Frankenstein in 2008: A Year End Review

A ticket to see Frankenstein was an important clue to the origins of Hancock, the obstreperous superhero played by Will Smith, just one of many Frankenstein connections in movies released this year. The problem with the prop ticket from the movie is the date: For starters, June 21, 1931 was a Sunday and, anyway, Frankenstein began shooting on August 24.

The X-Files: I Want To Believe featured cloning, body parts, two-headed transplants and a Russian scientist referred to as Dr. Frankenstein. Igor was an animated feature about a mad scientist’s hunchbacked assistant who wants to build his own monster. As the year came to a close, an independent feature, Frankenstein Rising, had yet to find a distributor.

Guillermo del Toro was the focus of once and future Frankensteins. In Hellboy 2: The Golden Army, scenes from the classic Bride of Frankenstein appeared on TV screens in our hero’s pad as counterpoint to his amorous relations. Director Del Toro was quoted extensively in the press about his plans to shoot a new Frankenstein, even identifying Doug Jones as his choice to play The Monster. As Del Toro will be busy for a while making The Hobbit for producer Peter Jackson, his Frankenstein is tentatively listed on the IMDB as a project for 2012.

In France, the 1931 Frankenstein and the 1935 Bride of Frankenstein were re-released to theaters and then on to DVD. The re-issue posters were superb. The same two classics were conflated for what is perhaps the most unusual Frankenstein film of 2008, The Spawn of Frankenstein, a fanedit by “Jorge”. Scenes were trimmed and rearranged, comedy relief and arguably superfluous material was jettisoned, a musical score and tinting added. The whole exercise was meant to make the story scarier and The Monster appear “bad to the bone”. The (unauthorized) remix can be found online on torrent sites.

In England, the Royal Mail honored Hammer Films with a set of stamps that included one for The Curse of Frankenstein of 1956.

On stage, Frankenstein continues to be endlessly reprised, rethought and refashioned in some way, whether straight drama, experimental, comedic or musical. Halloween alone sparks countless amateur productions. Of note: First introduced in 2007, an acclaimed, multiple award-winning Frankenstein by Edmonton’s Catalyst Theater toured in 2008 and will continue into the new year. A dramatic musical called Mary Shelley and Her Frankenstein, by Shirley R. Barasch, premiered in Pittsburgh.

Out of New York, a cast recording of the serious-minded Frankenstein, A New Musical was released in September. The play had earlier been steamrollered by the megabudget musical retooling of Mel Brook’s Young Frankenstein which, in turn, will close on January 4, a victim of hubris, bad marketing and ever diminishing returns as the economic downturn bites Broadway. It remains to be seen if a proposed touring company gets off the ground.

In books, a number of important titles appeared. Using Mary Shelley’s actual manuscript, Charles E. Robinson, a professor of English at Delaware University and an expert on the Shelleys, edited out some 5,000 notes and corrections in Percy Shelley’s hand resulting in The Original Frankenstein, Mary’s story in first draft, as it were.

The novel as illustrated by Bernie Wrightson, long out of print, was given a luxurious 25th Anniversary reissue by Dark Horse.

For young readers, “Doctor” Frankenstein himself guided us through a wonderful, heavily illustrated anatomy book called Frankenstein’s Human Body Book.

Frankenstein’s role in American culture, as a metaphor, and its racial resonance in the United States was the subject of Black Frankenstein: The Making of an American Metaphor by Elizabeth Young.

In comics, the Monster finally met the monster superhero he inspired, The Hulk, in a Halloween issue published by Marvel Comics. Writer Warren Ellis turned the story inside out, as expected, in a one-shot comic called Frankenstein’s Womb. Skot Olsen illustrated an adaptation of the novel by Rod Lott for Fantasy Classics, Volume 15. Marion Mousse’s excellent comics adaptation, published as three books in France, was translated and collected as one long graphic novel by Classics Illustrated.

The Hammer film magazine, Little Shop of Horrors, devoted it’s 21^st issue to Hammer’s Curse of Frankenstein, and Video Watchdog #142 carried never-before-seen color photographs from the set of Lizard’s Leg and Owlet’s Wing, the legendary 1962 episode of TV’s Route 66 where Boris Karloff dressed as the Frankenstein Monster for the last time.

