Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast - Mini #239: Universal Horror Films with Author-Historian Gary Gerani

Episode Date: October 24, 2019

This week: Directed by Roger Corman! The music of Billy Goldenberg! The trials of Colin Clive! Boris Karloff goes bowling! And King Tut inspires "The Mummy"! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Return guest, Gary Gerani. Yes, yes. Very happy to be here again. Welcome back, my friend. Always wonderful. Gary, to people who are hardcore listeners of the mini episodes

or even the full episodes, Gary was recently here for our Twilight Zone anniversary show with Rod Serling's daughter. It was really cool. And the talented Nick Parisi who wrote a terrific book.

And you did trading card shows for us in the past. Yes, I am the terrific book. And you did trading card shows for us in the past. Yes, I am the card king. And we were talking off the air about Night Gallery, and I said, sacrilege, I said, I didn't like the tearing down Tim O'Reilly's car. I didn't think it was good. I know, that's one of the most acclaimed episodes.

And I remember back then, I didn't like it. I saw it years later, I thought maybe I was wrong. Nope. Well,

you know what you got to check out? The Messiah of Mott Street, which is another acclaimed episode. Oh, that's the one

with Edward G. Robinson. And G. Robinson and Sam Jaffe. Yeah. And do you like that one? That's another? That's a good one. Yeah, that one I like.

That one I like. I like the original. Is it a pilot or was it done as a TV movie with Roddy McDowell as the spoiler-rich guy? Oh, that was the pilot. Yes. Well, that's a good one. With Ozzie Davis. So interesting that you mention that.

Because that was the original two-hour pilot for Night Gallery. That's the one who had Joan Crawford. Yes, that was Steven Spielberg's debut as a filmmaker. He did that Joan Crawford episode. With Tom Bosley. And Tom Bosley is wonderful in it. He's the one who gives up his eyes so Joan Crawford can see. That entire two-hour pilot

was scored by Billy Goldenberg, who was this wonderful composer that was, as much as I love Bernard Herrmann and Jerry, all these other great composers, Billy Goldenberg's music spoke to me so directly. And he did a

marvelous job with that, because those three stories, they all were very different stories. And the Rodney McDowell one, as he was saying, I created this, he was a busy little, buzzy little bee, so he created this little sound effect

as his theme, doo-doo-doo-doo, with electronic instruments. So he's just a brilliant guy. So this is the perfect segue. You're working with Billy on a documentary about his life and his career.

Yeah, I was so obsessed with this man's music. And most of the work that he... I mean, he's a famous guy. The Beatles loved him. He worked with Barbra Streisand. And he gave Elvis Presley a comeback special. Tell us some of the films he scored, too. Oh, he's mostly famous for doing the early Columbo episodes,

which were really remarkable music. But he did feature films in addition to great TV work. He did Play It Again, Sam. Sure. He did The Last of Sheila. Love that one. Yeah, a lot of interesting, Busting, which is a good movie, and he did a great score.

But his greatest filmed work was really films for television. He won constant Emmys, a million Emmys for miniseries and Queen of the Stardust Ballroom, which he's getting started again as a play. An incredible... And he was Elvis' favorite composer. And when Elvis had his comeback special,

Billy was the key guy there. He gave Elvis a number one single again for all these years. Streisand, all these people loved him. And I just loved his music because he did all those made-for-TV horror movies in the 70s.

Like Night Gallery, that was like one of the first. And then so many, you know, Don't Be Afraid of the Dark with the little gnome creatures. That's Billy. Fear No Evil,

Ritual of Evil, the UFO incident. Billy Goldenberg, yeah. This guy is brilliant. I did Don't Be Afraid of the Dark. Oh. Or Are You Afraid of the Dark? That's a little different.

Are You Afraid of the Dark? That's a different animal. Yeah, yeah. But Billy was such a wonderful guy. The reason I connected with him, not only because you want to meet someone that you respect so much, I wanted his music.

