When you were all growing up (this one is for mainly our older residents but you young’uns can post too), what was your local creature feature host/show.By the time I was old enough to stay up late (also had my own TV in my room), the local creature feature had gone the way of the DuMont Television Network. There are however some local public access shows on where I live that does creature features (even showed “Space Travellers” of all things) which I watch off and on. So with that in mind, what was your local host?
If you want to know more about the old horror hosts, I recommend a terrific documentary called “American Scary.” Joel is in it, briefly, by the way.
I grew up in the Philadelphia area, and the one I remember best was the great Dr. Shock. But there was also a show in our area when I was a kid called “FRIGHT FLICKS” which was notorious because the graphic for the show was a tombstone with those two words, in capital letters, written on it, shot at just that right angle so that the L and I in the word FLICKS kind of… never mind.
Who was your favorite host?
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Well, a tale of TWO horror hosts, Tom Leahy of Wichita and Uncle Ed Muscare of Kansas City. Both had extremely long careers in local TV; Tom’s horror host career spanned, off and on, forty years. Tom was tall, rugged-looking, and did a killer John Wayne imitation. He began appearing as The Host (just, “The Host”) in black and white, in the fifties. That came back in color; his usual shtick was Frankenstein-monster makeup, which worked well, because Tom was built along the lines of Glenn Strange.
He also did a kiddie show in the afternoon, one of the last ones in the country, as Major Astro, appearing in an space suit. He held on to that job ‘way too long, and by the nineties you could tune in to see silver pressure suit with an incredibly wrinkled old guy’s head sticking out of it. Tom died in 2010, beloved by pretty much everyone who knew him.
AND IF YOU’RE A TRUE BELIEVER, A CONNOISSEUR OF REALLY BAD MOOVIES, YOU KNOW HIM, TOO. Tom played Captain J. W. Duke in the infamous “King Kung Fu.” It’s available, right now, on YouTube, in its entirety. For some unknown reason, probably contractual obs, he’s not on the cast list, which is a shame, because he’s really the only reason to watch the damn thing.
Uncle Ed Muscare (also worked as “Muscari”) did the same kind of thing in Kansas City, which even pre-cable was translated down to Wichita. He had both a kiddie show and a horror-host show, the latter sometimes in vampire makeup. He was twisted, funny, and original, and HE invented the Bananaphone–don’t listen to any claims otherwise.
Uncle Ed, in the early eighties, was the reason we would gather with beer and pizza at my place in Wichita on Saturday nights, to watch some of the best of the worst. More than ten years before MST came to be, we got to see The Brain That Couldn’t Die, loaded with adult beverages, and one of us started calling Dr. Bill’s frantic charge up the hillside with his girlfriend’s head, Jan on her way to the Pan, as perhaps the greatest broken-field run in the history of the sport of football. Beery hysteria ensued.
And From Hell It Came. OMG. That wasn’t out on VHS OR DVD for decades, and we all had to survive on only the memories of the roar that went up when Murray the Native leans in to the discussion and, in absolute seriousness, tells the white men that, “The natives call it–Tabonga!”
Thank you, Uncle Ed, for giving us that. Uncle Ed is also all over YouTube, in many forms.
Unfortunately, things went very badly when he retired. You can Wiki Uncle Ed Muscare (which will roll over to his YouTube Channel name, “Edarem,” but I’ll guarantee it won’t make you any more cheerful.
What a great topic, though.
He was also in the original Night of the Living Dead, playing the reporter accompanying the Sheriff. His daughter was in one of the sequels, Day of the Dead.
Hi, I’m also from that Central Ohio market. :-)
Fritz’ eyeglass frames were molded to look like an owl’s ear tufts in a silvery material. That was the most elaborate part of his outfit.
He has a distinctive deeeeppp, warm voice. When he wasn’t hosting movies, he was a jazz radio host.
Outside of the art-insertion gags, he sat in a bare-bones mostly virtual set that could have worked for almost anything.
Nope, not very “horror,” but still as beloved as other long-lasting hosts with much more elaborate costumes.
In fact, a local theater has him doing new stuff (not live — dude’s pushing 80 now), and there’s a YouTube channel of both old and new segments.
On the national cable side, mine were Commander USA as a kid, then in college, Joe Bob Briggs’ MonsterVision on TNT and one that has yet to be mentioned:
USA Up All Night, with Rhonda Shear on Friday and Gilbert Gottfried on Saturday.