As usual, variations on The Monster, often with garish green skin and oversized neck bolts, popped up on toy shelves in plush and plastic. For serious collectors, Moebius Models released a perfect copy of the famous Gigantic Frankenstein model kit. Amok Time released a 12-inch figure of The Monster from I Was a Teenage Frankenstein.

Sadly, we must mark the passing in 2008 of Stan Winston, the special effects genius who, among an astounding list of credits, perfected The Monster’s makeup for Tom Noonan in The Monster Squad (1987). Also lost to us was the wonderful Hazel Court, horror film royalty and Elizabeth to Peter Cushing’s Victor in The Curse of Frankenstein (1956). And Forrest J Ackerman died on January 4. In February, we had celebrated the 50th anniversary of FJA’s Famous Monsters of Filmland.

Right here on Frankensteinia: The Frankenstein Blog, a little detective work revealed a fun secret from the cover painting of Marvel’s Monsters of the Movies issue number 2. We also tracked down a very rare graphic adaptation of Universal’s Frankenstein Meets The Wolfman (1942) made in Spain in 1946.

Some of our most popular posts, based on hits and linkage, included the one about the Frankenstein View-Master reels, and guest blogger Geof Smith’s reminiscence of Nelson Bridwell’s 1970 children’s book How To Care For Your Monster. Also popular was the Alex Velazquez illustration of Frankenstein contemplating liposuction, and posts about The Munsters, namely a look at the ‘lost” Munsters color pilot. A cover of Monster World #2 featuring The Munsters and their Munster Koach was widely reblogged, as well.

Hitwise, by far the most popular post ever on Frankensteinia was The Bride Unwrapped featuring the lovely retro (and NSFW) photography of Aleksey Galushkov. The post was referenced on io9, Nerdcore, the AMC blog and numerous other high-profile sites. Sex sells, who knew?

A point of pride: This blog was singled out by Intute, a consortium of UK Universities, as “a useful research aid for those seeking to survey the uses to which the Frankenstein monster is still being put in popular culture, and the contemporary neo-gothic / neo-Victorian imagination in general.”

And finally, Frankensteinia turned one year old in August, and we celebrated by launching a sister site, the picture blog called MONSTER CRAZY!

Onwards to 2009.

The preceding was my personal overview of the 190^th year in the ongoing career of Frankenstein. It was not meant to be exhaustive. If there is any Frankenstein reference from 2008 that you think should be mentioned, please post a comment and share it with us.

Have a great New Year!

Dr. Frankenstein's Human Body Book

Here’s a fabulous book that, despite its title, has a rather tenuous if amusing connection to our monster-making experimenter. Dr. Frankenstein’s Human Body Book, from DK Publishing, is actually an illustrated anatomy primer wherein, merely for introductory purposes, young readers are invited to assist Dr. Frankenstein in assembling a human body.

The Frankenstein references are strictly limited to short diary entries, written with gentle humor, to accompany and encourage the reader/assistant. Connecting limbs to the skeleton, the diary reads, “Up to the elbows with work. Assistant managed to put the humerus in the right place without hitting the funny bone”. Examining the central nervous system, the diary notes, “Assistant and I used our gray matter to install a brain…”. Otherwise, the text, by Richard Walker, a science writer and a veteran of anatomy books, is perfectly serious.

The information is doled out in easy-reading, bite-size pieces that support the generous iconography. Illustrations allow us to peer inside a bone or an eyeball, and a skull is exploded into its component parts. Medical photographs reveal microscopic structures and inner workings.

The book is beautifully designed and the production values are off the scale. This is one of those indestructible books with a vinyl cover and rigid, extra-thick board pages. Every spread opens flat. The cover features a lenticular 3-D image that peers inside a human heart.

I couldn’t help noting that for all its completeness, meticulously stepping through every layer of the human body, the naughty bits have been left out, probably to spare parents who will explore the book with very young children. It’ll be up to the grownups to fill in the details when and as they see fit.

Dr. Frankenstein’s Human Body Book, subtitled The monstrous truth about how your body works, is an unusual but welcome addition to the Frankenstein Library. Aimed at very young readers, it will delight the curious of all ages.

Here’s the Publisher’s page, with a glimpse at inside pages. You can order the book directly from them, or through the Frankenstore.

