MonsterGirl’s 150 Days of Classic Horror #61 FRANKENSTEIN 1931 / BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN 1935 & SON OF FRANKENSTEIN 1939

FRANKENSTEIN 1931

Before we throw the switch and send sparks flying at The Last Drive-In, I want to share my plan to give Frankenstein, Bride of Frankenstein, and Son of Frankenstein the careful, lingering attention they deserve. These films are stitched together from more than just celluloid and shadow- they’re woven from the anxieties, artistry, and ambitions of a studio and its monsters, and they demand a thoughtful eye and time to unravel their legacy. Down the road, I’ll be returning to each of these iconic films with essays as painstaking and reverent as the work of Dr. Frankenstein, piecing – no -suturing together my reflections like the monster himself, until they stand worthy of the legend that first rose from Universal’s storm-lit laboratories.

In the Shadow of the Lightning: Of Monstrous Creation and Legacy:

The 1930s were a decade of shadows and lightning for Universal Pictures, a studio that carved its name into the annals of cinema by turning Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein into a mythic legacy of Gothic terror, tragedy, and transcendent artistry. Three films-Frankenstein (1931), Bride of Frankenstein (1935), and Son of Frankenstein (1939)-form a trilogy of creation and consequence, each a chapter in a saga where humanity’s hubris and compassion collide in the flicker of a Kenneth Strickfaden’s laboratory of the electrical sparks of life after cold morbid death.

Directed by visionaries who understood that horror thrives in the space between awe and dread, these films are not merely monster movies but meditations on identity, belonging, and the cost of playing god. At their heart lies Boris Karloff, the man who begins from a darkened grave, to a stitched-together body. His boots are like iron tombstones strapped to his feet, each step pounding the earth with the weight of a walking graveyard. And don’t forget the neck bolts, Karloff, whose performance as the Monster transformed a silent brute into cinema’s most tragic paradox: a creature of violence and vulnerability, feared and mourned in equal measure. Frankenstein’s monster was one of the first ‘other’ that I could relate to and drew from me a depth of compassion, partly due to Karloff’s poignant, remarkable performance as a soulless newborn monster who finds his own soul at the hands of human monsters.

James Whale’s Frankenstein 1931 opens not just with a curtain, but a warning- a fourth-wall-breaking prologue where Edward Van Sloan, as the sardonic Dr. Waldman, cautions the audience of the “thrill of horror” to come. It is a promise kept in every frame.

After this, the film’s eerie credits roll, featuring a backdrop of ominous, rotating eyes, before the story proper begins with a haunting graveyard scene at dusk. Mourners and priests gather around a fresh grave, and as night falls, Henry Frankenstein and his hunchbacked assistant, Fritz, appear, digging up the newly buried body to collect parts for Henry’s experiments. This grave-robbing sequence, shrouded in shadows and gothic atmosphere, immediately establishes the film’s macabre and transgressive spirit, ushering viewers into a world where the boundaries between life and death are about to be electrifyingly crossed.

Colin Clive’s Henry Frankenstein, a man feverish with ambition, stitches together a body from grave-robbed parts, his laboratory a cathedral of the profane and epic blasphemy where lightning substitutes for divine breath. The Monster’s awakening- a jerking, twitching ascent to life, limbs stiff as rigor mortis- is a perverse nativity, scored not by angels but the crackle of Tesla coils. “It’s Alive, It’s Alive!!!!” It is Karloff (only famously listed as ‘The Monster’?), hidden under Jack Pierce’s iconic makeup (a masterwork of sculpted latex and tragedy), which imbues the creature with a child’s confusion and a titan’s rage.

Boris Karloff’s legacy is forever entwined with the Monster he so lovingly called his best friend. Stepping into the creature’s heavy boots and enduring the grueling daily ritual of Jack Pierce’s makeup, Karloff poured his soul-and often his physical well-being-into a role that would transform not just his own life, but the very nature of cinematic horror.

He once reflected, “Whale and I both saw the character as an innocent one, and I tried to play it that way. The most heart-rending aspect of the creature’s life, for us, was his ultimate desertion by his creator. It was as though man, in his blundering, searching attempts to improve himself, was to find himself deserted by his God.”

Karloff’s Monster was not a mindless brute, but a being suffused with longing, confusion, and a desperate need for acceptance, a “pathetic, confused creature caught in a situation it couldn’t comprehend,” as he described it.

His expressive eyes and mournful gestures turned what could have been a one-dimensional villain into a universal symbol of loneliness and misunderstood humanity. The pain and exhaustion Karloff endured- long hours, heavy prosthetics, and lasting injuries- were, in his words, worth it for the gift of giving life to a character that would “garner critical acclaim and solidify his place in horror cinema history.”

Karloff never regretted his bond with the Monster, embracing the role as both a personal triumph and a profound artistic responsibility. “The Monster turned out to be the best friend I ever had,” he said with fondness, recognizing that his own humanity shone brightest through the mask of the misunderstood creation. In doing so, Karloff helped forge a legacy in which terror and empathy walk hand in hand and the Monster’s yearning for light continues to echo in the hearts of audiences nearly a century later.

His outstretched hand toward sunlight, a gensticulation that continues to bring me to tears, his tender interaction with a lakeside girl (a moment of innocence shattered by tragic, unintended violence), and his final flight into a burning windmill are not just scenes but seismic shifts in storytelling. Arthur Edeson’s cinematography drapes the film in German Expressionist shadows, turning jagged castle spires and tilting gravestones into a visual scream. The Monster’s guttural moans, crafted by Karloff’s rasp, become a language of their own- a soundscape of anguish that Universal would echo for decades.

Some of the key scenes in Frankenstein (1931) have become iconic not only in horror but in all of cinema for their visual power, emotional resonance, and lasting influence: I truly am one to lash a metaphor to death, but here goes.

The Creation Scene: In a storm-swept laboratory filled with sparking machinery, Henry Frankenstein (Colin Clive) and his assistant raise the Monster’s body toward an opening in the roof. Lightning strikes, electricity crackles, and the Monster’s hand slowly rises, signaling the birth of new life. Clive’s ecstatic exclamation, “It’s alive! It’s alive! In the name of God, now I know what it feels like to be God!” is one of the most famous lines in film history, capturing both the thrill and the terror of creation.

The Monster’s Introduction: James Whale masterfully builds suspense as the Monster enters the room backwards, then slowly turns to reveal his face in a series of increasingly tight close-ups.

The Monster’s face emerges from the shadows like a thunderclap frozen in time, a grotesque symphony of stitched flesh and sorrow, illuminated by the flickering lightning of a storm-battered night. Each scar and bolt tells a silent tale of unnatural birth, a haunting visage that is both a curse and a lament, etched in the chiaroscuro of horror and humanity intertwined. A humanity that only Karloff could conjure into being.

Karloff’s first movements are stiff and uncertain, like a child learning to walk, and his reaching for the sunlight is both poignant and unsettling. This moment establishes Karloff’s Monster as both terrifying and deeply sympathetic.

The Monster’s Fear and Imprisonment: When Fritz, Frankenstein’s hunchback assistant Fritz, (Dwight Frye – Dracula’s Renfield), torments the Monster with fire, the creature’s terror and confusion are palpable. Chained and abused, the Monster lashes out, ultimately killing Fritz. This scene underscores the Monster’s innocence and the tragic consequences of fear and abuse.

The Lake Scene with Little Maria: In one of the film’s most haunting and controversial moments, the Monster befriends a young girl named Maria, playing with flowers by the water’s edge. To the Monster, it is a revelation and a shared bit of childhood playfulness. When he runs out of flowers, he innocently throws Maria into the lake, believing she will float like the blossoms. Her accidental drowning is a turning point, transforming the Monster from misunderstood outcast to hunted menace and setting the villagers on a path of vengeance.

The Attack on Elizabeth: On the night of Henry and Elizabeth’s (Mae Clarke) wedding, the Monster slips into Elizabeth’s room, leading to her iconic scream and collapse. This scene cements the Monster’s status as both a figure of terror and tragedy, and showcases Clarke’s performance as one of the quintessential “scream queens.” Clarke’s performance in these scenes, especially her sheer terror during the Monster’s intrusion, is widely regarded as her best moment in the film and one of the most memorable in early horror cinema. Her ability to embody both vulnerability and resilience helped set the template for generations of “scream queens” to follow.