Because you couldn't get this made for TV movies. You can't buy scores for things like that. But I figured, if I find the composer, maybe he has copies of his scores. And he did. So I was in seventh. And then I tried to set up the scores with CDs. It was really difficult.

So that's why I finally decided, I'm going to do a documentary about him. That way we'll get the whole story out and all that wonderful music can be played. And that's why I'm in the band. Great. And it's still in development? Or it's still being made? It's still in production, really.

I am hoping to have a rough cut, rough assembly on it. In 2020 was the deadline that I gave myself. I've interviewed just about everybody. Tell us some of the people who read it. Oh, Robert Wagner. Our friend Robert Wagner. Robert Wagner, when he came over to my house, it was just so hysterical to begin with, he comes over to my apartment, Robert Wagner. Our friend Robert Wagner. Robert Wagner, when he came over to my house, it was just so hysterical to begin with,

he comes over to my apartment, Robert Wagner, right? It's a rainstorm. He came over anyway because he loves Billy so much. Who else is in it? Oh, we got Estelle Parsons, who was hilarious. Great. We've got Susan Clark. We've got all kinds of great people.

Susan Clark would be a good guest for this show. Yes. She's a lovely lady. We should call her. And she is a lovely lady. We should call her. And she is sharp and smart. We should call her. She's done cool stuff. And plus, her brother had great body of work.

Hey, somebody brought up an actor who died recently and how we never thought of him. That actor, Richard Lynch. Oh, yeah. Yeah, he was in everything. Yeah, he would have been great. We can't think of everybody. Let's talk about why Gary is here. And you can plug the doc again.

Why are you here, Gary? Well, I was wandering down the street. Let me see if you guys had something to do. This is an October episode, obviously. It's a week before Halloween when we're posting this. And Gary is here to talk about Gilbert's favorite topic in the world. Old monster movies. And specifically Universal. Yes. Classic monster movies. And specifically universal.

Yes. Classic monster movies. Gary published a book. When did this book come out, my friend? Oh, geez, maybe about six, seven years ago. Six, seven years ago. Top 100 horror movies from, horror movies, my Brooklyn accent is getting me away,

from Fantastic Press. And you got an introduction by Roger Corman. How'd you get Roger Corman to do the introduction? Roger Corman produced a movie I wrote. Ah, yes. It's a movie I don't like to talk about, because it turned out really badly. You don't have to talk about it. Don't say that.

It's Vampirella, based on the comic book character Vampirella. Oh, wait. Who played her? Talisa Soto. Talisa Soto was one of the Bond, James Bond leading ladies in the later years. And it was on Showtime. They insisted that we have to have an actress who has some kind of credentials, right? But the

movie really, and Roger Daltrey played Dracula, which was a real thrill because he wrote an original song for it. It's so incredible. I'm going down on the set and I hear something, Gary, Gary, Roger, just finish the song. He wants you to hear it. Roger Daltrey wanted me to hear his song

so even though the movie didn't turn out that great it was an experience so you developed a relationship with Roger and Roger always loved the script

it was a good script but it was produced on oh the bat transformations it's like instead of you know like Adam Cassell when they turn into bats they look so cool

it's like it turns into a bowl of dust awful awful you mean to tell me, Frank, when they turn into bats, they look so cool. It turns into a bowl of dust. Awful, awful. You mean to tell me Roger Corman was cutting corners? How could that be? That's hard to believe. We had him on this show. Did you hear the episode we did with him?

Oh, no, no. I'll send you the link. It was a lot of fun. It was a lot of fun. One of his famous stories is they were doing an outdoor shot, and it was nighttime, and they said, we don't have any movie lights. And he goes, well, you got cars, don't you? And they all turned on their headlights. That might have been for that Shatner picture.

Yeah. That's great. And they lit it that way. But we got to remember, Roger Corbin, even though he's famous as the king of the bees and all these kind of cheesy movies, he was a brilliant director. His Edgar Allan Poe films with Vincent Price are beautifully directed. And lovely to look at. Yes. They're gorgeous.