Rhonda had a cute, yippy way of pronouncing “Up” in “Up All Night” when she’d welcome us back from break. Gilbert, of course, is an acquired taste, but he could be tolerable and even funny in the short doses of the host segments.
In the Pittsburgh area, WIIC [now WPXI] had “Chiller Theater” on Saturdays at 11:30 pm. It was hosted by “Chilly Billy” Cardille, who, along with some sidekicks, presented all sorts of shlock in a late-night double feature. The show ran for decades, and Bill Cardille remained in broadcasting, working in the WPXI news department for decades, and ending his career on the radio.
Sadly, Mr Cardille passed away just a week or so ago, at the age of 87. I’ll always remember the show. I notice that he’s featured in the “American Scary” documentary. I’m glad to see that.
I was lucky enough to grow up during the second golden age of Horror Hosts. In Detroit we had several: first the legendary “Sir Graves Ghastly” who reigned on Saturday afternoons on WJBK TV2 from the late ’60s until the early ’80s. We also enjoyed periodic runs from the wildly popular Cleveland import “The Ghoul” Aka Ron Sweed, who was so popular in the motor city that he actually moved up there for a few years. We also had annual Halloween specials from “Count Scary” aka Tom Ryan, who even did a crossover special with the Ghoul. I loved “Son of Svengoolie” when he was briefly syndicated, and then later on when I was in Chicago.
We had family in Columbus and D.C/Baltimore we would frequently visit so I made a point of seeking out both Fritz the Nite Owl in Ohio and Count Gore de Vol in D.C, and they were always treat.
My favorite though had to be Joe Bob Briggs, who’s “Drive-in Theater” on the Movie Channel became a must see for me in the late ’80s
All of the great schlock masters primed me for the genius of MST in the early ’90s
All of these great schlock masters primed
In Omaha, in the ’70s, we had Creature Feature with Dr. San Guinary (played by John Jones). Great memories. http://www.omaha.com/go/from-the-archives-remembering-omaha-s-dr-san-guinary/article_9dfc3dd2-d5ca-57b0-89ef-66e82801c16a.html
I mainly had USA’s “Up All Night” in my teen years (1980’s) Back in the early 70’s I did have Chiller Theater” on the old New York City station WPIX. No host. An animated six fingered hand came out of a pool of blood:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ok6uzndOmPA
It looks like the Cinematic Titanic episodes that are on Hulu will expire after this weekend. I think they warned us about this a while ago, but if anyone hasn’t enjoyed the 10 episodes available, please give them a try! Who knows when or how they’ll be available again in the future.
In New Orleans, we had the mighty Momus Alexander Morgus, a.k.a. Morgus the Magnificent, with his assistant Chopsley operating from the Old City Ice House, in downtown New Orleans.
http://www.morgus.com/main_index.html
Well, he was never my local horror host, but, in my mind, there’s still no one who beats the legendary Zacherley. I just wish there were some complete shows out there to collect.
In the Detroit area, I have a vague recollection of Morgus in the sixties, but the main men were Sir Graves Ghastly on Saturday afternoons, then in the early seventies The Ghoul on Saturday nights. Still later, a local DJ named Tom Ryan did a hilarious Count Scary (but he didn’t have a regular show, just specials for a time). Lastly, in the 2000’s, was Wolfman Mac, who made a stab at resurrecting locally produced programming with his Saturday night Nightmare Sinema. I liked them all for different reasons, although The Ghoul seemed to show a lot of movies that MST3K would have gone for (They Saved Hitler’s Brain, for example!).
And also for those that travelled north from the D there was Don Melvoin aka Count Zappula out of Traverse City…I think he also performed as Dandy Don hosting Westerns if I reckon.
We had Creature Feature, and Dr Morbius! (Iowa)
Watching Bob Wilkins transform from nerdy harmless ktvu-2 weatherman to slightly creepy horror-host w/o changing wardrobe, makeup or even his delivery was a lesson in perception I will never forget. Watching classics like HOPB and Attack of the Killer Tomatoes was the icing on the cake!