The attack is the most famous and chilling scene, for Clarke as she arrives on her wedding night, when the Monster enters her bedroom through an open window. The confrontation is a masterclass in terror: Elizabeth’s screams and physical collapse convey genuine fear, heightened by Clarke’s real-life anxiety about Karloff’s makeup (the actor would wiggle his little finger to reassure her during takes). The Monster’s attack leaves Elizabeth bruised and traumatized, her body strewn across the bed in a tableau reminiscent of Fuseli’s “The Nightmare,” a moment both grotesque and strangely beautiful.

Mae Clarke’s portrayal of Elizabeth in Frankenstein (1931) may not be the film’s largest role, but she leaves a lasting impression through several key scenes that have become iconic in horror cinema. Early in the film, Elizabeth is introduced as the compassionate and anxious fiancée of Henry Frankenstein. Her concern for Henry’s well-being and obsession with his experiments help ground the story in nurturing emotion. One memorable moment comes as she pleads with Henry to abandon his dangerous work, her vulnerability and sincerity underscoring the emotional stakes of the scientist’s hubris.

As the wedding approaches, Elizabeth’s unease intensifies. Clarke delivers a series of lines filled with foreboding-“Henry, I’m afraid. Terribly afraid. Where’s Dr. Waldman? Why is he late for the wedding?”-her intuition that something is terribly wrong, adding to the film’s suspense.

The Windmill Finale: The film culminates in a dramatic confrontation at an old windmill. The Monster, pursued by angry villagers -as they surge forward like a living wildfire, their torches blazing with the fever of justice and vengeance, each flame a furious tongue licking at the darkness and hungry to consume the fleeing monster.

He drags Henry to the top and hurls him down, nearly killing his creator. Trapped and terrified, the Monster is engulfed by flames as the villagers set the windmill ablaze- a visually stunning and emotionally charged climax that leaves the Monster’s fate ambiguous.

BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN 1935 

In 1935, Whale returned four years later with his subversive operatic Bride of Frankenstein, a film that drapes its predecessor’s Gothic gloom in baroque camp and existential wit. Here, the Monster (Karloff, now granted halting speech) evolves from a force of nature to a figure of pathos, demanding companionship in a world that recoils at his existence. Enter Ernest Thesiger’s Dr. Pretorius, a decadent aesthete who blackmails Henry Frankenstein into crafting a mate, his laboratory cluttered with homunculi in jars like perverse snow globes. The Bride’s creation- a crescendo of theremin wails, exploding equipment, and Elsa Lanchester’s the epitome of the monstrous feminine hissing, electrified entrance- is both a macabre ballet and a blasphemous wedding. Lanchester, playing both Mary Shelley and the Bride, crowns the film with a performance of silent fury, her neck bolts and Nefertiti hair echoing Karloff’s silhouette while carving her own iconography. Franz Waxman’s score, a whirlwind of strings and dissonance, mirrors the story’s duality: tragic and absurd, sacred and profane. The finale, where the Monster destroys the lab, crying “We belong dead!” to his horrified Bride, is less an ending than a requiem for the outcast- a theme Whale elevates with Shakespearean grandeur.

Elsa Lanchester’s turn as the Bride is the stuff of both legend and paradox- a fleeting performance that haunts the film’s legacy with its electricity, wit, and subversive power. Lanchester, who also plays Mary Shelley in the film’s prologue, was initially hesitant about the role, fearing it might limit her career, but ultimately approached it with her signature blend of humor and artistry.

She famously drew inspiration for the Bride’s hissing, staccato movements from the swans in Regent’s Park: “They’re really very nasty creatures,” she later quipped, demonstrating the hiss in interviews with gleeful theatricality. The result is a performance that’s at once animalistic and regal, a living jolt of camp and pathos that director James Whale encouraged to the hilt. “Inside you pretty girls is the Devil,” Lanchester recalled Whale telling her, a sly nod to the film’s undercurrent of feminist rebellion.

Lanchester’s experience on set was physically demanding; at just 5’4”, she was made to wear stilts and tightly wrapped bandages that left her nearly immobile, often needing to be carried between takes.

Her screen time as the Bride is famously brief, but her impact is seismic. The Bride’s unveiling is a masterstroke of cinematic spectacle: unwrapped by two men who created her for their own ends, she recoils in horror from Karloff’s Monster, her iconic scream slicing through the laboratory’s chaos. Lanchester would later joke, “I hope I am not hired on that talent alone,” referencing the scream that became her cinematic signature.

Critically, Lanchester’s Bride has become a lightning rod for feminist and queer readings. On one level, she is the ultimate object-created, unveiled, and exchanged by men, her body assembled from fragments, and her fate decided without her consent.

Yet in her refusal- her shrieking rejection of the Monster and the destiny imposed upon her- she enacts a radical, if wordless, act of autonomy. Scholars have argued that her scream is not just terror but protest: “an act of speech-one whose authority is implicitly twinned, via the double casting of Elsa Lanchester, with the authorship of Mary Shelley”.

The Bride’s refusal to mate in the image in which she was made disrupts the patriarchal fantasy of woman as passive companion, instead asserting a monstrous, unspeakable power that both fascinates and terrifies her creators.

The Monster’s outstretched hand, trembling with hope, meets the Bride’s fierce rejection- a scream that shatters the fragile bridge between them. In that moment, his heart crumbles like a castle built on sand, each echo of her scream a dagger of rejection piercing the fragile shell of his longing. It is a profound solitude, as if the light he reached for flickers and dies, leaving him adrift in a sea of silent despair.

Boris Karloff masterfully channels his pain through Jack Pierce’s elaborate makeup, letting every nuance of suffering and yearning seep through the layers with dignity, grace, and pathos; his performance is a lantern glowing from within a mask of stitched shadows, illuminating the Monster’s soul with a humanity so profound that it transcends the bolts and scars, and lingers in the audience’s heart long after the final frame. To me, it is one of the defining moments that illuminates the full dimension of Karloff’s artistry as an actor-his ability to infuse the Monster with a profound humanity that transcends the mask of horror.

Lanchester herself captured the strange magic of acting as a transformative experience that takes one from oneself into the captivating realm of another character, yet always with a trace of their true selves persisting beneath the surface.

Her Bride is more than a monster’s mate or a cinematic icon- she’s a flash of resistance stitched into the fabric of horror history, a figure whose brief, electrifying presence continues to spark new readings about femininity, autonomy, and the monstrous possibilities of saying “no.”

The music of Bride of Frankenstein is as evocative and electrifying as the film’s visual spectacle, setting a new standard for horror cinema and leaving an indelible mark on film scoring. Composed by Franz Waxman, the score is a lush, melodramatic enticement that intertwines like vines on a trellis, coiling around the tension, romance, and the uncanny, shaping the film’s emotional and atmospheric landscape.

Waxman’s approach was groundbreaking for its time: rather than relying on brief musical stings or recycled cues, he created a large-scale, through-composed symphonic tonality that underscored the action with masterful control and effect.

Drawing from the German Romantic tradition and the musical language of the supernatural, known as ombra, Waxman employed slow tempos, minor keys, chromatic harmonies, tremolando strings, and unusual instrumentation (especially trombones and ghostly winds) to conjure awe and horror. His use of reminiscence motifs, or leitmotifs, for different characters and ideas, such as the Monster, the Bride, and Dr. Pretorius, brought a Wagnerian sense of cohesion and emotional resonance to the film.

Key moments in the score include the “Creation of the Female Monster” sequence, where Waxman’s music becomes a tempest of swirling strings, pounding timpani (evoking an obsessive heartbeat), and sparkling harp glissandi, perfectly mirroring the storm of electricity and emotion as the Bride is brought to life. The tolling of mock wedding bells and the Bride’s shimmering theme, played by violins and violas, add both irony and grandeur to her unveiling, while the Monster’s theme, rendered on horns and low woodwinds, underscores his tragic presence.

Waxman’s score is also notable for its incorporation of diverse musical styles and references to classical works, such as Mendelssohn’s “Spring Song” and Schubert’s “Ave Maria,” which appear in key scenes.