And they showed he had real chops as a director. He deserves a lot of credit for that. Now, let's get to my universal. Universal. All right. We're going to go in chronological order here. And I only did the sound films. I didn't list Stino Phantom of the Operas in the book.

We'll reference them a little as we talk about the sound films. But I thought Dracula was a good place to start, which came out in February of 31. So we'll talk about the sound films. I want to know, too, how you happened to choose these. You chose the big eight, right? With the exception of I think Son of Frankenstein. Didn't make it into the book.

Son of Frankenstein did. It must be bubbling under the top 100. Yeah, bubbling under. It's an important title. But let's talk about Dracula, which is interesting. Because Gilbert and I have talked about it on the show. Obviously we're not the first people to talk about how stagey it is. Yes. And how static it is. It just looks like a film stage play.

Some parts are amazing. Some parts are actually creative. And then it looks like, oh, we got a film to play. Well, the only, I know what you're saying about how sometimes that actually does work for the movie. It's almost

like a silent movie in a lot of ways. In many ways. And there is something about the deathless quality of Count Dracula and his castle that you almost are in a slow-moving dream. It actually sort of

kind of helps it. But Todd Browning, you know, really, a lot of people aren't that crazy about the job he did on that. It does look a bit like a stage play, particularly in the second half,

because it was pretty much based on the stage play of Dracula. That's kind of what they did. There is the Spanish version. Yes, I was going to ask you about the Spanish version, which we talked about. It's more cinematic. There are more camera moves. But here's a classic example of what do you think is better, right? In the Spanish version, they

introduce the Dracula character. All of a sudden, Renfield turns around, and at the top of the stairs is Dracula, and the camera moves all the way up to the stairs to finally, till you get to him, right? Nice dramatic move. In the original, it's just Lugosi standing there saying, I am Dracula. No fancy camera moves, nothing. And yet, I prefer... Well, first of all, Lugosi was so great as Dracula that you could not replace him.

And in the Spanish version, it's a different actor. Of course. Even though he wasn't their choice, their original choice. It kind of got crazy. But yeah, so there are aspects to what Todd Browning, that seems stilted, but which actually have a timeless, strange quality that kind of sticks with you. I want to ask you about two things, Gil, and this may be a reason. And tell me if you think this is bullshit, Gary.

I read that the stock market crash in 29 affected the film's budget. And they wound up – now, maybe this is incorrect. and they wound up, now maybe this is incorrect, and they wound up and Uncle Carl made the decision to adapt the play and not the book. And that's one of the reasons that it's a little bit stage bound

or that it was made with less money than they originally intended. You're making a face. No, because you hear that all the time. There's no way they could have filmed the book. I mean, the book is a big, sprawling epic. And they had the play to work with, which actually showed how you can tell that story

in a reasonable way for an audience. So I'm sure the play was mainly what they always kind of had in mind. Interesting. There are parts where Todd Browning does get creative with the camera. Oh, yeah. There are great shots in it, and then it'll go back to stage play. The best part of it, and everyone has said this, really is the first third.

When you're with Renfield going to the castle, it's almost like a classic fairy tale, like Beauty and the Beast getting lost in the forest and coming to the castle. So that has all of the power of the movie. And the special effects with the glowing eyes. Yeah, well, they had flashlights trying to shoot lights on his eyes so it looked like they were glowing. But they would miss his eye. It would be on his cheek. And you'd see the flashlight trying to get up to the eye. Well, they later corrected that in The Mummy when they would miss his eye. It would be on his cheek. And you'd see the flesh trying to get up to the eye. Well, they later

corrected that in The Mummy, when they do the same thing, when they get to The Mummy, it's perfect. You know, the eyes are perfectly lit. But, uh... So, Browning, who had worked with Chaney, Sr., wanted Chaney. As did everyone. Despite the fact that Lugosi had triumphed on

stage. Here's the whole story there. Uh, Lon Chaney, Sr., was the man of a thousand faces. He was the horror star. And he had done The Hunchback of Notre Dame. He had done Phantom of the Opera and all these other weird parts. So he was the guy. But, you know, he died right around that time.