Here’s a video of four different Virginia-based horror hosts (The Bowman Body, Dr. Madblood, Dr. Gruesome & Skeeter, and Armistead Spottswoode) participating in a monster movie trivia contest at the Science Museum of Virginia. A couple of MST3K films get a mention. The number of views it has received is somewhat underwhelming, so give it some hot pad love.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBkhrMZ8QMM
Found a photo of The Creep, Lou Steele on ebay. http://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/V9UAAMXQBlJR-zpm/s-l1600.jpg
We had Dr.Boo! He wore all black,a cape and a top hat and his face was pale with black circles around his eyes.His sidekicks were Melvin the Dummy Mummy and Gary the Gorilla.This was in Fort Smith,Arkansas and there was a fan club…In Tulsa,Oklahoma they had Mazeppa’s Uncanny Film Festival and it starred Gailard Sartain(Mississippi Burning,Fried Green Tomatoes)and a pre-Buddy Holly Gary Busey.Used to watch them every Saturday night..Here’s the website: http://www.mazeppa.com
Madison, Wisconsin had Ferdie’s (later Lenny’s) Inferno. The host was “Mr. Mephisto,” a guy in light-colored makeup and a tatty top hat and suit. He had a sidekick who was a voice in a wooden box.
Strangely enough, it has an IMDB page: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt4780158/
There are also some videos on Youtube.
Think Commander USA used to have the horror/monster double-features on Friday-night USA until he moved to Saturday afternoon:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xiVoD_ccF-Y
After he was replaced by Rhonda Shear on UP! All Night, Rhonda was supposed to be USA’s answer to MTV’s Julie Brown, and they appealed to the jiggle-goof audience with 80’s spring-break comedies like “School Spirit” and “Ski Academy”:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8MqfCT8avZg
The local PBS affiliate in Scranton, PA ran Uncle Ted’s Ghoul School every weekend (Either Fridays or Saturdays). He also appeared on the ABC affiliate WNEP hosting another version of this show along with the kids morning show (Hatchy Milatchy) and the afternoon movie show “Dialing for Dollars.” The man was a workhorse. I gotta admit it: I love his fez.
One weekend, my father let me stay up and watch Corman’s “The Man With The X-Ray Eyes” and it gave me nightmares for the next month!
Extra bonus fact: Bill O’Reiley wrote for Uncle Ted when they worked for WNEP. They did not get along. Bill O. hated that Uncle Ted showed up for work with a few drinks under his belt and would consistently mess up the gags he wrote.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z3Klw1Y0IRI
Which PBS station was that, Channel 44 or 46? I only remember seeing him on WNEP.
My wife’s from Northern Ohio, and she filled me in on Superhost. You can find clips of him on Youtube. One in particular is his farewell broadcast in which he does a noticeably hostile monologue against the station for ending the show. I would feel for the guy, but when you look at the other examples of his work, he really didn’t seem to put very much at all into his shtick.
Jacksonville Florida had “Far Out Flicks”, Saturday afternoons — or maybe Sunday? I’d guess this was early 70s. Mid 70s?
No host, but a cheesy opening involving a flying saucer made from two aluminum pie pans with a Dixie cup on top hovering over Jacksonville.
My memory is fuzzy on lots of things but I’ll never for get that into… nor the recurring “booo-DOOOP” sound effect. Lots of 50s-era science fiction cheese, as I recall. :alien:
Can’t be sure but I think this is where I saw “The Giant Claw”, “Mothra”, and other such fare… not to mention “The Deadly Mantis”. Great stuff for a kid.
I don’t recall Des Moines having one when I was a kid (the 80s), but the city had one called Gravesend Manor (pretty cool name) in the 50s and 60s.
http://www.desmoinesbroadcasting.com/woi-tv/gravesend-manor/gravesend-mainpage.html
probably not the format for suggesting future topics but what the heck.
most repulsive romantic couple/love scene in a MST’d movie.( for me anyone in Eegah except the two horned frogs going at it in the desert.)
MST’d character who did/didn’t deserve getting the shaft.(a lot of people feel that the ‘marked one’ from the ‘mole people’ didn’t have to die. of course, spending your life with John Agar a’int much better.)
most repulsive character in a MST’d movie.(for me anyone in Eegah except the two horned frogs going at it in the desert and the shovel who never asked to be in the movie.)
best geographical/nationality riff. (the ‘ode to Canada from final sacrifice.)
In Cleveland, I grew up with Hoolihan & Big Chuck which ran from 1966-79, and when Hoolihan (Bob Wells) left, evolved into Big Chuck & Lil’ John, which ran from 1979-2007. The show actually spun off from Ghoulardi (1963-66), after Ernie Anderson left for Hollywood to eventually become the voice of ABC. Very funny simple sketch comedy, and local entertainment. That string of the three shows has to make it one of the longest lasting movie host shows…. http://www.bigchuckandliljohn.com
In the Cleveland area, I grew up with Big Chuck and Lil’ John. Of course Ghoulardi is still revered and Houlihan and Superhost are fondly remembered. At one point, Big Chuck and Lil’ John were shown on a Detroit affiliate and got a lot of complaints about the ethnic jokes of Chuck (who’s Polish) and John (who’s Italian). A precursor to today’s PC world. I currently enjoy Svengoolie and The Midnight Movie.
