BLACULA 1972

Directed by William Crain and released by American International Pictures (AIP) in 1972, Blacula follows the tragic tale of Mamuwalde (the towering 6’5” figure of thespian William Marshall, a stage actor with a distinguished career in theater, performing in numerous classical stage works, including several Shakespearean plays. Marshall made his Broadway debut in 1944 in Carmen Jones), an African Prince who visits Count Dracula’s ( Charles Macaulay) castle with his beautiful wife Luva (played by Vonetta McGee) to plead for an end to the slave trade in the 18th century afflicting his people, the Abani.

However, the evening’s uneasy meeting quickly turns sour as Dracula scoffs at Mamuwalde’s proposal, baring his metaphorical teeth with a disdainful and haunty attitude toward him and making lewd insinuations about Luva. This confrontation escalates into a physical clash, culminating in Dracula’s transforming Mamuwalde into a vampire and cursing him with the moniker soulfully reimagined from Dracula to Blacula and mocking the prince, christening him, and cursing him with his name.

He condemns him to an eternal existence of bloodlust. Within the framework that is part of the blaxploitation genre, Blacula, on another level, explores themes of racial oppression, identity, and the lasting impact of historical injustices. (I will be talking about this film more extensively in the future.) Dracula imprisons Mamuwalde inside a coffin and leaves Luva to die after she witnesses Dracula feeding on her beloved husband and then entombing her.

Fast forward to 1972, two hundred years later, with a deliciously campy appeal, Blacula introduces us to Bobby McCoy (Ted Harris) and Billy Schaffer (Ricky Metzler), a flamboyant duo of gay interior decorators who embark on a treasure hunt in Transylvania. Their fabulous antiquing outing? To snag the most fabulous gothic relics from the former Castle Dracula at a steal. As they swoon over the macabre decor, the estate’s salesman regales them with spine-tingling tales of the real Count Dracula, but they dismiss his warnings with a flick of their wrists. Back in L.A., amidst their haul of treasures, including Mamuwalde’s coffin, Bobby’s curiosity gets the better of him, and he decides to pry it open, unleashing the undead Blacula. He springs to life, famished for blood, and in a wickedly, kitschy, and humorous scene makes them his first victims, turning Bobby and Billy into his first modern bloodthirsty acolytes.

He becomes enamored with Tina, a woman who resembles Luva, leading to a series of murders as he attempts to reconnect with her. Meanwhile, Dr. Gordon Thomas (Thalmus Rasulala), Tina’s sister’s (Denise Nicholas) boyfriend, is a pathologist who works for the Los Angeles Police Department. Gordon investigates the strange deaths and uncovers the truth about Blacula and the vampirism spreading in the city. The film culminates in tragedy as Blacula ultimately loses Tina and chooses to end his own life, succumbing to sunlight after a series of violent confrontations with the police and his kind.

Blacula features a special guest appearance by Elisha Cook Jr. as Sam, the morgue attendant, and Ketty Lester as a very unfortunate and frightening cabbie who plays one hell of a scary member of the undead!

Picture a vampiric version of hide-and-seek gone hilariously wrong, where Ketty Lester’s Juanita jumps out like an overeager bloodsucking jack-in-the-box, turning Sam’s quiet night shift into an unexpectedly terrifying welcome he never saw coming!

SCREAM BLACULA SCREAM 1973

Directed by Bob Kelljan (who also directed Count Yorga, Vampire 1970 and the sequel Return of Count Yorga 1971), this follow-up was produced by American International Pictures (AIP) and released in 1973. Scream Blacula Scream once again features the resurrection of William Marshall as the elegant Prince of Darkness, Pam Grier as Lisa Fortier, Michael Conrad as Lieutenant Harley Dunlop, Janee Michelle as Gloria, and Barbara Rhoades as Elaine.