He, you know, it was his time had come. The other main guy was Conrad Veit who was the, I'm pronouncing the name right, Veit, whatever, but he was the fellow who's most famous

for being the bad guy in Casablanca as Major Strasser or whatever. He had done a horror film for Universal, a silent one, called The Man Who Laughs

with the Joker. And, yeah, I think that's where... And they had him in mind to play Count Dracula. Didn't know that. And he would have been quite amazing in his own right.

Lugosi, who had done the play, had to campaign like crazy to get that part. Yeah, he had to beg. Yes. And now when you see it, it's like... He's the iconic Dracula.

It's like, I feel like if Bram Stoker came back and said, no, he's not right, I'd say fuck you. He's better than the book you wrote. Yeah, very often these guys

will realize that what they created for this guy I just realized that Ian Fleming admitted, wow, the James Bond you created for the movies is so much better than what I created. Because the James Bond in the movies has a sense of humor, it's witty, whereas it's very dry if you actually... Sure, the character gets developed. Sometimes the creators are able to appreciate

what was done in film. Was there an epilogue cut where Van Sloan, Edward Van Sloan spoke to the audience? Van Sloan would speak to the audience? Van Sloan would speak to the audience also in the original trailer that they did, which is pretty much

not available, too. He was like the host who was taking you into this world, the little old Professor Van Helsing. And then he wound up playing that kind of role

in a few other, I mean, in The Mummy, it's almost the same thing all over again. I find the way the dominoes fall interesting. Had Chaney not died and Lugosi doesn't get this part, then they're not considering Lugosi for Frankenstein.

Oh, yeah. The only reason they considered him was because Dracula, you know, was a big deal and a logical thing, right? Well, thank goodness we didn't play the Frankenstein monster, and what happened there is that it was a director, Robert Flory, who was originally supposed to direct Frankenstein. Murders in the Rue Morgue, Robert Flory. That's where he wound up. Now, he lost the gig on Frankenstein.

And when he was going to do Frankenstein, yeah, it was going to be Lugosi. He lost the gig to James Whale. James Whale is a better director. I think Florey's a good director, but James Whale was really special. And he's the one who found Karloff. I think he saw him, what was it, eating lunch at the studio? They saw him at the commissary. So they announced Lugosi in April of 31.

They announced publicly, Gilbert, that Lugosi was going to play the part. And listen, they also announced that Boris Karugosi was going to play the part. Hey, listen, they also announced that Boris Karloff is going to play the Invisible Man. Right. So they would always make these kind of announcements, and then things would change. And I think originally they were planning on the Wolfman in 1932, and I think they wanted Boris Karloff. It was very, very strange. The Universal, in the 30s, right, they had all their huge successes with Frankenstein, Dracula, The Mummy,

but they didn't nail the werewolf correctly. They did Werewolf of London. Which flopped. Which flopped. Now, that's with Henry Hull, who's a very good actor who made movies with Alfred Hitchcock and, you know, very solid actor. But according to the myth, he didn't want that much makeup done on him.

So his werewolf kind of looks more like a bat man rather than a wolf man. It really looked like later on Nicholson's is wearing identical makeup. And that's Rick Baker makeup. There you go. I'm sure Rick probably was paying homage to that. Well, I heard that Henry Hull just didn't want to hide his face behind that much makeup. It could have been vanity. And that Pierce was very frustrated.

