monster.” Still, it is work—and he would of Frankenstein. The studio was looking at Atwill opens in Providence, ster rally”—a vengeful lunatic who, aided be a lost soul without work. box office, the players at a paycheck. Even Rhode Island, in a revival of by J. Carrol Naish’s hunchback, rabidly lets At 2:55 a.m., Erle C. Kenton, the direc- Elena Verdugo, then 18 years old and in a his 1924 stage hit, The Outsider. loose Lon Chaney’s Wolf Man, John Carra- tor, calls for Karloff, who wades into the showcase role as the Gypsy girl who dances, Exonerated in April of perjury dine’s Count Dracula, and Glenn Strange’s pond. Strange grasps him. The “villagers” flirts, screams, kills, and dies, was hardly regarding the Yuletide orgies he Monster. Fifty torch-bearing bit players and stand by with their torches. The brush euphoric to be in the film. allegedly hosted in 1940, Atwill extras chase the Monster, who is lugging the blazes like bonfires. “Actors made that kind of movie,” Ms. is trying to rebuild his scandal- Mad Doctor into the Visaria marshes—actu- “Action!” cries Kenton. Verdugo laughs, “so they could buy their wracked career. ally the old jungle from Nagana (1933). Strange sinks, lowered on a hydraulic lift lunch!” Carey Loftin doubles Karloff, who will soon join Glenn Strange in the “quicksands” Friday, July 16: Columbia for the final fade-out. (Courtesy ofRonald V. Borst/Hollywood Movie Posters) “Quicksands!” the Mad Doctor warns the under the muck. Then goes Karloff. “Cut!” The actors, a quirky pack, were at releases its fifteen-episode serial, 6 MONSTERS FROM THE VAULT #33 FALL 2014 7.