These touches, combined with Waxman’s bold, original themes, create a soundscape that is both familiar and unsettling, heightening the film’s sense of Gothic wonder and existential dread.

Ultimately, the music of Bride of Frankenstein does more than accompany the action- it amplifies the film’s emotional stakes, turning moments of terror, longing, and revelation into a symphonic experience. Waxman’s score not only elevated the film itself but also laid the groundwork for generations of Hollywood composers, influencing everyone from Bernard Herrmann to John Williams.

Bride of Frankenstein endures as one of cinema’s most celebrated sequels, hailed not only as James Whale’s masterpiece but also as a landmark of Gothic horror whose artistry, subversive wit, and iconic imagery have influenced generations of filmmakers. Its legacy is defined by its rare achievement of surpassing the original, its selection for the National Film Registry as “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant,” and its unforgettable characters-from Boris Karloff’s tragic Monster to Elsa Lanchester’s electrifying Bride-who remain immortal in the collective imagination. Bride of Frankenstein is one of those top TEN classic horror films that, if I wound up with the proverbial gun to my head, would wind up on my list.

By 1939, the Frankenstein mythos had become a Gothic heirloom, passed to Rowland V. Lee’s Son of Frankenstein. Basil Rathbone’s Baron Wolf von Frankenstein, heir to his father’s cursed legacy, arrives at the family estate-a crumbling monument of skewed staircases and skeletal trees-to find the Monster (Karloff, in his final portrayal) comatose and Bela Lugosi’s Ygor, a blacksmith with a broken neck, lurking like a malevolent puppetmaster. Lee’s direction trades Whale’s operatic flair for a denser, more psychological tension, weaving a tale of paternal guilt and inherited madness. Karloff’s Monster, now a relic manipulated by Ygor, is a shadow of his former self, yet still capable of moments of brute poetry, such as his silent bond with Wolf’s son (Donnie Dunagan), a thread of innocence in a film steeped in decay. The sets, designed by Jack Otterson, are a labyrinth of stone and shadow, their oppressive grandeur reflecting Wolf’s spiraling obsession. While the film lacks the avant-garde daring of its predecessors, it bridges Universal’s 1930s elegance with the pulpy thrills of the 1940s, ensuring the Monster’s place in Hollywood’s pantheon.

Bela Lugosi’s portrayal of Ygor in Son of Frankenstein is a performance that slithers through the film like a shadow with a crooked grin, a masterwork of grotesque charisma and cunning that leaves an indelible mark on the Universal canon. Lugosi, shedding the aristocratic menace of his Dracula, crafts Ygor as a creature born of earth and gallows rope- a blacksmith whose neck was snapped by a failed hanging, yet whose spirit is as unbreakable as his twisted spine. He is the living echo of the graveyard, his voice gravelly and mocking, his smile a leer that seems to know all the secrets rotting beneath the castle stones.

Ygor’s personality is a storm of contradictions: sly and unrepentant, he is both survivor and schemer, a scavenger who relishes his outsider status. Lugosi’s acting is a symphony of physicality and vocal nuance- he shuffles and limps with animal cunning, eyes darting with mischief and malice, voice curling around lines like smoke around a crypt. There is nothing subservient or pitiable about this “assistant”; instead, Ygor manipulates Wolf Frankenstein (Basil Rathbone) with a puppeteer’s glee, extorting and needling him into reviving the Monster for his own revenge. “They die, dead! I die, live!” he crows, his survival a taunt to those who wronged him and a testament to Lugosi’s ability to make even the most grotesque characters magnetic.

Key moments with Ygor are carved into the film’s Gothic architecture: his introduction in the ruins, lurking like a spider in his lair; his gleeful boasting to the villagers and authorities, untouchable because he is legally “dead”; and his chilling command over the Monster, whom he treats as both weapon and companion. The relationship between Ygor and the Monster is one of the film’s most poignant threads- Ygor is not merely a master but a twisted friend, the only soul who shows the Monster a semblance of loyalty and understanding. When Ygor is finally shot by Wolf, the Monster’s anguished howl and rampage are less the fury of a beast than the grief of a child losing his only companion.

Lugosi’s Ygor stands out not just for his villainy but for the insidious charm and dark humor he injects into every scene. He is the mold from which all future mad science henchmen would be cast, yet none have matched the earthy, anarchic energy Lugosi brings. His performance is a crooked root running through the film-twisted, vital, impossible to ignore-a reminder that sometimes the most monstrous figures are those who have learned to survive in the shadows, laughing at the world that tried and failed to bury them.

Ygor’s backstory is the crucible that forges his complex, layered personality, not merely a stock villain or a subservient assistant, but a survivor marked by pain, cunning, and a thirst for vengeance. Once a blacksmith in the village, Ygor was hanged for grave-robbing- a crime that tied him to the world of death and the Frankenstein legacy- and left for dead by the very community he once served. Miraculously surviving the execution but left with a twisted neck and a body permanently scarred, Ygor returns to the world as an outcast, both physically deformed and socially exiled.

This traumatic ordeal shapes every facet of his character: his bitterness toward the villagers who condemned him, his sly manipulation of Wolf von Frankenstein, and his fiercely independent, almost anarchic spirit. Ygor’s survival after the hanging gives him a sense of invincibility and a dark, mocking humor- he boasts of being “dead” in the eyes of the law, making him untouchable and free to pursue his own agenda. Far from being a loyal servant, Ygor uses his outsider status to manipulate those around him, especially the Monster, whom he treats as both weapon and companion in his quest for revenge against the jurors who sentenced him to death.

Lugosi’s performance brings out this complexity- Ygor is sly, charismatic, and unpredictable, alternating between ingratiating charm and chilling malice. His backstory of betrayal and survival infuses him with a sense of grievance and cunning, making him a uniquely memorable figure in the Universal canon. Ultimately, Ygor’s history of suffering and exclusion is what fuels his schemes and his bond with the Monster, turning him into a villain whose motives are as much about justice and recognition as they are about evil.

#61 down, 89 to go! Your EverLovin’ Joey formally & affectionately known as MonsterGirl!

Postcards from Shadowland Halloween Edition 2020 –

The Unknown Terror (1957)

The Golem (1920)

The Man from Planet X (1951)

Woman in the Moon (1931)

Four Sided Triangle (1953)

Doctor X (1932)

Häxan (1922)

City of the Dead aka Horror Hotel (1960)

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920)

Murders in the Rue Morgue (1932)

Invasion of the Saucer Men (1957)

It Came from Outer Space (1953)

The Brain from Planet Arous (1957)

Not of this Earth (1957)

Terror is a Man (1959)

The Giant Claw (1957)

Nosferatu (1922)

Dracula 1931

Dracula (1931)

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931)

Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman (1943)

Left to right: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Evelyn Ankers, Joan Davis and Richard Carlson in HOLD THAT GHOST (1941), directed by Arthur Lubin.

The Thing from Another World (1951)

The Most Dangerous Game (1932)

Son of Frankenstein (1939)

Corridors of Blood (1958)

The Seventh Victim (1943)

The Queen of Spades (1949)

It Conquered the World (1956)

The Invisible Man Returns (1940)

The Raven (1932)

House of Dracula (1945)

Isle of the Dead (1945)

The Bad Seed (1956)

13 Ghosts (1960)

Horror Island (1941)

The Last Man on Earth (1964)

 

MonsterGirl’s Halloween – 2015 special feature! the Heroines, Scream Queens & Sirens of 30s Horror Cinema!

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Horror cinema was at it’s spooky peak in the 1930s~ the era gave birth to some of the most iconic figures of the genre as well as highlighted some of the most beautiful & beloved heroines to ever light up the scream, oops I mean screen!!!!

We all love the corrupted, diabolical, fiendish and menacing men of the 30s who dominated the horror screen- the spectres of evil, the anti-heroes who put those heroines in harms way, women in peril, –Boris, & Bela, Chaney and March… From Frankenstein, to Dracula, from The Black Cat (1934), or wicked Wax Museums to that fella who kept changing his mind…Jekyll or was it Hyde? From the Mummy to that guy you could see right through, thank you Mr. Rains!