It very easily could have been that. Or, you know, there might have been other explanations. But the bottom line was, the reason why that movie failed, a werewolf has to be sympathetic. It's the ultimate character who's a tragic character, and Henry Hull played it as an austere kind of, oh, like, you know,

like a, you know, a very kind of uppity kind of guy. You couldn't relate to him. And when they eventually did The Wolfman years later, they completely corrected that mistake and had Larry Talbot as your best friend next door, an earthy guy you could relate to. So that was how they did that. And a lot of people called The Wolfman a horror film noir because it's one of those that just that's interesting lead characters everything just goes wrong and nothing can ever be right for him well that's true well he is definitely

a tragic character i'm trying to think there was there wasn't a femme fatale that led him into that unless this is the old lady who's the uh the gypsy uh but it has a noir well my god those movies were shot in the studio with those crazy sets and the trees where you could see all the roots sticking out and the fog machines.

You were in another world. Right, right, right. Like a fairy tale. Back to Frankenstein just for a minute. Now, again, this could be bullshit,

but I read that the sight of Lugosi in the makeup made Uncle Carl laugh. Well, you know what they were doing? Even though they did tests. They supposedly did tests of Lugosi in the monster makeup,

in the Frankenstein makeup, on the Dracula sets. It was not the Frankenstein makeup we know and love. I see. That was developed later for Carl. I heard the makeup, somebody had said, was similar to the goal exactly

i was about to say the same thing because that's where frankenstein came from so they made legosi up to look like the goal this this yeah very strange looking thing and and supposedly that's why he's i i i can't play this now the ultimate version that they used was much, much better. It was just a smart design. What Pierce came up with. Yeah, the Pierce thing. Right, right. And even, you have to give Karloff something.

It was Karloff who took out the bridge in his teeth so that he could have sunken cheeks. Yes. And in Bride of Frankenstein, when the monster talks, he had to put it back in because he couldn't talk with it out. So the monster, you'll notice, his cheeks are a little thicker, heavier than they were in the first movie. The dedication of Karloff. And when you realize what he went through. Yeah. Did John Carradine turn down the part, too?

John Carradine? Supposedly. Wow. That I don't know. Someone showed me. That could be BS. My friend Alan Asherman showed me what he thinks was a statue, a head mask of the Frankenstein monster that looks very much like Carradine. Like Carradine. Well, you know, Carradine pops up in The Bride of Frankenstein.

Yes, he does. In the blind man scene, whatever. He's the monster. He does. Can't you see? Right. It's a classic kind of moment for him. He sure does.

And what's funny about those movies, because they hadn't developed the skull cap yet, so they had to build, so the head goes from big to smaller, big or small. Well, yeah, those things always change from film to film, but you're right.

The style of makeup during the Jack Piercy era, he would just keep building up on the stuff. Years later, the techniques were so much more advanced. They looked a little rubbery

by comparison. There's a difference between something that's handmade and something that's kind of, you know, pumped out of a mold. But that's part of,

I mean, look at the mummy with that incredible amount of detail on that face. Poor Karloff, right? He had to sit there and have all that, and then he had to take it off. So quite a commitment. The dedication.

Well, yeah, we were talking to Rick about this. We had Rick Baker here a couple of days ago. We were talking about how after a while, Karloff just wore the makeup home because it was less stressful. Then he would have to get touch-ups when he came back, but he didn't have to start from square one again. I pity the poor people who might see him on the way back from home. So he was spotted in the commissary by

Whale, as the story goes. He was already an actor, and he was in Scarface. He had his own thing going for him. He is in Scarface. He's shot in the bowling alley yes isn't it great to see Boris Koloff throwing a bowling ball it's very strange yeah we will return to Gilbert Gottfried's amazing colossal podcast after this baseball is finally back get

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I can see he's happy. He's giving me a handjob under the table. Between that and Universal Monsters? Why should this show be any different? Life is terrific. So Karloff, who doesn't get any kind of billing in the Frankenstein movie, because he's billed, he's insulted, he's billed with a question mark. And again, this could be BS too, but I'm hearing he wasn't even invited to the premiere. Is that true?

That I don't know. That's what I heard. It could be. I heard that too. You mean he wasn't invited because they wanted to keep a mystery? I have no idea. I mean, why else would they? So Frankenstein is such a sensation that by 32, it's Karloff, just the last name, and it's above the title.

