American Scary

THE PREMIERE!
Tuesday, October 24, 2006

Hey, group! So that happened... :)

While it wasn't a huge turnout (we were opposite a Q&A with Oliver Stone about Born on the Fourth of July that was running WAY over time), those that did show up seemed to enjoy the film a lot, based on their reactions and what they said afterwards. On the host front, we had Crematia Mortem (Roberta Solomon), Mr. Lobo (Eric Lobo), Remo D. (Shane Dallmann), and Malena Teves (from Neil Gaiman's Fox series) in attendance, as well as film interview subjects Curtis Armstrong, Patricia Tallman, and Len Wein. Our friends Marv & Noel Wolfman and Trey Stokes also showed up, along with various other friends and family of everyone. But there actually were people there who were NOT affiliated with us!

Malena wrote about the event on her blog as well - you can read that here.

And here's an excerpt from Sandy's posting to a few Yahoo groups:

The audience cheered, laughed and egged each other on as their favorite host or friends came on the screen. Timothy Herron got a laugh every time he appeared. Goulfinger came off as erudite. Griffin came off as a consummate showman. Count Gore was eloquent and the audience was engaged. They jeered the bad puns, hooted at the blue humor in places and laughed at the pure genius we all know as the American Horror Host.
Nobody left and in the end, nobody got strung up in front of anything either.
We gave out buttons, answered questions and talked in the lobby for about an hour after. Everyone learned something they didn't know from the film and many were surprised to learn of current hosts, the HHU or the scope of the hosting phenomena.
My goal was to make a movie that reminded people of this show they loved and had forgotten. I wanted to remind them that TV used to be local and something ANYONE can do. I wanted it to be a fun ride for the fan but accessible to the masses.
One of the teen ushers asked for a button and said, "Wow, your movie is really cool. I kept peeking in. These guys were funny."
"Yeah," added a co-worker with orange and black ribbons in her hair, "I'd like to do a show like that."
Now, if I can only engineer an audience full of those kids!

After the Hollywood premiere, the film screened the next day at the Austin Film Festival. Professor Anton Griffin's account of that screening, as well as a review of the film, can be found here.

Monday night, Malena and I (John) attended the Gala Awards ceremony which was affiliated with the Hollywood Film Festival. I hesitate to say that it was part of the festival, as there was little to no mention of the films from the festival. However, we had a grand time, and got to meet and talk with quite a few of the celbrities at the party, including Robin Williams, Forrest Whittaker, and John Lasseter (whose wife is a big fan of Chilly Billy!)

Next stop, Cleveland! We're scheduled to screen there 6pm November 11 at the Ohio Independent Film Festival. I'll be appearing on Cleveland's WCPN radio around noon on Halloween day to talk about the film on-air with Chuck Schodowski.

MORE SCREENINGS!
Monday, October 10, 2006

We've added two more festivals! American Scary will be screening twice at the Austin Film Festival - 7pm Sunday, October 22 and then again on Thursday, October 26 at 7pm. We're also going to be screening at the Ohio Independent Film Festival in Cleveland, Saturday November 11 at 6pm.

Tickets are now on sale for the Hollywood Film Festival screening - you can order those from the ArcLight website right here.

WORLD PREMIERE UPDATE!
Monday, September 18, 2006

Never fear, the movie's not dead, we've just been editing, re-editing, and editing some more as we refined the film. There's been a lot of movement and activity behind the scenes lately, so we've been sitting on our hands waiting for the official announcements to start happening...

The movie is done (or done to the point where we're ready to show it!), and will premiere at 9pm Saturday, October 21st as part of the Horror program at the Hollywood Film Festival at the ArcLight Cinema in Hollywood!

FilmThreat publicly announced the horror line-up this morning, and the actual film festival pages should be updating soon, as everything was delivered to them last week for next month's premiere.

Tickets should go onsale beginning October 1 at the ArcLight Cinemas website. We don't know yet whether there will be any kind of Q&A after the screening, or who from the interviews will be in attendance. However, both John and Sandy will most definitely be attending!

And a very special thanks to those of you who helped out with some last minute edits, footage and additions! It really made a difference!

JANUARY UPDATE!
Monday, January 10, 2005

We're still here!

Not much news to report right now on the film - we're still working on editing the movie, tracking down footage and photographs, and beginning the process of getting music for the film. It's all beginning to come together quite well - we've essentially locked down how we're going to open and close the film, now it's just all the reshuffling, reordering, and tweaking of everything inbetween that taking so much time... Unfortunately, the one problem we're going to have is that we can't touch on *all* of the hosts out there - we'd need a whole mini-series or a sequel to attempt that, so deciding what to keep and what to drop has been a challenge.

As for the website, we've made a few cosmetic changes, and added some new sections. We've added a CafePress store with American Scary logo swag for those of you who are interested, and we've also added a new section of short host biographies of the major figures in the film. There's just a few there now, but we'll be adding more people to that in the coming weeks.

