Existed, Roger Corman's 1960 Film the Little

ong before the words “cult movie” The film is filled with memorable se - in the Los Angeles music scene of the ex“isteFd, RogEer CormEan’s 1E960 qEuences tEhat are EgenuinelEy funny,Dnone 1950Ms—the firEst really!to ”take the cello Lfilm The Little Shop of Horrors more so than Jack Nicholson’s turn as a into the jazz arena. He became part of came along and pretty much defined dental patient who loves pain (“No Novo - the very unique Chico Hamilton Quintet those words. Filmed in only two days cain—it dulls the senses”). Even the char - and was both heard and seen in the film (on sets left over from another movie) acter names are smile inducing: Seymour Sweet Smell Of Success. Katz also be - on a miniscule budget that today prob - Krelboin, Gravis Mushnick, Audrey came an A&R man for Decca Records, ably wouldn’t pay for the craft service Fulquard, Burson Fouch,Wilbur Force, and and also had several albums under his table on a movie set, somehow all the on and on. The dialogue throughout the own name. At some point in the late elements—a truly witty script by Charles film is filled with quotable lines, some of 1950s, Corman found Katz or Katz B. Griffiths, a wonderful cast, including them worthy of Ionesco. found Corman and the two collaborated Jonathan Haze, Mel Welles, Jackie on several films, including A Bucket Of Joseph, Dick Miller, and a young Jack “Look at it, it grows like a cold sore from the Blood, The Wasp Woman, Ski Troop At - Nicholson, and let’s-get-it-done direction lip.” tack, Little Shop , and Creature From by Corman—came together to make an The Haunted Sea. inspired comedy. The film played the “I’ve got to go home. My wife’s making gar - bottom half of two double bills—first with denias for dinner.” Katz’s score for Little Shop suits the film Mario Bava’s Black Sunday , and, a year Audrey, Jr. “Give me food!” perfectly. I could analyze each cue for later, with The Last Woman On Earth . Seymour: “Aw, take it easy Dracula, you, but somehow that just seems But it wasn’t those lower-half showings what do you think I’m carrying here, my wrong. Fred Katz’s score speaks for it - where it found its success—no, it was dirty laundry?” self—it’s funky, jazzy, beat, weird, local TV broadcasts that made Little crazy—and perfect accompaniment for Shop a cult movie phenomenon. That’s “It’s a finger of speech.” a large plant that continually bellows where most people discovered it, and is certainly where I discovered it one late “I’m just crazy about Kosher flowers.” “FEEEEEEED ME!” night. “FEEEEEEED ME!” REDUX — Bruce Kimmel And what a discovery it was. I, like oth - ers, howled with laughter, then immedi - In 1982, as if the cult of Little Shop was - ately told all my friends they had to n’t big enough, Alan Menken and catch it. I’m suspecting that was a fairly Howard Ashman’s musical version of common occurrence with this film—and the film had its world premiere at the word grew and grew. I remember going WPA Theater (then moving to the Or - to a sold-out midnight screening in pheum). It was an instant smash hit, Westwood in the early 1970s, where the played all over the world, and was then film got incredible reaction. And so it has itself turned into a film, bringing the Lit - been ever since—thanks to home video, tle Shop saga full circle. Not bad for a the film, which was never copyrighted low-budget two-day comedy that has and is in the public domain, has been endured as a one-of-a-kind classic. released by a whole slew of companies on VHS and DVD, in bad transfers, de - The score to Little Shop was written by cent transfers, colorized transfers—per - Fred Katz. Katz, born in 1919, was a haps it will even make it to Blu-Ray one child prodigy on both piano and cello, of these fine days. but would become a well-known cellist.

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