Just like Garbo, just one word, right? Yeah. He made that much of an impact, you know, that's all it took. What was a great name, Karloff. I'm looking at the posters last night on the web and his name's above the title

in everything as well as on the title card. Meanwhile, his real name is William Henry Pratt. He's a gentleman from England and Karloff.

And Pratt is a dirty word in England, too. Did you say that to Sarah when we had her on the show? What? Did you say that to Sarah? I had her on the show? Did you say that to Sarah? I think I maybe.

It's a dirty word. Calling someone a prat. Okay, so you're talking about the Pierce makeup. Yeah, which is just fantastic. I like it almost as much. We were talking to Rick about this. I like the Lugosi makeup in White Zombie. Yes. Very much.

But this makeup is very impressive. Oh, yeah, sure. I mean, the amount of detail is just remarkable. I mean, you look at that today and you go, oh, my God. But even putting the glory of that makeup aside, you talk about the movie itself,

The Mummy was unusual because Frankenstein was based on a classic novel, as was Dracula. The Mummy was an original made-for-the-movies universe. Yeah, I was going to say that. The first one not based on source material. I always felt like the Mummy was a remake of Dracula. It's so similar.

You're absolutely right. Just the same way that The Invisible Man is something of a remake of Frankenstein, you have the same kind of characters, the second male lead who's interested in the girl. Right. There's a parallel between Dracula and the mummy. And also, they have the same cast, other than Legosi. You know, you've got David Manners. Yeah, he turns up everywhere.

You've got Evergrande Sloan. Yes. And they're pretty much playing the same kind of characters. So it was almost like they redid, you're right, the Dracula thing. But again, Invisible Man is also a reworking of the formula of Frankenstein.

He disappears. Why mess with it? And yet they're such good movies. Yes, on their own. You don't think of them as imitations of each other because they were so distinctive in their own way. Now, what were the problems that Colin Clive had? A lot of problems. Yeah, he went nuts toward the end.

I think he died two years after Bride. Yeah. He had a drinking problem. He had issues. He had a drinking problem. He had issues. He was originally one of the key people, I think the main person that Whale wanted initially to play the Invisible Man.

That voice you would have been hearing instead of Claude Rains. And he played Hysterical very well. Oh, yes, yes. It's alive, it's alive. Yeah, right, right, right. And he would have made a good, his voice would have been great as the Invisible Man. I mean, I think they got the right guy.

But he was seriously considered for a while. I heard he was once either on a play or in a movie. And he was doing a dramatic scene. And he broke down crying. And they had to stop shooting or take him off stage. He was like crying hysterically. He was a frail fellow. Emotionally fragile.

Yeah, but a wonderful... And he achieved immortality. Absolutely. So, you know, you have to say to yourself, I'm crazy, I'm nuts, and whatever. And yet, they'll be watching his performance forever. By the way, you say that The Mummy, you point out that The Mummy was the first one

not based on source material, yet based on recent events. It was based on the opening of King Tut's tomb only a decade earlier. How cool was that? In 22. To take that real life thing and then turn it into an original monster character. You know, it's an interesting performance.

He underplays in that movie, Karloff. And yet, he's terrifying on so many levels. It's one of my favorites. When I first saw that movie as a kid... It's chilling in a way that... Well, I was first thrown by the fact that you only see him with all the bandages and the mummy proper, if you will,

just in the first few minutes of the film. And then the rest of the movie, he becomes sort of like, almost like a Fu Manchu kind of guy, you know, with the fez and whatever. Very soft-spoken, as you've been saying. But he's not a bandaged monster coming after you anymore, which is what the later mummy movies always did. Sure, sure. So that kind of threw me.

And it was the only mummy movie that went that route, you know? I mean, that actually gave you this kind of different version of the movie. And how many names did the Mummy actually have? There was Imhotep, Amun-Ra. Oscar. Yeah, yeah. Eddie. Tiny.

