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Fans of George A. Romero

The fandom that revolves around George A. Romero is real. I have been a fan of his for many years. With the advent of Facebook it has been an opening door for us fans to be able to connect with each other and it also allows us to share stories, photos, and the recent news of any new projects that George A. Romero is currently working on. That is the main source that keeps us updated.

Ever since I joined Facebook, I have met so many wonderful people who adore this man as much as I do. During my time in the groups, I met William Sanders and Matt Blazi. Those two, in my opinion, are the people that I look up to most. The purpose of this paper is to illustrate through interviews on how important George A. Romero is to the fans that adore his films. Then,

I have a quote from one of the actors who worked on one of his films. Not only has he made the best films in the world but how he has changed the lives of so many. The fan culture that surrounds George is huge. By doing this paper, I hope that I can capture how these guys actually feel.

A brief history of George A. Romero: George Andrew Romero was born on February 4th

1940 in New York City. When he was a teenager he received an 8 mm camera, where he began to shoot everything on site. After he graduated from High school he and his parents moved to

Pittsburgh, . He went to college at Carnegie Mellon University, where he studied

Paint and Design. George ended up dropping out of college, because he was eager to begin his movie career. He then turned to making commercials and short movies before he and his friends created The Latent Image. The Latent Image consisted of eight people who he had met from running reels to and from studios. George was never too keen on shooting commercials and then

FA 790 Manuscripts & Folklife Archives – Special Collections Library – Kentucky University

Phelps 2 decided that he wanted to make a feature film, so with a budget of $114,000 he and his company produced, Night of the in 1968.

There wasn't much success with . When they able to get a distributor, the Walter Reed Company, they forgot to put the copyright label on the film. After this was noticed, the film then became public domain. Years after the film gained an audience and became one of the most influential films of all times, George and the rest of the company never received any benefits from their hard work. There have been talks about getting a proper copyright title for the movie but until then, the movie will remain in the public domain.

After no success with Night, George never wanted to do another dead film. But, when

Dario Argento (an Italian director) saw Night, he came to George and offered to finance another dead film. George had been working on a script and Dario offered to fly him out to Italy, so that he could finish the script without being bothered. So, In 1978 George Romero gave us Dawn of the Dead. The film is considered by most people to be the greatest film that he created. And is definitely my favorite film of all time.

Then, after much success with Dawn of the Dead in 1978, George gave us Day of the

Dead in 1985. To most fans, this is considered to be the least favorite of the three. In this film,

George had a bigger budget than the other two. Due to not having the budget that he really wanted, he had to change the screenplay and cut some of the scenes. But, to George, this is his favorite of the dead films. My opinion of this film is good, however this is considered to be my least favorite. Even though, I love all of his films, I still watch this when I get tired of watching

Night and Dawn.

FA 790 Manuscripts & Folklife Archives – Special Collections Library – Western Kentucky University

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My view of George A. Romero: George Romero will forever have the legacy of being a great independent filmmaker. I have loved his films over the years and will continue to do so.

When I have kids, I will to the best of my ability, show them how much he has made an impact on my life. He is the reason why I am in school to be a director. His influence has shown that a person that can go from being a low-budget director to being an independent high-budget filmmaker. In my opinion his legacy will be heard worldwide. He is the father of the modern day zombie. His contributions to zombie walks, conventions, and to documentaries have proved this thus far. As a fan, I would like to see one more zombie movie made by George. His plans at the moment are to do different things, but the fans would love to see more. The fans cannot get enough of .

Matt Blazi's Interview: Matt Blazi has been a fan of George Romero for about thirty years. He first watched Dawn of the Dead when he was three or four years old. On Saturday mornings, he would get up and go into the living room and pop Dawn of the Dead in the VCR. It was something that stuck with him and he has continued to watch it over and over again. There was a time where he didn't watch it but he started driving and sort of rediscovered it again. While out driving, he went into Blockbuster Video and saw it for sale. He had never seen it for sale before and bought it. Then a couple of weeks later he discovered that there was a director’s cut of the film. This was before the internet was popular and after researching it, he found that it was made in . It was only a three hours from where he was at. The film took on its own life and snowballed into more watching, dissecting, researching, and more learning. It was just something about the movie that other films didn't have. Most fans believe it's the social commentary but for him it's knowing what kind of man George A. Romero is.