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Gloria Stuart The Invisible Man

Last year I featured Scream Queens of 40s Classic Horror! This Halloween – – I felt like paying homage to the lovely ladies of 30s Classic Horror, who squealed up a storm on those stormy dreadful nights, shadowed by sinister figures, besieged by beasts, and taunted with terror in those fabulous frisson-filled fright flicks… but lest not forget that after the screaming stops, those gals show some grand gumption! And… In an era when censorship & conservative framework tried to set the stage for these dark tales, quite often what smoldered underneath the finely veiled surface was a boiling pot of sensuality and provocative suggestion that I find more appealing than most contemporary forays into Modern horror- the lost art of the classical horror genre will always remain Queen… !

Let’s drink a toast to that notion!

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The Scream Queens, Sirens & Heroines of 1930s Classic Horror are here for you to run your eyes over! Let’s give ’em a really big hand, just not a hairy one okay? From A-Z

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Phantom in the Rue Morgue 1954.

ELIZABETH ALLAN

Elizabeth Allan

A British beauty with red hair who according to Gregory Mank in his Women in Horror Films, the 1930s, left England for Hollywood and an MGM contract. She is the consummate gutsy heroine, the anti-damsel Irena Borotyn In Tod Browning’s campy Mark of the Vampire (1935) co-starring with Bela Lugosi as Count Mora (His birthday is coming up on October 20th!) Lionel Atwill and the always cheeky Lionel Barrymore… Later in 1958, she would co-star with Boris Karloff in the ever-atmospheric The Haunted Strangler.

Mark of the Vampire is a moody graveyard chiller scripted by Bernard Schubert & Guy Endore (The Raven, Mad Love (1935) & The Devil Doll (1936) and the terrific noir thriller Tomorrow is Another Day (1951) with sexy Steve Cochran & one of my favs Ruth Roman!)

The film is Tod Browning’s retake of his silent Lon Chaney Sr. classic London After Midnight (1927).

The story goes like this: Sir Karell Borotin (Holmes Herbert) is murdered, left drained of his blood, and Professor Zelin (Lionel Barrymore) believes it’s the work of vampires. Lionel Atwill once again plays well as the inquiring but skeptical police Inspector Neumann.

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Irena (Elizabeth Allan) and Professor Zelen (Lionel Barrymore) hatch an intricate plot to trap the murderers!

Once Sir Karell’s daughter Irena ( our heroine Elizabeth Allan) is assailed, left with strange bite marks on her neck, the case becomes active again. Neumann consults Professor Zelin the leading expert on Vampires. This horror whodunit includes frightened locals who believe that Count Mora (Bela in iconic cape and saturnine mannerism) and his creepy daughter Luna  (Carroll Borland) who trails after him through crypt and foggy woods, are behind the strange going’s on. But is all that it seems?

Mark of the Vampire (1935)

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Elizabeth Allan (below center) and Carroll Borland as Luna in Tod Browning’s Mark of the Vampire (1935).
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Elizabeth Allan and Carroll Borland in Mark of the Vampire (1935).

The Phantom Fiend (1932)

Directed by the ever-interesting director Maurice Elvey (Mr. Wu 1919, The Sign of Four, 1923, The Clairvoyant 1935, The Man in the Mirror 1936, The Obsessed 1952) Elizabeth Allan stars as Daisy Bunting the beautiful but mesmerized by the strange yet sensual and seemingly tragic brooding figure- boarder Ivor Novello as Michel Angeloff in The Phantom Fiend! A remake of Alfred Hitchcock’s first film about Jack the Ripper… The Lodger (1927) starring Novello once again.

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Ivor Novello is the strange & disturbing Michel Angeloff. Elizabeth Allan is the daughter of the landlords who rent a room to this mysterious fellow who might just be a serial killer. Daisy Bunyon falls captivated by this tormented and intense young man…
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A.W. Baskcomb plays Daisy’s (Elizabeth Allan)father George Bunting and Jack Hawkins is Joe Martin the regular guy in love with Daisy.
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Michel Angeloff (Ivor Novello) to Daisy Bunting (Elizabeth Allan) “Stay away from me… don’t ever be alone with me…{…} -You trust me, no matter whatever I’ve done?”

The Mystery of Mr. X (1934)

There is a murderer loose in London who writes the police before he strikes with a sword cane, he signs his name X. It happens that his latest crime occurs on the same night that the Drayton Diamond is stolen. Robert Montgomery as charming as ever, is Nick Revel the jewel thief responsible for the diamond heist, but he’s not a crazed murderer. The co-incidence of the two crimes has put him in a fix as he’s now unable to unload the gem until the police solve the murders.

Elizabeth Allan is the lovely Jane Frensham, Sir Christopher Marche’s (Ralph Forbes) fiancé and Police Commissioner Sir Herbert Frensham’s daughter. Sir Christopher is arrested for the X murders, and Nick and Jane band together, fall madly in love, and try to figure out a way to help the police find the real killer!

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HEATHER ANGEL

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Heather Angel is a British actress who started out on stage at the Old Vic theatre but left for Hollywood and became known for the Bulldog Drummond series. While not appearing in lead roles, she did land parts in successful films such as Kitty Foyle, Pride and Prejudice (1940), Cry ‘Havoc’ (1943), and Lifeboat (1944). IMDb notes -Angel tested for the part of Melanie in Gone with the Wind (1939), the role was given to Olivia de Havilland.

Heather Angel possessed a sublime beauty and truly deserved to be a leading lady rather than relegated to supporting roles and guilty but pleasurable B movie status.

The L.A Times noted about her death in 1986 at age 77 “Fox and Universal ignored her classic training and used her in such low-budget features as “Charlie Chans Greatest Case and “Springtime for Henry.”

Her performances in Berkeley Square and The Mystery of Edwin Drood were critically acclaimed… More gruesome than the story-lines involving her roles in Edwin Drood, Hound of the Baskervilles or Lifeboat put together is the fact that she witnessed her husband, stage and film directer Robert B. Sinclair’s vicious stabbing murder by an intruder in their California home in 1970.

Heather Grace Angel was born in Oxford, England, on February 9, 1909.
Heather Angel in Berkeley Square (1933) Image courtesy Dr. Macro

The Hound of the Baskervilles (1932)

Heather Angel is Beryl Stapleton in this lost (found negatives and soundtracks were found and donated to the British Film Institute archives) adaptation of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes thriller Originally serialized in The Strand magazine between 1901 and 1902.

In this first filmed talkie of Doyle’s more horror-oriented story, it calls for the great detective to investigate the death of Sir Charles Baskerville and solve the strange killing that takes place on the moors, feared that there is a supernatural force, a monstrous dog like a fiend that is menacing the Baskerville family ripping the throats from its victims. The remaining heir Sir Henry is now threatened by the curse.

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Mystery of Edwin Drood (1935).

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Douglass Montgomery as Neville Landless and Heather Angel as Rosa Bud in the intensely superior rare gem The Mystery of Edwin Drood (1935)

Mystery of Edwin Drood (played by David Manners) is a dark and nightmarish Gothic tale of mad obsession, drug addiction, and heartless murder! Heather Angel plays the beautiful and kindly young student at a Victorian finishing school, Rosa Bud engaged to John Jasper’s nephew Edwin Drood. The opium-chasing, choir master John Jasper (Claude Rains) becomes driven to mad fixation over Rosa, who is quite aware of his intense gaze, she becomes frightened and repulsed by him.

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The brooding & malevolent Rains frequents a bizarre opium den run by a menacing crone (Zeffie Tilbury), a creepy & outre moody whisper in the melody of this Gothic horror/suspense tale!

Angel and Hobson

Valerie Hobson plays twin sister Helena Landless, the hapless Neville’s sister. (We’ll get to one of my favorites, the exquisite Valerie Hobson in just a bit…) When Neville and Helena arrive at the school, both Edwin and he vies for Rosa’s affection. When Edwin vanishes, naturally Neville is the one suspected in his mysterious disappearance.

OLGA BACLANOVA

Olga Baclanova

Though I’ll always be distracted by Baclanova’s icy performance as the vicious Cleopatra in Tod Browning’s masterpiece Freaks which blew the doors off social morays and became a cultural profane cult film, Baclanova started out as a singer with the Moscow Art Theater. Appearing in several silent films, she eventually co-starred as Duchess Josiana with Conrad Veidt as the tragic Gwynplaine, in another off-beat artistic masterpiece based on the Victor Hugo story The Man Who Laughs (1928)

Freaks (1932)

Tod Browning produced & directed this eternally disturbing & joyful portrait of behind-the-scenes melodrama and at times the Gothic violence of carnival life… based on the story ‘Spurs’ by Tod Robbins. It’s also been known as Nature’s Mistress and The Monster Show.