Caris was in the cheap ones Corris right and then we mustn't forget Ardeth Bay Ardeth Bay which is the name he takes

right and that was that was his presentable version of himself he must have taken his bandages off and taken a bath

and then kind of you know you can still see he's a wrinkled old guy but that's Ardeth Bay who leads them to dig up the tomb of his lost love.

Yeah. That's where the plot goes. Yeah. I read there was a reincarnation scene that didn't make it into the final film. Well, the leading lady,

Zita Johan. Zita Johan. Oh, she, first of all, she's such an interesting lady. She's different than most of the actresses. I mean, listen,

nothing against Evelyn Ankers or any of these other wonderful people, but she had a curious quality and she was into, in real life, reincarnation and mysticism. They had extended scenes of her reincarnations all through

the, you know, toward the end of the movie, when she's got this mirror in front of her, when she shows up there, well, that scene, through that mirror, you had seen all of those sequences that they filmed all over the years, how she was reborn. And they wound up cutting all that because they felt it was shifting the attention to her and away from Karloff. And they didn't want to take the chance of lessening him. So she, you know, but she was wonderful. I wish that footage would surface. Barry Levinson

lists The Mummy as one of his favorite movies in the world. This is deep dive trivia. Let's quit. In the six or seven minutes we have left in this one, let's move on to 1933 and The Invisible Man, which you have just talked about. The special effects hold up to this day.

Just watch them. I was just watching last night. And, you know, they never let up because all through that movie, there's something interesting. That's John Fulton's special effects. But, you know, that's the only universal movie from that horror classic from that period that could kind of pass as a normal movie because it was based on the H.G. Wells classic. And even though he was a crazy, that would very often be shown not alongside the others, but on its own. My father didn't have any use for horror movies, but that one was respectable. He made an exception for the Disney man.

And if you're not a big horror freak, you can watch it because it's got the old lady from Titanic. That's right. That's right. I forgot she's in that. Yes, she is. Now, did Karloff, again, was Karloff the original

choice for this part? I read conflicting things. I read that he and Whale were at odds. It was a weird thing, too. He was going to also be playing, I think, Cagliostro, the great magician. I mean, there was all these other weird, I mean, he was attached, his name was attached to all of those projects. Why wouldn't it be at this point? And, you know, you talk about the parallel similarities, as Gilbert brought up, between Dracula.

Like, it's almost a remake in some ways. I guess the idea was not to stray too much from the formulas that were working. And as I say, though, each of those films does kind of stand on its own. I heard like Karloff, he left Universal and I guess

he was with RCA or whatever. Well, Karloff and Lugosi both were contracted to Universal. But they wound up doing a lot of cheap movies for other companies too.

Karloff's choices were generally better. He would turn up in things like The Walking Dead, which is a Warner Brothers movie. Oh, and what I can say, I mean, listen, no one's going to take anything away from Frankenstein. Those are great performances. My favorite Karloff performance,

have you ever seen The Body Snatcher? Oh, yes. Oh, my God. We're going to do a whole Val Luton show down the road. The Body Snatcher, it's so nice to see Lugosi come back. He's great in that. I mean, it's kind of sad because I believe Lugosi was supposed to play the Henry Daniel role. Because originally, they wanted Karloff Lugosi as equals.

But Robert Wise, I think, realized that Lugosi wasn't quite up to it, and Henry Daniel was. So, Lugosi wound up in that small role as Joseph. And I remember Karloff sings some song that's about, you know,

oh, birching! Because that really was that, based on the reality. Oh, what he does in that, Right, because that really was that based on the reality. Yes, he birched Daniel. Oh, what he does in that, he does almost like a little dance. Yes. He's incredible. And Lugosi, very deadpan, goes, I don't understand what this all means.

And he was almost like Chico. That was great. Hey, boss. You know, in a sad way, some have said, well, there you see it. Karloff made it big in the heart. And Lugosi had a struggle. And in that scene, it really looks like, here's the guy that's on top of the world. And the other guy that's, oh, poor Lugosi, right?