FA 790 Manuscripts & Folklife Archives – Special Collections Library – Western Kentucky University

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The Man in the Movies: Matt has been in a couple of George's movies. He was a zombie in and . It first started with (producer of

The Walking Dead) Matt had met him at a convention and spent the whole weekend getting to know him. They exchanged emails and kept in contact with each other. Nicotero's special effects company ended up getting the job for Land of the Dead and contacted Matt to come up to

Canada and be a zombie in the film. That's when George wanted the fans to be a part of the film.

George has received so much from his fans, so he thought what a better way to get them involved. When Matt first got on set, he called Greg to tell him that he was there. Greg came out of the make-up trailer and told the production assistant to get him in make up as soon as possible.

Then in an hour and half, he was in make-up and on set.

Then Matt was able to get into Survival of the Dead. It started off as a joke between him and his friends Rob and Glenna, who also live in and who were also in Land of the Dead.

They had been emailing back and forth and Matt said that Rob and Glenna should get in contact with George and see if they could get involved with Survival of the Dead. Rob emailed George and asked if they could be in Survival. George said, yes! Rob handled the details and then shortly after that, they were on the set. Matt was asked how attached he was to his hair and asked if he was afraid of fire. Matt started to laugh. Rob said that it was possible for them to get into make- up and get in front of the camera. George's wife greeted them and took them to the extras tent and told the production assistants to get them into make-up. The budget for the movie was very low and they were not promised a cameo, but since they were George's friends, they ended up being zombies in the film after all.

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A Collector of Mall Memorabilia: Matt Blazi's love for George A. Romero, has took him to where George directed Dawn of the Dead, the Monroeville Mall in Pittsburgh. Matt visits the mall quite often and when the mall was tearing down the JC Penny's to replace it with a movie theater, Matt was able to get inside of the store and save the wood paneling from being demolished. This is where David Emgee (Stephen) died when he suffers bites from the zombies.

The wood paneling is special for some people. For a true fan to get a piece of the paneling is a dream come true. I was lucky enough to get a piece myself. This is considered to be one of

Matt's favorite pieces of memorabilia. The fact that he was able to find this paneling thirty-six years later, was a shock to him. He feels as though that this is a piece of history that should be shared with others around the world.

Matt's View of George's legacy: Matt believes that George's legacy will be to carry on being an independent filmmaker. The audiences love for George’s films will carry on for generations. George says, “That if you want to make movies, go out there and shoot it and worry about everything else later on. You don't have to submit to Hollywood to be successful. All you have to have is courage and the love for films and that should carry you on forever.”

William Sanders' Interview: William Sanders aunts loved classic black and white films.

They used to babysit him when he was a child and he grew up watching Night of the Living

Dead. He first saw Night at the age of eight or nine years old. As William got older, he and his friends would go to midnight showings of the new horror films that would come out in the theaters. One of his friends had an attic bedroom and he would line his bedroom wall up with old posters as soon as he could get his hands on one. William and his friends wore out copies of Dawn of the Dead, sitting up in his friend’s bedroom. That's kind of the kid William

FA 790 Manuscripts & Folklife Archives – Special Collections Library – Western Kentucky University

Phelps 6 was. He loved to watch anything that had to do with George A. Romero. His love for horror films has led him to get into the movie theater business. When was released,

William did a promotion where he flew a fan out to meet George. He has also been involved with zombie walks and other things along those lines. His fandom has led him to name is children after George A. Romero.

Road Trip of the Dead: William is currently working on a film titled, Road Trip of the

Dead. This is a reality film, where fans go out to the filming locations of all of George’s movies and things don't work out the way they are planned. The cast includes Lawrence Devincentz,

Matt Blazi, and Daz Spooky. Lawrence is from South Carolina and Daz is from England. Daz can only work on the film when he is here in the United States. They came up with this idea when Daz and Lawrence went to some of the filming locations. Daz and Lawrence went to visit the house where had done the remake of Night of the Living Dead, and they were greeted with a shotgun when they arrived. Then, there is a time when they went to visit the cemetery of the original Night of the Living Dead, and Daz ended up getting sick to his stomach and they were out in the middle of nowhere. This is basically what the movie is about. A group of fans going to visit all of these filming locations and things don't always go the way they seem.

William has most of the documents secured for Road Trip, but they still have to get everyone together to complete the film. It's just a matter of getting everyone together to get it finished.

They hope to have it showing in film festivals in October, 2015.

Most valued piece of Memorabilia: William Sanders has all sorts of movie memorabilia but his most valued piece is an authentic promotional banner from Night of the Living Dead.

Marilyn Eastman who played Helen Cooper in the movie, made these and was handing them out

FA 790 Manuscripts & Folklife Archives – Special Collections Library – Western Kentucky University

Phelps 7 during the Texas Frightmare Weekend in Dallas, Texas. This was a type of promotional insurance, that if you were to die from fright while watching Night of the Living Dead, you would receive $10,000. William has had most of the original cast members to sign it.