It was essential for Browning to attain realism. He hired actual circus freaks to bring to life this quirky Grand Guignol, a beautifully grotesque & macabre tale of greed, betrayal, and loyalty.

Cleopatra (Baclanova) and Hercules (Henry Victor) plan to swindle the owner of the circus Hans, (Harry Earles starring with wife Frieda as Daisy) out of his ‘small’ fortune by poisoning him on their wedding night. The close family of side show performers exact poetic yet monstrous revenge! The film also features many memorable circus folks. Siamese conjoined twins Daisy & Violet Hilton, also saluted in American Horror Story (Sarah Paulson another incredible actress, doing a dual role) Schlitze the pinhead, and more!

Freaks

Anyone riveted to the television screen to watch Jessica Lange’s mind-blowing performance as Elsa Mars in American Horror Story’s: Freak Show (2014) will not only recognize her superb nod to Marlene Dietrich, but also much reverence paid toward Tod Browning’s classic and Baclanova’s cunning coldness.

Baclanova-Olga-Freaks

( BTW as much as I adore Frances McDormand, Lange should have walked away with the Emmy this year! I’ve rarely seen a performance that balances like a tightrope walker, the subtle choreography between gut-wrenching pathos & ruthless sinister vitriol. Her rendition of Bowie’s song Life on Mars…will be a Film Score Freak feature this Halloween season! No, I can’t wait… here’s a peak! it fits the mood of this post…)

Annex - Baclanova, Olga (Freaks)_02

Baclanova and Earles

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“You Freaks!!!!”
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Gooba Gabba… I guess she isn’t one of us after all!

here she is as the evil Countess/duchess luring poor Gwynplain into her clutches The Man Who Laughs (1928).

Annex - Veidt, Conrad (Man Who Laughs, The)_01

Flicker Alley and Universal Pictures Present Paul Leni’s The Man Who Laughs (1928) The Tortured Smile “Hear how they laugh at me. Nothing but a clown!”

Continue reading “MonsterGirl’s Halloween – 2015 special feature! the Heroines, Scream Queens & Sirens of 30s Horror Cinema!”

The Electrical Secrets of Kenneth Strickfaden: or as Harry Goldman’s book calls him -“Dr Frankenstein’s Electrician”

Kenneth Strickfaden-(1896"“1984)

I saw"”with shut eyes, but acute mental vision"”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. Frightful must it be, for supremely frightful would be the effect of any human endeavor to mock the stupendous mechanism of the Creator of the world.

"” Mary Shelley

Colin Clive -Frankenstein 1930

When I think of Kenneth Strickfaden I visualize the mad scientist grabbing the master switch in his clandestine laboratory. Suddenly the machinery hums and glows, glass tubes boil with liquids, electrical currents charge through the coiled tubes and conductance. Lighting leaps across the sky and finds its way into the diving spot in the lab. The crackle, snapping hiss and sparks of ozone. The well orchestrated machinery of mad science that now act as futuristic hardware. The electrical odor that would still permeate the air for years to come as he shaped the way we perceived the mad scientist labs and mysterious scientific exploration!

early days Strickfaden assembling a mad scientist apparatus
early days Strickfaden assembling a mad scientist apparatus

Kenneth Strickfaden was an expert in high voltage electricity, film set designer, and electrical special effects master. Using his skills as a carnival electrician, he created the science fiction apparatus that can be seen in more than 100 films and television programs, showcasing Strickfaden’s technical phantasmagoria of light and sound!

I often wonder how many of these films centered around mad science and the laboratory environment utilized some of Strickfaden’s machines and electrical effects without giving him credit.

The Devil Commands
Boris Karloff in The Devil Commands.
Karloff, Boris (Man They Could Not Hang, The)
Boris Karloff in The Man They Could Not Hang.
man made monster
Man Made Monster

I can see influences in Edward Dymtryk’s  The Devil Commands 1941 with Boris Karloff. With art direction by Lionel Banks and props by Franz, Oscar, and Paul Dallons. The Man They Could Not Hang 1939  & Man Made Monster 1941  Set direction by Russell A Gausman and John P Fulton who had worked with Strickfaden before. I believe Strickfaden did the special effects and used part of his equipment. Doctor X (1932), The Invisible Man 1933, The Man Who Lived Again, and more!

Dr X mad science
Dr. X (1932).
The Man Who Lived Again
The Man Who Lived Again.
The Invisible Man set
The Invisible Man 1933.

Strickfaden’s first contribution was to Just Imagine 1930. Today it has become something of a "lost" film and nearly impossible to see on the big screen. "While the beautiful art deco sets, enormous miniatures, and remarkable projection effects still amaze," says Production Designer John Muto, Founder of the ADG Film Series, "the music, comedy, and love story are derived from vaudeville and must have seemed very dated as cinematic musicals exploded in the 1930s. I suspect that may be why the film faded from view. Our audience will discover a very surprising film!"
"Today, most films set in the future portray a bleak, dystopian, even apocalyptic world.” Besides the beautiful art design Just Imagine featured a stunning laboratory filled with electrical equipment  by Ken Strickfaden.

Just Imagine Lab
Just Imagine 1930.
The Clutching Hand Strickfaden
The Clutching Hand (1936

But it was his work for James Whale’s 1931 masterpiece Frankenstein, The Bride of Frankenstein, and Ghost of Frankenstein that struck like lightning! Stock footage of the lightning bolt generated by Strickfaden’s equipment can be seen in so many films and television shows. John P Fulton head of the special effects department at Universal Studios was responsible for the special photographic effects-

Jame’s Whale had wanted a lab that was reminiscent of the one in Fritz Lang’s Metropolis 1927 Lang’s art department/set designers Otto Hunte, Erich Kettlehut, Walter Schulze-Mittendorf & Karl Vollbrecht. Special effects by Ernst Kunstmann, Konstantin Irmen-Tschet and Erich Kettelhut. Visual effects Eugen Schufftan, Willy Muller, Hugo O Schulze, and an uncredited Edgar G. Ulmer.

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Metropolis 1927.
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Fritz Lang’s Metropolis 1927.
Oz orb
This orb of Kenneth Strickfaden’s has made it through Fu Manchu’s clutches to the Wicked Witch of the West’s long bony fingers

You can see Strickfaden’s wonderful creations in  The Wizard of Oz, The Mask of Fu Manchu to television’s The Munsters, and his final work, Young Frankenstein. Strickfaden recycled a number of the pieces that he kept maintained like his “Cosmic Ray Diffuser” that he used in the original Frankenstein.

Kenneth Strickfaden was born in 1896-by the time he was in high school he was using a camera and setting up shots of amusement parks, and battle scenes, and visualizing and creating his own laboratory apparatus and equipment.

the bride
Thesiger and Clive in The Bride of Frankenstein

When I was just a little tiny wide-eyed MonsterGirl I would daydream plenty on rainy days and spend hours down in the basement assembling pieces of metal and plastic doohickeys having taken apart various appliances around the house, trying to create my very own little mad scientist lab. I’d get large pieces of wood and paint the control panels. I could literally spend hours down there pretending to be Dr. Pretorious. I was fascinated by science fiction technology and the secrets of life and death, and the fantastical storytelling Universal Monsters had to offer.

Frankenstein near the slab

Boris as Frankenstein on the set

backstage
Backstage on the set of Frankenstein

My pop would continually ask me where I put his hammer, though it was true most of the time, I did take his tools to aid in my small-scale construction of a basement laboratory. I was constructing panels with knobs and meters, I didn’t always have his hammer. And by no means did I have the eye or the technical brain to develop such intricate machinery that could spark and crackle streams of white heat, the suggestion of the life force arching in splendor. It just felt so good to be living my own fantasies without being told that I should go play with dolls. That’s also partly how I got to be known as MonsterGirl by the neighborhood bullies. Anyway… back to the genius of Frankenstein’s electrician.