The Covers of Frankenstein : Monster World No. 6

From the fall of 1965 (with a January ’66 cover date), a Don Post mask of Glenn Strange as the Frankenstein Monster made festive for Warren & Ackerman’s Monster World number 6.

I want to take this opportunity to thank all of you who visited Frankensteinia this year. Readership is still growing (!) and that is very gratifying to me. Thanks to all of you who left comments — much appreciated! — and all of you who became “Friends of Frankensteinia”. If you are a regular reader and you have a blogger account, click “Follow This Blog” on the right-hand menu and make yourself known. You can also hook up with Frankensteinia on MySpace and/or Facebook. Come on, us Frankenstein fans have to stick together!

And may I say thanks, also, to those who follow my picture blog, Monster Crazy. I’ve posted every day there since launching back in August. Having a lot of fun with it, too. Check it out, won’t you? There’s a prominent link at right.

Here’s to a great Holiday Season, and may the New Year be your best one ever.

Have a Cool Yule!

Herman Munster Meets Santa Claus

The Munsters have been periodically revived through the years in TV specials and even a clone series that tallied as many episodes as the original 1964 sitcom. The latest incarnation — notwithstanding a recent Hustler Video Classics-Gone-Porn version — was the 1996 Holiday TV Movie, The Munsters’ Scary Little Christmas, in which Grandpa’s experiments transport Santa Claus to 1313 Mockingbird Lane.

Critics were unimpressed. The best thing said about the show was that very young children might be entertained. At least the casting was inspired, with Sam McMurray valiantly channelling Fred Gwynne’s genius, Sandy Baron — a Catskills-trained comic — picking up for Al Lewis, and the formidable Ann Magnuson a good pick to essay Yvonne De Carlo’s Lily. The 91-minute special survives on DVD.

Staying in a Christmas mood, here’s a real treat: The original Munsters appearing in Macy’s Santa Claus Parade!

Up on YouTube is a wonderful vintage movie newsreel from 1964, Santa’s in Town, subtitled “Munsters Escort Kris in Parade”. Gwynne and Lewis appear in character, riding the Munsters Koach down Broadway. There are nice shots of the novelty car’s detailing, such as a spider and its web in a corner of the windshield.

Not sure, but I think the first shot might have been doctored by Universal’s special effects department, the film marquees whited out so as not to promote competitors’ films.

It’s a wonderful time machine glimpse of Macy’s parade 44 years ago, and its fun seeing Al Lewis having a ball in the city he loved.

The Munsters in Santa's in Town on YouTube.

Screencaps from The Munster’s Scary Little Christmas on Marky Munster’s elaborate fan site.

The Munsters Scary Little Christmas on DVD.

Related
The Munsters's Color Pilot
Frankenstein Meets Santa Claus

Frankenstein's Daughter

"Tonight, you'll live again, you vixen!"

— Oliver Frank(enstein)

Frankenstein’s Daughter turned 50 on December 15, 2008.

Working with a meager $65,000 budget, a breakneck six-day shooting schedule and a crackpot script, director Richard Cunha delivered a businesslike, unapologetic grade-z programmer that is perfectly entertaining. It was the last of four ultra-low budget monster movies punched out by Cunha in 1958, which have since earned him cult director status. He made two more pictures and moved on to television as a director of photography.

The mad scientist in this effort — played as an unrepentant sleazeball by TV actor Donald Murphy — is Oliver Frank, a third-generation Frankenstein, operating out of a Los Angeles bungalow. Early on, he spikes fruit punch with a special formula that turns heroine Trudy (Sandra Knight) into a freaky monster that runs around scaring the neighbors. The Jekyll and Hyde juice makes her grow bushy eyebrows, bad teeth, and makeup man Harry Thomas’ trademark ping-pong eyeballs (also used to goofy effect in Killers from Space). The rest of the time, Knight looks confused by the weird goings on, at least when she isn't required to scream and faint, which she does a lot.

Meanwhile, Oliver, with the help of his exceedingly seedy assistant Elsu (Wolfe Barzell), is putting together a female creature, the title character, honoring the family tradition. The Monster, dressed in a bulky rubber suit, has a bandaged head and brutish features, with a gruesome scar running right down the middle of its face.