I spent my early childhood in the Tampa area mesmerized by Dr. Paul Bearer (aka Dick Bennick) and the Creature Feature on WTOG. I moved to the Cleveland area in 1989 and became a fan of Big Chuck and Lil’ John – the direct descendants of the legendary Ghoulardi on WJW-TV.
Has Tales from the Crypt been mentioned yet?
When I was a teenager in the early/mid 1970s in Washington, DC, the local institution was Count Gore DeVol’s “Creature Feature” on WDCA, channel 20. Count Gore nurtured my love for classic horror and sci-fi from the 1930s through 1960s, and introduced me to much of the fare later featured on MST3K — Corman, Gordon, Lippert, Ed Wood, and the like, and such classics as Attack Of The Giant Leeches, Gamera, and The Brain That Wouldn’t Die.
Count Gore ran from 1971 through 1988 — ironically, cancelled the same year that MST3K debuted locally on KTMA in Minneapolis. I didn’t know it at the time, but Count Gore was preparing me for MST3K; one of the things that attracted me to MST3K was that it lampooned so many of thoes good old cheesy, crunchy old 1950s and ’60s “B” movies — in fact, it was an old Corman fave from my Count Gore watching days, Attack Of The Giant Leeches in Season 4, that finally made me a true hardcore after spending the first two or three seasons checking in on MST3K here and there.
See my comment a little ways up the thread, here… Count Gore played a major role in nurturing my love of cheesy old horror and sci-fi flicks, and his Saturday night “Creature Feature” featured many of the movies that I saw again on MST3K — Gamera, Attack of the Giant Leeches, Plan 9, King Dinosaur, Revenge of the Creature… hell, I’d guess that at least half to three-quarters of the movies I saw on MST3K I first saw on the old Count Gore show. MST3K seasons 1-4, in particular, were like a trip down memory lane for me; I’d been watching on and off for a while, but the night they riffed Giant Leeches made a total hardcore… I remember that night I was flipping through the cable guide and noticed “holy crap, man, Attack of the Giant Leeches is on MST3K tonight!” That pretty much nailed it down for me.
I remember growing up watching Dr.Shock on PHL-17 in Philadelphia
he was one creepy looking old dude,long gone now. :-)
“Kemah’s Creatures and Caverns Theater” hosted by “Specter Rotchild.” My dad wrote, produced, and hosted it.
Covering Kemah, Texas and surrounding area and Gulf coastline, 1959 through 1964.
Lots of local advertising commercials about fishing guide trips and touristy beach vacations and fishing supplies. I have all the shows on quadruplex videotape and need to transfer them to digital to preserve them. Internet searches turn up nothing about the show, which is sad, but no surprise there, as the show wasn’t really officially part of the station’s schedule budget, but the station kept making the shows because a dozen or so local marinas and merchants consistently purchased those Saturday late time slots. My dad once told me that they must have thought since they were all up late drinking and fishing that surely other people were watching the show, too.
The show began as a one time Halloween special but soon turned into a weekly show, albeit very late on Saturdays. Two often used tag lines: “Specter’s caverns of total terror” and “Broadcasting regularly every next terrific Saturday.”
At the end of each show, the station immediately played the Star Spangled Banner and signed off and put up the test signal.
No one really watched in great numbers except the local children and it was never syndicated, but my dad loved doing it and I loved staying up so late as a kid to watch it. I was thirteen years old when it started, the perfect age to get into horror movies. All my classmates knew Specter Rotchild was my dad. Haha. Simpler times and good times. I could write a book. When my dad passed away, they stopped the show. I think because it was all in his name and like I said, more of a side creation. They also didn’t think it was right to try and replace him, so there is that, too. There were three episodes he had “in the can” that never aired.
Kemah was a great area. So was Baytown. I knew Gary Busey, who was from Baytown. He was always funny as hell. We were all the same age. Everywhere down there was great to grow up in. Somewhat removed from the rest of Texas. We had our own surfer culture if you could call it that.
What a blast from the past.