Back to The Invisible Man real quickly before we get out of here. And we're going to do another one of these afterward for Halloween. I read a couple of things. I read that Karloff turned it down. I read that Whale wanted a more intellectual voice for the scientists. And that he heard Reigns being screen tested for another movie. You don't know if these stories are true. The test of time over the years, how these stories have changed.

I also read that H.G. Wells was not pleased with the way Island of Lost Souls turned out. He hated Island of Lost Souls. So he demanded that they treat his source material with more respect. I think Island of Lost Souls is a wonderful movie. Yes, we saw it here. We both love it. That holds up.

That's one of those that I mean, the scene where they're crashing through and getting like the surgical equipment yeah and then you hear you hear Moreau it was Charles Lawton playing Moreau and you hear him and they're like

you know like that crazy scream Paramount right? they had that hot looking girl who was the leopard was it Aquanetta? it's been so long that I've seen it but

yeah she was half panther half human and she winds up you know kind of saving them at the end

she becomes a good girl you know if Wells hated that one it's a good thing he didn't live to see the Brando version

oh that's a jaw dropper but my favorite was the Brando version. Oh! Do you imagine? Yeah! That's a jaw-dropper. But my favorite with the Brando version is this one part after Brando dies or is killed, what's his...

Val Kilmer? Val Kilmer starts doing a Brando imitation. Oh, yes, an imitation. Have you seen the documentary about the making of that movie? Oh, God, that must have been the most insane thing ever made, that film, because... That, to me, when he goes into the Brando imitation, I thought, this is where it's officially... Completely nuts.

Yeah, yeah. The physical man is... Gilbert's right. The effects hold up and it's very well made. And Reigns is very strong. And the dialogue in that part.

It's well written. It's so crisp. Everything about it. It's so clever. That funny little hat, I always liked it. Doing the kind of sweet stuff

and then doing the big, you know, megalomania. Even the moon is frightening me to death. It's very good. And Claude Rains was a very big Lon Chaney fan. And a lot of his moves are like the Phantom of the Opera. Well, he eventually played the Phantom of the Opera.

Eventually played him. Yeah. A lot of people criticized his performance there because it wasn't like the look of the original. It was more like a scarred kind of a thing. They were trying to do a little bit more of a realistic approach at that point. That was Universal's first Technicolor movie. John Huston and Preston Sturgis both took shots at that script? I'm sorry?

John Huston and Preston Sturgis both took shots at the Invisible Man script? John Huston also worked on Murders in the Rue Morgue. Murders in the Rue Morgue, yeah. That one I knew. Why didn't Reigns do the sequel? Why didn't he do the follow-up Invisible Man script? John Houston also worked on Murders in the Rue Morgue. That one I knew. Why didn't Reigns do the sequel? Why didn't he do the follow-up Invisible Man picture? Because he was doing things like Casablanca.

He moved up in the world. Besides, the interesting thing with Reigns is that he was a little guy. So you have the megalomania of the little guy, like little Hitler. He was working for Capra. But then they went the other direction with The Invisible Man Returns with Vincent Price. The young Vincent was this big, tall, imposing guy. And that worked, too, in a different way.

Okay, we're going to do more of these. We have to get to the wolf man. Oh, my God, yes. I'm going in order. By the way, have you seen Ed Begley's parody on Amazon Women on the Moon? Oh, yeah. I think Carl Gottlieb might have written that. Yeah, he takes his pants off.

You can't see anything. It's wonderful. Okay, Gil, we're going to do more of these. We're going to do an actual episode on Halloween, which will be next week's show. You want to take us out with a little bit of the vampire? Aha! Halloween, which will be next week's show. You want to take us out with a little bit of the vampire? To die, to be really dead, must

be glorious. There are far worse things awaiting man than death. Not bad. We'll see you next week Gary's coming back © BF-WATCH TV 2021... © BF-WATCH TV 2021