Campaign for Dawn Doe: In the opening scenes of Dawn of the Dead, there is a skeleton that is used for a prop in the basement scene. It turns out that it's an actual human skeleton. Tom

Savini who was the special effects artist in Dawn, rented the skeleton from a guy named Larry

Winterstellar, who owned a costume shop in Pittsburgh. After the movie was completed, Larry then sold the skeleton to Marilyn Wig. She is the owner of Costume World in Pittsburgh, which is still in business. Marilyn put the skeleton into a casket and displayed it at her shop and the police rode by and noticed that it looked real and seized it. The police had a coroner run an autopsy on the skeleton and it turned out to be a real human skeleton. The courts ordered the skeleton to be buried. William heard about this and started a campaign to get the funds together to get Dawn Doe a proper headstone. Sadly, the fans haven't been much help with the campaign and William plans to pay for the headstone with his own money.

William's take on George's legacy: “George will forever be known as the godfather of the modern day zombie and the grandfather of modern day horror. He changed the way that horror movies were filmed.” When Night of the Living Dead came out, William believed that

George changed the face of horror as well as creating the genre itself.

David Crawford's Experience: David Crawford plays Dr. Foster in Dawn of the Dead.

He was kind enough to email me his reflection on working with George A. Romero and this is what he has to say, “Working with George Romero was a sublime experience. It went very smoothly. He had been working with his crew on other projects and they meshed together like a

FA 790 Manuscripts & Folklife Archives – Special Collections Library – Western Kentucky University

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Mercedes transmission. George is like a calm and friendly bear. He knows what he wants and has conferred with his crew so it all happens easily. David Early and I were well prepared, too.

We were used to working together on stage and had rehearsed our Dawn scene thoroughly well before the shoot date. In fact, David told me we were cast because of our stage work. George had attended a production of "Trial of the Catonsville Nine" in which we played brothers (colorblind casting) and decided to use us from that. We didn't even have to read. I didn't think very much of that particular job at the time. It was only a half-day, only paid $50 (as I remember) or $100 (as

David Early remembered), and only a horror movie. I had no idea how fine a production it would be, let alone how popular it would be decades later. I remember being shocked when David called me one time in the late 90's or early 00's and said he had attended a horror convention in

Cleveland and made $2,000 selling his autograph. I had no idea that horror conventions existed and certainly had no idea that people would pay for autographs. I went to my first convention a few years later, and though I didn't make anywhere near $2,000, I had a great time meeting zombie fans and re-uniting with fellow actors. I've been to at least a dozen since then. I guess that little half-day job has given me my bit of immortality. Movies do live forever (at least so far) and it's an honor to be a part of one of the best.”

In conclusion, I thoroughly enjoyed doing the fieldwork for this project. I was able to learn a lot about the people I interviewed. Being able to catch the hearts of the fans, and then writing about them, was an excellent opportunity. Hearing the stories about their most prized possessions, their experiences with their own films and new ones, what they think George’s legacy will be, was quite exhilarating. I’m sure that I created a bond with these guys and I hope that I can somehow repay them for taking the time to allow me to interview them for this project.

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Bibliography:

Blazi, Matt. "Fans of George Romero." Personal interview. 15 Nov. 2014.

Crawford, David. "Fans of George Romero." E-mail interview. 18 Nov. 2014.

Document of the Dead. Dir. Roy Frumkes. Perf. George A. Romero, , Scott Reiniger, David

Emge, and Gaylen Ross. Synapse Films, 1985. DVD.

Fan of the Dead. Dir. Nicloas Garreau. Perf. Nicolas Garreau. Cheezy Flicks Entertainment, 2008. DVD.

Follows, Tom, and Curtis, Owen. The Pocket Essential George A. Romero. N.p.: Oldcastle, 2009. Print.

Pocket Essential Ser.

Kiesler, Sara, ed. Culture of the Internet. New York: Lawrence Erlbaurn Associates, 1997. Print.

Lewis, Lisa A., ed. The Adoring Audience Fan Culture and Popular Media. New York:

Routledge, Chapman, and Hall, 1992. Print.

Sanders, William. "Fans of George Romero." Personal interview. 17 Nov. 2014.

FA 790 Manuscripts & Folklife Archives – Special Collections Library – Western Kentucky University

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FA 790 Manuscripts & Folklife Archives – Special Collections Library – Western Kentucky University