Tuesday, October 15, 2024

Johnny Deadline: Son of Monsterpalooza Scrapbook

 by JB

Rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated. I was alive enough last weekend to attend the Son of Monsterpalooza fan convention in Burbank, California, USA.

I am now an old hand at this convention business (Also an old foot, an old spine, and an old neck) so I will spare you the esoteric details and get right to the MEAT of this show.
1) Although the guest list included luminaries such as Bruce Campbell and Ozzy Osbourne, I never saw either one over the course of three days. Bruce Campbell, as often happens, was kept in a separate room, and meeting, greeting, asking for an autograph, or photographing the Blizzard of Ozz required purchasing the “Ultimate Sin Package,” which included a photograph with him and an autograph. I could not afford the “Ultimate Sin Package” because I have a monthly mortgage to pay... and I like to eat. $700. Seven hundred dollars.

Three cheers for the celebrities who will still mingle with the hoi polloi, right on the convention floor: Griffin Dunne, David Naughton, Mira Sorvino, Linda Blair, Kevin Durand, Natasha Henstridge, and the cast of Return of the Living Dead. Hip, Hip, Hooray.
2) The fine folks at Vinegar Syndrome and Severin Films were in the house, enabling me to finally add a movie to my Blu-ray collection that I had not seen since I was ten years old on the ABC Wednesday Night Movie of the Week: Moon of the Wolf, starring David Jansen, star of Superdome. Oh, and The Playgirl and the Vampire too. Woo-woo.

3) I finally got to meet artist Jeff Brawn, creator of one of the greatest collectibles ever conceived. Jeff designed a vending machine, a real vending machine, based on William Castle’s The Tingler. It dispenses a capsule that contains two plastic, glow-in-the-dark maggots, which are supposed to be baby tinglers. The vending machine plays the film’s title song from its radio commercial. When one lifts the little metal door to retrieve this prize, the machine shakes and buzzes, just like William Castle made theater seats do in 1959.
It is the single greatest thing I have ever seen in my life. Go to Jeff’s Instagram page to see it in action: he’s taking orders for this Christmas. It’s expensive, as all real art is, but worth every penny. NOTE TO FRIENDS AND FAMILY: I would really like to see one of these under the tree this year. I have been a very good boy.
4) Many people wore costumes. This year I counted three Leatherfaces, about a dozen Michael Meyers, and five or six Art the Clowns. Best Costume? Friend-of-the -Site Cameron Cloutier’s son dressed as Sam from Trick ‘R’ Treat. He danced around for what seemed like hours; it was one of the cutest things I’ve seen in a very long time. Second Best Costume? A woman came dressed as the stretching room from Disney’s Haunted Mansion. “Is this woman’s dress ACTUALLY stretching?” I failed to get a picture.
5) I found a vendor savvy enough to split sets of the new NECA Ben Cooper Vintage Halloween Costume figurines, so that I was able to purchase just the action figure I wanted from the original set of five. Often, when first entering the vendors’ room at any fan convention, I silently quote a line from “Jerusalem” from Jesus Christ Superstar: “There is nothing you can’t buy.” Time and time again, this is proved right. The figure in question has special significance because when my wife was but a five-year-old, she wanted to wear the original Ben Cooper Frankenstein’s Monster costume. Her mother objected at first, saying that it was “a boy’s costume,” but eventually cooler heads prevailed and my wife got to be Frankenstein’s Monster in October of 1967. I facetiously asked our listeners to send me one of these on a recent podcast, but nobody did. So, I bought one. So there.

6) I sometimes wish that Son of Monsterpalooza scheduled more panel discussions, like Flashback Weekend in Rosemont, Illinois always does. I used to attend Flashback and miss it very much. Sometimes I wonder if big ballroom events like panel discussions are becoming increasingly rare because that takes some celebrities away from the real business of the Con, selling their images and autographs. Still, it was nice to be among my People for a few days, and it got me super excited that Halloween is but two weeks away. Stay scared, everybody.

4 comments:

  1. Wait, you got to see Mira Sorvino AND Natasha Henstridge live in person? You lucky dog. I'm assuming you didn't meet them directly because you would talk about it much more 😁

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    1. At one point a crowd bottleneck saw my scooter stuck in front of Sorvino’s table. Instead of simply staring at her like a kid at the zoo, I mentioned that one of my favorite performances of hers was in Quiz Show. She seemed flattered… and said that no one ever asks her about that one! I was just about to bring up her Celebrity Jeopardy wins, but then the crowd broke up and I could pass.

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  2. $700 for Ozzy. Really? That is crazy.

    I have gone to a few horror conventions, but I learned that they are not my favorite experience. I was at two in Pittsburgh (Horror Realm) and one in New Jersey (Chiller Theatre). I am not interested in autographs, and my budget and space for films and horror paraphernalia is limited these days. I also went to them on my own, which is certainly not as much fun as being with others. Once you look at the merchandise of the vendors and see the celebrities, there is not much left to keep you occupied.

    I have been eyeing that The Playgirls And The Vampire release. The film is silly fun and has a rare glimpse of nudity from the early 1960s. Having only ever watched the full-screen version that's been available on streaming sites for years, that blu-ray would likely be a big improvement.

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  3. If The Playgirls and the Vampire is good fun, I will review the Blu-Ray on this very site in the future. Nudity, you say?

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