Paul Walter assistant holds the switch box that controlls Strickfaden's Magnalux invention for lighting simulating flashes
Paul Walter’s assistant holds the switch box that controls Strickfaden’s Magnalux invention for lighting simulating flashes-Image from Goldman’s book.

arcs of electicity

Strickfaden had the sort of fascination for creating a milieu of scientific realism, working on our sense of wonder and the possibilities of the creations these machines would aid in either creating life or destroying it, which was always a draw for me. His special electrical designs and effects were visually groundbreaking for American film audiences, far-fetched perhaps but divine. He used junkyard electrical parts from the 1930s, fake wiring, and high voltage Jacob’s ladders (An electric current then flows until the path of ionized gas is broken or it, as it rises, will pull the arc apart and so extinguish it.), and spark gaps and the occasional Tesla Coil. “Ribbed ceramic insulators are a must… as are the slate front panels and wooden cabinetry that were standard of scientific and medical devices of the day”

And that’s why I wanted to do this little feature tribute to a man who’s responsible for shaping the look of so many classic horror and sci-fi fantasy film milieus over the years. The sets and laboratory apparatus that contributed to the Gothic science mood of the story, came to life because of the innovation Strickfaden used in creating his fantastical yet plausible designs. As a key to the plot structure as the players themselves.

"Megavolt Senior" Tesla coil
image of Strickfaden’s “Megavolt Senior” from Goldman’s Book

Appendix A sparks of light

During the grand days of classic horror between the decades of 1930s and 1940s, the landscape might have looked entirely different if Kenneth Strickfaden hadn’t been so fascinated with creating apparatus and contraptions that flashed and sparked with high voltage, meters keeping track, tubes, and coils and large equipment that paid true homage the science fiction writings he was trying to breathe life into himself a technician like Pretorious and Dr. Frankenstein. The appearance of these industrial gadgets and machines, and the look of the laboratory brought such a sense of realism to an already Gothic stunner, and Mary Shelley’s story, too which was ahead for its day. As Harry Goldman refers to in his book title, Strickfaden was the right electrician for the job.

Strickfaden high voltage

clive with the bride 'Nebularium"
Colin Clive with Elsa Lanchester as The Bride- notice The Nebularium! Image from Goldman’s Strickfaden-Frankenstein’s Electrician
Famous Monsters of Filmland #21 1963
on the set of Frankenstein from Famous Monsters of Filmland #21 1963

Though his fascination started in high school by the early 1920s film makers saw the potential in his inventive apparatus. He was given work at many Hollywood studios, in which he offered them a slew of amazing special electrical effects.

From Goldman’s, Kenneth Strickfaden, Dr. Frankenstein’s Electrician, Strickfaden’s work was not easy, “Apparatus constantly failed due to overheating,” he once revealed to writer Scott MacQueen. “Most effects did not photograph as expected, or they were eliminated due to electrical failures.”

Despite these unusual, and expected, setbacks, the onscreen results were phenomenal, and far more convincing than any simulations. Strickfaden made much use of the inventions of Nikola Tesla, which had been perfected more than thirty years before the first Universal Studios “Frankenstein” movie. But, unlike Tesla, he was also concerned with the theatrical “look” of his fanciful contraptions, which had to appear to be futuristic and capable of untold wonders. The names he gave the machines were often equally marvelous, such as: “the retrogressive wave charger,”DXL Accumulator,” and High Amperage Pyrogeyser.”

When, in the late 1940s, real-life scientific marvels turned out to be subtler than Strickfaden’s machines, his work apparently went out of fashion and was little seen in Hollywood until the ’60s, when it was used extensively in The Munsters TV show and in commercials.

notes and more skethes

Before his death in 1984, he spent much time touring with his “Kenstric Space Age Science Show,” educationally demonstrating spectacular electrical phenomena.

Standing fearlessly before a high voltage arc.His reliable switchboard can be seen in the foreground while the famous "Meg Senoir" Tesla coil appears in the background
Standing fearlessly before a high voltage arc.His reliable switchboard can be seen in the foreground while the famous “Meg Senoir” Tesla coil appears in the background.

the firescope

The Cosmic Ray Diffuser
The Cosmic Ray Diffuser-Image from Goldman’s Book

A few highlights of Strickfaden’s career include:

Frankenstein (1931) The equipment brought Mary Shelley’s monster to life.

In The Mask of Fu Manchu (1932), Strickfaden created a dazzling electrical death ray even doubling for Boris Karloff, who played Fu Manchu when the evil mastermind spreads his hands and the powerful lightning dances between his long sinister fingernails.

Murders in the Rue Morgue 1932 Bela Lugosi is Dr. Mirakle- Ken Strickfaden lends his electrical gadgets to Mirakle’s laboratory.

Chandu the Magician -Strickfaden’s machines came from FRANKENSTEIN now they equip (Bela Lugosi) Roxor’s lab- His death ray, a giant ray gun that sends pulsating death beams aimed at the major cities of the world!

In The Bride of Frankenstein (1935) Strickfaden configured the electrical displays for the Bride creation sequence.

James Whale and his crew film Ernest Thesiger and Dwight Frye amidst Kenneth Strickfaden's electrical equipment in The Bride of Frankenstein.©1935 Universal Pictures.

The Wizard of Oz (1939) He created the effect of the Wicked Witch of the West trying to remove Dorothy’s ruby slippers and receiving an electrical shock. The orb she uses to scry was a Strickfaden design.

The giant crystal ball that Margaret Hamilton uses as the Wicked Witch was actually uncovered in a junkyard found amidst the remnants of other discarded Hollywood memorabilia from a now defunct prop house. The enormous hand-blown glass, with high voltage Tesla coils, had a new owner who spotted it in Goldman’s book Dr. Frankenstein’s Electrician. It had been used by Bela as Roxor in Chandu the Magician.  It was a great prop for Boris Karloff in Mask of Fu Manchu, but once he placed it up for auction the new owner learned that it had actually been the crystal ball used in The Wizard of OZ.

Fighting Devil Dogs (circa 1941)“Manifested projectiles of something like ball lightning.”

Sherlock Holmes Faces Death (1943)He simulated an unusually realistic lightning strike.”

Young Frankenstein (1974) Strickfaden recreated some of his best work from the original Frankenstein.

Lost City 35

Karloff as Fu Manchu

Karloff Fu Manchu

Fu Manchu Boris Karloff

Bela in Chandu the Magician
Bela in Chandu the Magician with the death ray.
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Boris as the absent-minded scientist in The Boogeyman Will Get You.

lorre and boris boogeyman will get you

Colin Clive Ernest Thesiger The Bride of Frankestein
Ernest Thesiger and Colin Clive in The Bride of Frankenstein.

Phantom Creeps set design

The Phantom Creeps K Strickfaden

He was born in Montana in 1896, Kenneth Strickfaden was an imaginative and adventurous guy who worked at amusement parks, taking myriads of photos. He traveled overseas serving in World War One. He was also an airplane mechanic so he was very handy technically, having built and tuned Tesla coils and X-Ray machines. A Tesla coil is an electrical resonant transformer circuit invented by Nikola Tesla around 1891. It is used to produce high-voltage, low-current, high frequency Eventually, he found himself in Hollywood working as a studio electrician in the late twenties.

Strickfaden holding Melodyne musical disc The large lens appeared in Son of Frankenstain 1939
Image of Strickfaden holding the Melodyne musical disc and large lens that appears in Son of Frankenstein from Goldman’s book Dr. Frankenstein’s Electrician

In 1931, Kenneth Strickfaden was hired to set up the equipment for Frankenstein’s tower laboratory. He was to furnish it with a ‘powerful engine.Strickfaden assembled various machines. One which was used for the lightening powered scene that would help resurrect Boris Karloff’s monster back from the dead to life on the slab. He combined his knowledge of electrical science engineering and part of his love of creating side show electrical pageantry in order to transform Dr. Frankenstein’s laboratory into a place of unorthodox alchemy within a modern science dominion.

Kenneth Strickfaden Bride of Frankenstein control panel
Kenneth Strickfaden Bride of Frankenstein control panel-Image from Goldman’s book

At first, the designs were to be more streamlined and modern in their look, but Strickfaden had managed to construct a place of Gothic dread within the medieval structure of the setting and seamlessly adapt the apparatus of modern science with the stone walls. The juxtaposition of the two worlds adds to the feeling of Dr Frankenstein’s heretical, rebellious, and clandestine primacy as his secrets lay hidden away.