Thanks to everyone who's helped us out so far!

HALLOWEEN 2005 UPDATE!
Monday, October 31, 2005

I realize we've not updated this in some time, but there hasn't been much to report - we've been editing the film, re-editing the film, tweaking the edits and then re-editing again...

However, the film is *very* close to being finished - most of the tweaks right now are minor ones for pacing, or adding in more B-roll and clips to cover edits... we felt strong enough about the rough cut that we submitted it as a work-in-progress to both the Sundance Film Festival and the Slamdance Festival... the festivals won't make their selections known for another month or so, but we're going to keep working on things for the time being...

Back to the editing!

JANUARY UPDATE!
Monday, January 10, 2005

We're still here!

Thanks to everyone who's helped us out so far!

HALLOWEEN UPDATE!
Sunday, October 31, 2004

The second American Scary trailer is now live - you can take a look here or by clicking the trailer link over to the left.

There hasn't been much news to report of late, as we finished gathering interviews earlier this summer, and have been working on editing the movie ever since. It's coming together nicely, but we're going to take our time and make fine-tune everything before we release it to festivals and then theaters.

At Doctor Gangrene's Horror Hootenanny a few months ago, we met the band PsychoCharger, and the band shared some of their host memories, and then offered us their music for use in the film. One track in particular impressed us so much, it's become the music behind the opening montage in the film... They'll make a great addition to the music in the film, whic already includes contributions from The Moon-Rays, the King Dapper Combo, and MX-80.

MAY UPDATE!
Wednesday, May 19, 2004

Sorry for the lack of updates, but the last two months have been very busy for us, with lots of trips and interviews to add to the film.

In March, we went to New York, and met with Joe Bob Briggs, Commander USA, Halloween Jack, and Zacherley! All had some great stories to tell, and we had the added bonus of learning that the Commander was a huge Zacherley fan... After that, we hit Syracuse and Philadelphia, and added Baron Daemon, Dr. E. Nick Witty, and Stella to the lineup. We also went back to Cleveland for some followup material with Big Chuck and Little John (including filming at a show taping), Son of Ghoul, and The Ghoul.

April saw us heading back to Los Angeles to interview Curtis Armstrong and Film Threat's Chris Gore, as both had memories of The Ghoul and Sir Graves Ghastley they wanted to share. We also ran back down to San Diego to meet up with the original Svengoolie, Jerry Bishop.

May saw one of the coolest opportunities for the film, as we were invited onto the set of the Fox Movie Channel's upcoming 13 Nights of Fright, hosted by noted author Neil Gaiman! We spent a day on the set, and recorded a fantastic interview with Neil afterwards - and then Patricia Tallman (Babylon 5 and Night of the Living Dead)showed up, to share her memories of Chilly Billy, Svengoolie and Marvin.

MARCH UPDATE!
Friday, March 5, 2004

The first American Scary trailer is now live - you can take a look here or by clicking the trailer link over to the left.

We would like to welcome aboard Production Assistants Chris Hanel, Patti Garcia, Brendan Thompson, and Mike Woods. We would also like to thank Crystal Guillory, Ronald Lee, George Chastain, Joseph Fotinos, Shane Dallman, and Erik Lobo who have all banded together and knocked out a mammoth job of Horror Host sleuthing for us. If you are interested in helping out, please contact us.

We will be heading for New York next week to interview Zacherley, Joe Bob Briggs, and a few others, and will be returning to Cleveland the weekend after, where we'll be shooting some fan interviews at Ghoulardi's Bar & Grill. Stay tuned for more updates!

JANUARY UPDATE!
Saturday, January 31, 2004

The American Scary crew had an incredible afternoon recently with Maila Nurmi, also known as Vampira. Everyone involved was blown away by her charm and grand Hollywood tales. She spoke about not only her early days as a host, but gave us advice for the next generation hosts. We look forward to including her footage in the project and seeing more of her in the future. Many thanks go out to Jeff Clausen for making that happen for us.

We will be heading for New York in March, and should be returning to Cleveland and Los Angeles soon, along with a possible trip to Chicago - stay tuned for more updates!

NOVEMBER UPDATE!
Friday, November 7, 2003

The American Scary crew has been on the road and hard at work with recent trips to Cleveland, Nashville, and Kansas City - interviewing the likes of Tim Conway, Roberta "Crematia Mortem" Solomon, Richard "Count Gore DeVol" Dyszel, Ron "The Ghoul" Sweed, and many other hosts.

We are planning a trip to New York and other East Coast areas soon, and several trips to Los Angeles. If you know of someone we should speak with, please contact us.

AMERICAN SCARY HEADS FOR CLEVELAND!
Friday, September 26, 2003

The American Scary crew will be recording interviews at the Cinema Wasteland convention next weekend (October 3-5) convention in Cleveland, Ohio.
If you're going to be there and have an interesting host related story, please contact us!