Elvira was my first B-movie host. I remember her humor and her dress more than most of her movies. I do recall her showing Revenge of the Creature and one of the first two Blob movies.
I caught Commander USA a little, but didn’t watch anyone regularly until Joe Bob Briggs’ Monstervision in the 90’s. I still miss him.
I see that Count Floyd was mentioned here in passing. But SCTV’s “Monster Chiller Horror Theater” was a hilarious send-up of the local creature feature genre we’re discussing, so has to be expounded on just a bit here.
Joe Flaherty was fabulous as the host, trying to talk up how terrifying the show was, especially when they would cut back to him from the cheesy and decidedly unscary “movie” (such as, “Dr. Tongue’s House of …” [“Pancakes” is the one I remember best – in 3D, no less!] with his expression of utter disbelief.
“Kids, I promise next time it will be REALLY scary!”
Louisville had ‘Fright Night’ Saturday night on WDRB 41 in the early/mid 70’s; hosted by the Fearmonger, a local actor in no makeup, in stark black & white close ups! Fun times! Sadly, no video of any shows actually exist, as far as we know. Or do they?! Bwahahahaha!!!
Here’s an interesting link on the show and on local Louisville horror movie director, William Girdler. Enjoy!
http://www.williamgirdler.com/kissinger.html
Doug is also notable in that when I saw Cinematic Titanic in Green Bay several years back, Joel listed him as a major influence. Joel would have watched him during his high school years in Ashwaebenon.
I can’t believe (unless I missed it) nobody has mentioned Son of Svengoolie (now just Svengoolie)! Chicago – he’s still going, Frank and Trace were on recently.
In Cincinnati in the late 60s we had “Scream-In,” hosted by yet another Cool Ghoul. The show was incredibly dumb, featuring standard fare like Attack of the Mushroom People, Zontar–the Thing from Venus, Killers from Space, and so on. But with enough Little Kings churning in your gut it was tolerable fun.
And apropos of nothing, in 1972 I got to interview Vincent Price when he came to campus. Great, great guy, very soft-spoken, about nine feet tall with hands like Smithfield hams. But wicked quick with film lore and and very witty.
Or the time when the movie (“Bloodsucking Monkeys from East Midland, PA”) didn’t show up, and he had to describe how SCARY it was.
Back in Sioux City, IA, in 1968, the local CBS affiliate got the lamest horror host ever. Looked like a dirty homeless guy. Lol The show was Fridays at 10:30 & repeated Saturday afternoon at 1 PM. He only lasted about six months & was gone sometime in 1969. The show continued without a host & was going strong when I moved away in 1972. My brother-in-law told me they got another host in 73/74 that was popular but I don`t know his or the earlier one`s on-air names.
Not only did Morgus host movies, he starred in his own, years before Elvira did.
If you were into B-movies growing up in Detroit was great. They’re all mentioned already, but to think we had Sir Graves, The Ghoul, Count Scary AND Count Floyd before most folks since we got SCTV broadcast on CBC out of Windsor, Ontario.
In Rochester, NY we had a show called “Chiller Theater” and the host was called “The Chiller”. He had a fright wig, a lab coat and a blue screen face mask that made it look like he had no face. He was played by Jerry Carr and someone even recorded a song called “The Chiller”. Do I wish I could find a copy of that 45!!
I’m afraid you did miss it. Son of Svengoolie was mentioned in posts 7, 36, and 55. Remember, Control+F is your friend (though not as much help when people misspell your search keyword).
I was a kid in the Twin Cities in the 1980s, so…
Joel Robinson and his robots ARE my local host.
Go to bed, old man!
BTW: Trace and Frank’s podcast has 4 episodes now. Movie Sign with the Mads is great! Let’s get some more love for it on Satellite News.
https://soundcloud.com/user-340711944
They are not just sticking with new releases, either. The last two were The Warriors (come out and play-ay!) and Valley of the Dolls.
Well in Chicago is was Son of Svengoolie. And I was probably 8 or 9 before I realized he wasn’t supposed to be terrifying.
As a kid in Indiana, a long time ago, it was Sammi Terri out of Bloomington. Then later in Alaska it was Elvira and the Rhonda Shear and Joe Bob Briggs and now Svengoolie on the oldies channel.
Doctor Madblood has had various incarnations of his show (and in recent years an annual Halloween broadcast on the local PBS affiliate) for 40 years. Fond memories. The show is mostly only known in the Virginia Hampton Roads area, though he did pop up in a few documentaries.