Strickfaden's apparatus quivered, sparked, crackled, and shrieked. The imposing levers were pulled in harmony with the dialogue, like an orchestrated scientific waltz. White hot arcs of electrical tendrils reached out and thrust wildly like serpent’s tongues. Beautifully glistening glass vials and tubes sat amidst copper spheres that wound themselves around like industrial jewels. Needles indicated where the force of energy was heading on the dials, and disks whirled like fun-house wheels. It was all so mesmerizing in Frankenstein’s laboratory with its arcane machinery that sang the songs of the universe, and the secrets of immortality and life from death, the sounds of voltage that pushed the machinery to its limits.

The Space Beacon

lab device bride notes
The Nebularium device from The Bride of Frankenstein 1935 Image from Goldman’s book
Creating "Nebularium" for House of Dracula '45
Strickfaden created a Nebularium for House of Dracula ’45. Image from Goldman’s book Dr.Frankenstein’s Electrician

From then on 1931 James Whale’s Frankenstein with its elaborately detailed laboratory up on the mountain tops set the tone for all mad scientist laboratories to follow. Kenneth Strickfaden would utilize and reconfigure his glorious apparatus over and over again in the Frankenstein films that followed, like Bride of Frankenstein.

You can see his fantastical machines like his “Megavolt Tesla Coil” & the Nebularium” in Flash Gordon serials and so many other horror and sci-fi features over the decades. Even in one of the most memorable episodes of The Munsters in the 60s, where Grandpa transfigures Herman into Fred Gwynn, losing his square-headed, neck-bolted Frankensteinian charm! The episode is called “Just Another Pretty Face.”

And Mel Brooks truly paid homage to the Universal cycle of Frankenstein pictures with his Young Frankenstein in 1974. Co-starring with Cloris Leachman, Madeline Kahn doing her Mae Clarke bit as Elizabeth, and Marty Feldman as Igor to Dwight Frye’s Fritz.

Set used on Young Frankenstein
Strickfaden’s machines and apparatus were re-used in Mel Brook’s Young Frankenstein

The Gothic laboratory where Gene Wilder plays Doctor, waxes campy and raises Peter Boyle back to life using a lighting storm and complex equipment that sparks and radiates arcs of light was the very same set of scientific apparatus used in Whale’s masterpiece in the 1931 film when Kenneth Strickfaden first configured it all for the set of Frankenstein with Boris Karloff.

Strickfaden died in 1984, and up until that time, he traveled the country with all machines and apparatus, and gave lectures in schools and auditoriums, also creating music with electrical instruments that he designed. He would demonstrate his lighting effects with ultraviolet light on radioactive materials, and shock and amaze students with something he called his “gravity nuetralizer” He did these programs from 1933 til his death.

Ghost of Frankenstein
Son of Frankenstein Basil Rathbone, Bela and once again Karloff as Frankenstein’s monster.
phantom creeps
Bela Lugosi in The Phantom Creeps

Strickfaden would step in at times as a stunt double in the films, for instance, he played Karloff’s monster for a scene that didn’t make it into the film. When Karloff didn’t want to use the “QUCH” machine fearing it was too dangerous as Fu Manchu, Strickfaden stood in for him. He held a large wand that generated a streaming arc of lightning which called for a million-volt spark to dance over his body. in Mask of Fu Manchu, Strickfaden was thrown across the set when he wasn’t grounded properly and received a jolt of electricity.

QUCH MACHINE
Kenneth Strickfaden’s QUCH machine-up for auction

He became the most trusted man around high-voltage trickery, yet Strickfaden admits very plainly that there’s no mystery to what he is able to do and that producing high voltage or amperage is rather simple.

One of the key apparatus that Strickfaden uses is his million-volt generator, which produces large sparks, and fat blue flames that can actually reach a height of 6 feet into the air. It’s his most intricately designed piece of equipment. The multi-distributor consists of a motor-driven set of whirling electrodes that can throw sparks. Strickfaden does say that a shock from the circuits could actually prove fatal.

Another device  Strickfaden used was called a ‘lightening screen’ This is another high-voltage generator that throws sparks across a large disk with a radioactive backing. Used with a darkened stage, the radioactive material continues to glow along the path of each spark even once the current has been shut off.

The Tesla Coil in Frankenstein and Mask of Fu Manchu

A note about Nikola Tesla-THE GENIUS WHO LIT THE WORLD- Young Nikola Tesla came to the United States in 1884 with an introduction letter from Charles Batchelor to Thomas Edison:   Nikola Tesla developed polyphase alternating current system of generators, motors and transformers and held 40 basic U.S. patents on the system, which George Westinghouse bought, determined to supply America with the Tesla system.

In February 1882, Tesla discovered the rotating magnetic field, a fundamental principle in physics and the basis of nearly all devices that use alternating current.  Tesla brilliantly adapted the principle of rotating magnetic field for the construction of alternating current induction motor and the polyphase system for the generation, transmission, distribution and use of electrical power. Tesla’s A.C.induction motor is widely used throughout the world in industry and household appliances. It started the industrial revolution at the turn of the century. Electricity today is generated transmitted and converted to mechanical power by means of his inventions. Tesla’s greatest achievement is his polyphase alternating current system which lights is used throughout the world

NOTABLE KENNETH STRICKFADEN-FILMOGRAPHY-CAMERA ART & ELECTRICAL DEPARTMENT

  • JUST IMAGINE 1930
  • FRANKENSTEIN 1931
  • THE MASK OF FU MANCHU 1932
  • MURDER AT DAWN 1932
  • DR. X (1932)
  • THE INVISIBLE MAN 1933
  • THE VANISHING SHADOW 1934
  • THE LOST CITY 1935
  • THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN 1935
  • FLASH GORDON serial 1936
  • THE AMAZING EXPLOITS OF THE CLUTCHING HAND
  • GHOST PATROL 1936
  • THE WIZARD OF OZ 1939
  • THE PHANTOM CREEPS 1939
  • THE SHADOW 1940
  • FIGHTING DEVIL DOGS 1941
  • SHERLOCK HOLMES FACES DEATH 1943
  • THE BOOGEYMAN WILL GET YOU 1943
  • HOUSE OF DRACULA 1945
  • MONSTROSITY 1963
  • THE MUNSTERS 1966
  • GAMES 1967 Curtis Harrington directs
  • DRACULA VS FRANKENSTEIN 1971
  • BLACKENSTEIN 1973
  • YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN 1974

SOLD AT AUCTION

DEATH RAY- apparatus -strickfaden auction
Kenneth Strickfaden’s DEATH RAY- apparatus -at auction.

device at Auction

electronic effects switchboard-Nebular Device used in both Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein

From the set of Frankenstein being sold at auction

Strickfaden device at Auction

Kenneth Strickfadens Digital Disputer Laboratory Device

junk store terminal 2

SOURCE MATERIAL FROM-

Kenneth-Strickfaden-Dr-Frankenstein-s-Electrician-

DR. FRANKENSTEIN’S ELECTRICIAN BY HARRY GOLDMAN 2005

FAMOUS MONSTERS OF FILMLAND #21 1963

Memorabilia Heritage Auction Galleries

Photos from the Academy of Motion Pictures homage to Strickfaden.-A selection of surviving gadgets from Strickfaden’s movie laboratories.

IMDb Kenneth Strickfaden Filmography

Modern Mechanix scan of a Popular Mechanics article from September 1949-by Eugene M Hanson.

1. Scott MacQueen, “Kenneth Strickfaden: Strange Revelations of the Man Who Lives in the House that Frankenstein Built,” Gore Creatures, no. 24, October 1975, pp. 24-26.

2. William Ludington, “Mister Electricity: The Multi-Volted Career of Kenneth Strickfaden,” American Classic Screen, vol. 7, no. 1, Jan./Feb. 1983, pp. 26-29.