Apparently, no one told the makeup man (either Paul Stanhope or Harry Thomas, accounts vary) that The Monster was female and meant to look somewhat like blonde bombshell Suzie (Sally Todd), murdered by Oliver after refusing his advances and getting her head stapled onto The Monster’s body. There was no time or money to fix the mistake, so they slapped lipstick on The Monster and, according to director Cunha, “we pushed the guy on the set and started shooting.”

Actor Harry Wilson plays the stiff-limbed, robotic Lady Monster who goes on a brief neighborhood rampage before returning home and politely knocking on the door to be let in. She’s later used by Oliver to dispatch enemies, responding to the ever-compelling command to “Kill… KILL!”.

Wilson, afflicted like Rondo Hatton with acromegaly, had an astounding list of credits, nearly 250 films running from the silent era to the mid-sixties, playing character parts like “inmate”, “bar fly”, “thug” and “pirate with an eyepatch”. He was also Wallace Beery’s stunt double for 25 years.

The film pauses halfway through for a poolside barbecue party, complete with rock and roll band, and the events wrap up quickly after Trudy’s ducktail-coiffed boyfriend and the slowpoke cops finally stumble over to the laboratory. Oliver Frank(enstein) gets a facefull of acid and the highly flammable Monster goes up in a whoosh — Harry Wilson doing a harrowing fire stunt — after bumping into a Bunsen burner.

Frankenstein’s Daughter, classic drive-in and fleapit fare, was quickly turned over to TV for late-night showings, where a generation of kids was treated to its bizarre monster and its cheap shocks.

Frankenstein’s Daughter is a very rough gem and it makes for a fine guilty pleasure.

You can download or watch Frankenstein’s Daughter online at Internet Archive.

Tom Weaver interviews director Richard Cunha on The Astounding B Monster.

A fine, in-depth review of the film on Monsters From The Vault.

Related
Frankenstein 1958

Master of the Mad Lab

“I saw the pale student of unhallowed arts kneeling beside the thing he had put together. I saw the hideous phantasm of a man stretched out, and then, on the working of some powerful engine, show signs of life, and stir with an uneasy, half vital motion.”

— Mary Shelley

In 1931, when he was tapped to equip Frankenstein’s tower laboratory with its own "powerful engine", Kenneth Strickfaden brought a unique set of skills to the job.

Born in Montana in 1896, Kenneth Strickfaden’s early, adventurous career took him all over America working in amusement parks, and overseas serving in World War One. He raced cars and boats, put time in as an airplane mechanic, built and tuned Tesla coils and X-Ray machines, eventually ending up in Hollywood, in the late twenties, as a studio electrician.

When called upon to assemble the lightning-powered machines that would blast Boris Karloff to robotic life, Strickfaden combined equal parts electrical science and sideshow pandemonium to create the ultimate Mad Scientist’s Laboratory. Early designs for Frankenstein proposed a neat, modern laboratory, but by the time the set was built, Strickfaden’s forbidding science fiction contraptions were installed in steampunk juxtaposition against the medieval stonework of Frankenstein’s mountaintop hideout.

Strickfaden’s machines sparked and screeched as levers were pulled, blinding electric arcs dancing wildly in glass vials and streaming off copper spheres. Needles went off the dials as magnets hummed and corona disks whirled out of control. Frankenstein’s machines concussed and smoked from way too much voltage. You could almost smell the scorched metal and the waves of ozone.

Frankenstein’s 1931 laboratory became the instant, permanent movie mad lab reference and Strickfaden would recombine and reuse his booming, spark-blasting machines not only in most Frankenstein films to come, but also in Flash Gordon serials and countless horror and science fiction films for decades to come. The original equipment was still being used in an episode of TV’s The Munsters in the mid-sixties, and hauled out of Strickfaden’s garage again for Mel Brooks’ Young Frankenstein in 1974.

On a parallel track, Strickfaden lugged his gadgets all over North America as eye-popping teaching tools, lecturing in schools and auditoriums from 1933 until his death in 1984.

The image at the top is from a 1949 article, High Voltage Magic, in Popular Mechanics Magazine, posted on the excellent and ever-fascinating Modern Mechanix blog. Click through to see the whole article and more pictures of Kenneth Strickfaden at work.