The sequel picks up with the death of the voodoo priestess Mama Loa, which ignites a power struggle within her cult. Her arrogant son, Willis Daniels, attempts to resurrect Blacula using voodoo to exact revenge on those who overlooked him for leadership in favor of his stepsister, Lisa Fortier. However, upon resurrecting Mamuwalde, Willis finds himself turned into a vampire and enslaved by the very creature he sought to control. As Blacula resumes his killing spree, he becomes infatuated with Lisa, believing she can help lift his curse through voodoo magic. The film escalates as Justin Carter, Lisa’s boyfriend Justin Carter, played by Don Mitchell. Justin is a former police officer and an African art collector who investigates the murders linked to Blacula while trying to save Lisa from his grasp. The climax sees Lisa attempting to exorcise Blacula using a voodoo doll, leading to an ambiguous ending filled with horror and tragedy as their fates intertwine.

#20 down, 130 to go! Your EverLovin’ Joey, formally & affectionately known as MonsterGirl!

From TV Horror: Investigating the Dark Side of the Small Screen by Lorna Jowett & Stacey Abbott

1-The Cat Creature 1973

Aired December 11, 1973, as an ABC Movie of the Week.

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“Beware the seal of Kah-ub-set, for he who dares to remove it will open the gates of Hell.”

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The Cat Creature was directed by horror film icon Curtis Harrington— Night Tide (1961), Queen of Blood (1966), Games (1967), How Awful About Allan (1970) tv movie, What’s the Matter with Helen (1971), Whoever Slew Auntie Roo (1972), The Killing Kind (1973), Killer Bees (1974) tv movie, The Dead Don’t Die (1975) tv movie also directed by Curtis Harrington, Ruby (1977), Devil Dog: The Hound of Hell (1978) tv movie.

The Cat Creature was scripted by Robert Bloch based on a story by producers Douglas S. Cramer, Wilfred Lloyd Baumes, and writer Bloch himself.Â

From Nice Guys Don’t Work in Hollywood written by Curtis Harrington -talks about how different television executives’ mindsets for telefilms are than major motion picture executives.

Director/writerÂ Curtis Harrington master at ‘horror of personality’

“I found out just how different on a television movie called The Cat Creature. The scriptÂ was written by Robert Bloch, based on an old story he’d published in Weird Tales. In fact, he was one of the horror writers I had discovered in the pages of Weird Tales during my teen years in Beaumont. It was a nice pulpy story about a girl who is the reincarnation of an ancient Egyptian cat goddess. In casting the actress to play the modern incarnation of this beautiful goddess, I got my first nasty taste ofÂ TV executive thinking. I discovered that this new set of black suits was always very involved in the casting of leading roles in the network TV drama. Unlike movie executives whose primary interest was ‘box office appeal’ they were concerned with something they called TVQ” This meant the ratings the stars other television appearances had received. The connection between a star’s suitability for a role meant absolutely nothing, and this was the case of The Cat Creature… […] I recalled that Egyptian women supposedly used henna to dye their black hair red, so we put a dark red wig on Meredith Baxter, and she agreed to darken her eyes with green contact lenses… […] Bloch had written an important supporting role, the proprietor ofÂ a magic shop, for a man. I suggested that he rewrite the role for a woman and that we try to get Gale Sondergaard for the part. Sondergaard was an actress I remembered vividly from my childhood. She had been memorable as the sinister Oriental [sic] woman in The Letter and in the title role of The Spider Woman, a Basil Rathbone/Sherlock Holmes adventure in 1937…

“I had wanted the proprietress of the occult shop to be played as a lesbian to lend a bit of spice to the show. But Standards and Practices , the office of the network devoted to removing any element to a script that might offend Mrs. Grundy, sent a memo after that there must be ‘NO SUGGESTION WHATSOEVER THAT THIS CHARACTER IS A LESBIAN.’ However, my natural propensity toward subversion was given its due when Douglas Cramer allowed me to add a dwarf hooker to a scene in a cheap hotel where Stuart Whitman as the detective interview John Carradine, who plays the hotel clerk. The dwarf lady of the evening is shown seated on the counter in the hotel lobby. Swinging her short legs and batting her eyelashes, she says to Stuart, “How’s tricks, baby!” This was left in, and Cramer was very pleased when the incident was singled out for comment in a New York Times review of the show. It wasn’t the sort of thing they were used to seeing in the bland medium of television.”