This has been electrifying -your ever lovin’ MonsterGirl

Postcards From Shadowland: Huge Halloween Edition! 2013

09_metropolis_workers
Metropolis 1927
earth vs the flying saucers
Earth vs the Flying Saucers 1956
uninvited_610
The Uninvited 1944
Bedlam
Bedlam 1946
103-MadMonster4
The Mad Monster 1942
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Black Sunday 1960
Annex - Veidt, Conrad (Cabinet of Dr. Caligari)_01
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari 1920
Tales From the Crypt
Tales from the Crypt 1972
1941_Wolfman_img5
The Wolf Man 1941
a NightMonster2
Night Monster 1942
Bela Island of Lost Souls
Island of Lost Souls 1932
carnival-of-souls
Carnival of Souls 1962
Annex - Chaney Jr., Lon (Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man)_05
Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man 1943
Annex - Chaney Sr., Lon (Hunchback of Notre Dame, The)_01
The Hunchback of Notre Dame 1939
Annex - Chaney Sr., Lon (London After Midnight)_05
London After Midnight  1927
Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein
Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein 1948
Annex - Chaney Sr., Lon (West of Zanzibar)_02
West of Zanzibar 1928
una O'Connor
The Invisible Man 1933
Annex - Cushing, Peter (Daleks' Invasion Earth - 2150 A.D.)_02
Daleks’ Invasion Earth -2150 A.D. (1966)
The Man from Planet X
The Man from Planet X (1951)
Annex - Karloff, Boris (Bride of Frankenstein, The)_05 2
The Bride of Frankenstein 1935
Chaney in the unknown
The Unknown 1927
amityville_horror
The Amityville Horror 1979
Annex - Karloff, Boris (Man They Could Not Hang, The)_NRFPT_03
The Man They Could Not Hang 1939
Corridors of Blood
Corridors of Blood 1958
Annex - Krauss, Werner (Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, The)_01
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari 1920
Annex - Lugosi, Bela (Ape Man, The)_01
The Ape Man 1943
Annex - Lugosi, Bela (Chandu the Magician)_01
Chandu the Magician 1932
time-of-their-lives
The Time of Their Lives 1946
Annex - Lugosi, Bela (Ghost of Frankenstein, The)_01
The Ghost of Frankenstein 1942
Invisible-Man
The Invisible Man 1933
Annex - Lugosi, Bela (Raven, The)_03
The Raven 1935
Annex - Churchill, Marguerite (Dracula's Daughter)_02
Dracula’s Daughter 1936
bloody-mama
Bloody Mama 1970
Annex - Lugosi, Bela (Son of Frankenstein)_02
Son of Frankenstein 1939
Annex - Lugosi, Bela (White Zombie)_01
White Zombie 1932
Annex - Marshall, Tully (Cat and the Canary, The)_01
The Cat and the Canary 1927
Annex - Naish, J. Carrol (Dr. Renault's Secret)_NRFPT_02
Dr. Renault’s Secret 1942
black sunday
Black Sunday 1960
Kill Baby Kill
Kill Baby Kill 1966
Annex - Price, Vincent (Abominable Dr. Phibes, The)_01
The Abominable Dr. Phibes 1971
Bela-Dracula_04
Dracula 1931
Annex - Price, Vincent (Dragonwyck)_01
Dragonwyck 1946
Annex - Price, Vincent (House of Wax)_01
House of Wax 1953
Annex - Price, Vincent (Raven, The)_01
The Raven 1963
Dracula's+Daughter
Dracula’s Daughter 1936
Annex - Rathbone, Basil (Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, The)_01
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes 1939
annex-karloffborisbrideoffrankensteinthe_03
the Bride of Frankenstein 1935
Beauty and Beast
Beauty and the Beast 1946
shrinking man
The Incredible Shrinking Man 1957
32093_Invasion-of-the-body-Snatchers-1
Invasion of the Body Snatchers 1956
tarantula
Tarantula 1955
village-of-the-damned-original
Village of the Damned 1960
catandcarary2
Cat and the Canary 1927

Bates Motel sign

silent-night-bloody-night
Silent Night, Bloody Night 1972
Freaks wedding-feast
Freaks 1932
west-of-zanzibar
West of Zanzibar
Chaney He Who Gets Slapped
He Who Gets Slapped 1924
Family Plot Karen Black RIP
Family Plot 1976  (rip Karen Black)
Curse-of-the-Demon-5
Curse of the Demon 1957
Devil_Girl_From_Mars03
Devil Girl From Mars 1954
Doctor Cyclops still
Dr Cyclops 1940
evelyn-venable-doubleWeb
Double Door 1934
rosemarys-baby-1968-
Rosemary’s Baby 1968
barbara-steele-and-vincent-price-pit-and-pendulum
Pit and the Pendulum 1961
experiment-in-terror
Experiment in Terror 1962
eyeswoaface
Eyes Without a Face 1960
demon fireball its in the trees
Curse of the Demon 1957
a behemoth PDVD_000
The Giant Behemoth 1959
frankenstein bride Mae Clarke
The Bride of Frankenstein 1935
ghost-of-frankenstein
The Ghost of Frankenstein 1942
haunted_palace_23
The Haunted Palace 1963
night of the demon true believers
Curse of the Demon 1957
he_who_gets_slapped
He Who Gets Slapped 1924
Hitchcock's Blackmail
Blackmail 1929
House on Haunted HIll -Nora-Mrs.Slydes
House on Haunted Hill 1959
house
House of Frankenstein 1944
images
The Haunting 1963
Night of the Living Dead
Night of the Living Dead 1968
Island of Lost Souls
Island of Lost Souls 1932
Metrópolis
Metrópolis 1927
it-came-from-beneath-the-sea
It Came From Beneath the Sea 1955
The-Crawling-Eye
The Crawling Eye 1958
itcamealien2
It Came from Outer Space 1953
it-came-from-outer-space-07
It Came from Outer Space 1953
Lifeboat
Lifeboat 1944
lionelatwill8
Man Made Monster 1941
Lon Chaney in The Monster
The Monster 1925
Murnau's Faust 3
Faust 1926
night-demon-macginnis
Curse of the Demon 1957
NightMonster1
Night Monster 1942
Poster - Day the Earth Stood Still, The_30
The Day the Earth Stood Still 1951
r2 d2  4The Thing-0
The Thing from Another World 1951
The Devil Commands
The Devil Commands 1941
stepford wives
The Stepford Wives 1975
screaming-skull2
The Screaming Skull 1958
Smoking Frankenstein friends are good
the Bride of Frankenstein 1935
Swimming with Julie
The Creature from the Black Lagoon 1954
The Black Cat Karloff and dead wife
The Black Cat 1934
The Black Cat Ulmer Karloff & Lugosi
The Black Cat 1934
fly
The Fly 1958
The Ghost Ship Lewton
The Ghost Ship 1943
The Invisible Ray
The Invisible Ray 1936
the leopard man
The Leopard Man 1943
freaks
Freaks 1932
The Man They Could Not Hang Karloff in Lab
The Man They Could Not Hang 1939
The Man They Could Not Hang
The Man They Could Not Hang 1939
The Mummy Karloff
The Mummy 1932
psycho
Psycho 1960
The Thing From Another World
The Thing from Another World 1951
The-Mummys-Ghost
The Mummy’s’ Ghost 1944
the undying monster
The Undying Monster 1942
jane_eyre-
Jane Eyre 1943
The Woman Who Came Back
The Woman Who Came Back 1945
the-amazing-colossal-man-pic-4
the Amazing Colossal Man 1957
the-incredible-shrinking-man
The Incredible Shrinking Man 1957
the-seventh-seal-
The Seventh Seal 1957
The+Haunting
The Haunting 1963
The Devil Commands
The Devil Commands
thing-from-another-world-pic-3
The Thing From Another World 1951
UndyingMonster+%2836%29
The Undying Monster 1942
Unholy 3 Lon Chaney
The Unholy 3 (1925)
Vampyr
Vampyr 1932
I walk with a zombie
I Walked with a Zombie 1943
the exorcist
The Exorcist 1973
carnival-of-souls-
Carnival of Souls 1962
White Zombie
White Zombie 1932
Zita JohannIsland-of-Lost-Souls-3
Island of Lost Souls 1932
Zounds-Herman Munster
Munster, Go Home! 1966

Special appreciation for several of the fabulous images courtesy of Dr. Macros High Quality photos!

HAVE A VERY SAFE & HAPPY HALLOWEEN FROM YOUR EVERLOVIN’ MONSTERGIRL!!!!!!