The article mentions that Strickfaden doubled for Boris Karloff, but it was not in a Frankenstein picture. Strickfaden stepped in for Boris for a hair-raising scene, holding a large sword in a streaming arc of lightning, in MGM’s The Mask of Fu-Manchu. The studio must have heaved a sigh of relief as it was a badly grounded Strickfaden, rather than their star, who was thrown clear across the set by the electrical blast. Strickfaden was shaken but, thankfully, not barbequed.

Strickfaden’s biography, Frankenstein’s Electrician, by Harry Goldman, from McFarland. Also available through The Frankenstore.

Photos from the Academy of Motion Pictures homage to Strickfaden.

A selection of surviving gadgets from Strickfaden's movie laboratories.

Related
Frankenstein’s Laboratory

Frankenstein 2008

The latest Frankenstein film is producer David S. Sterling’s Frankenstein Rising, written by Monte Hunter and directed by Eric Swelstad.

Currently in post-production, the film is notable for its cameo by 98-year old Anita Page as Elizabeth Frankenstein, her last screen appearance. Miss Page passed away on September 6.

Eighty years ago, the teenage, sad-eyed Page appeared as a flapper protected from gangsters by tough-guy detective hero Lon Chaney in While The City Sleeps. Page’s rise was meteoric, starring opposite the late silent/early sound era's most famous leading men. She was called “The Ideal Movie Star”, drawing more fan mail than anyone except Greta Garbo. Page is said to have even received several marriage proposals from a smitten Benito Mussolini.

Page, surprisingly, quit the movies at the height of her powers, in 1933, waiting until 2004 to reveal that her early retirement was a case of blacklisting for refusing the advances of MGM headman Irving Thalberg. She only returned to films, in small parts, over the last decade.

There’s a trailer for Frankenstein Rising on YouTube. The narration is by another classic film legend, Margaret O’Brien. The Monster is essayed by Randal Malone.

The Art of Frankenstein : Jeff Heermann

Here’s the 1910 Edison Frankenstein program cover recast as an engaging illustration by San Francisco-based artist Jeff Heermann.

Though the film was given a graphic novel adaptation, cartoonists’ takes on Charles Ogle’s expressive Monster remain relatively rare. Heermann’s sketchy brushwork suits Charles Ogle’s wildman Monster well.

Check out Heermann’s website, blog and flickr stream.

Related
The First Frankenstein of the Movies
Silent Frankensteins

All Seats 35 Cents!

Seventy-seven years ago today, on December 4, in 1931, Frankenstein premiered in New York at the Mayfair Theater. Pictured above is the original newspaper ad that ran on this day in The New York Daily News. The Monster’s image is based on the alternate, unused makeup with curious, stapled folds in the forehead.

The Mayfair originally opened as the Columbia, a Burlesque house, in 1910. The famous theater architect Thomas W. Lamb gave it an Art Deco makeover in 1930, when it became the RKO Mayfair, showing movies. In its heyday, sitting at Broadway and 47th, the building often carried a giant billboard poster, several stories high, that wrapped all the way around the corner.

It was called the DeMille in the Sixties, playing super-large screen 70MM and Todd-A-O blockbusters, its last hurrah before being chopped up and repurposed as the Embassy, a multiplex.

Abandoned and boarded up since 1998, the theater was demolished in 2007. It was the last of the old Times Square movie palaces to go.

Related
Frankenstein Premieres
The Selling of Frankenstein

Frankenstein Meets Santa Claus

As Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein ends, The Monster is last seen jumping from Walton’s ship “upon the ice raft which lay close to the vessel. He was soon borne away by the waves and lost in darkness and distance.”

Many writers have conjectured on The Monster’s fate as he disappeared into the merciless Arctic night. Turns out, according to Paul Dini, writer-producer of numerous animated TV series including Batman and Justice League, that the Big Guy ended up as a doll maker at Santa’s North Pole Workshop.

That’s the kick off to Santa Claus Vs. Frankenstein, a one-shot, 32-page Holiday comic starring Santa’s brat of a teenage daughter, Jingle Belle. Stephanie Gladden provides the art. The issue, in comic stores December 4, launches the Dinitoons imprint at Top Cow comics.

Publisher’s site: Top Cow Productions.

Writer Paul Dini interviewed on Newsarama.

With Thanks to Sam!