I don't know for sure how old I was when I first became fascinated by midnight spook shows. We were at a local fair (Ortonville Days in, well, Ortonville...a tiny town in Michigan), and my uncle had dared me to go through a "Haunted House". He said he would give me 50 cents and pay for the tickets to get in, if I would be brave and go all the way through it...by myself. The outside of the portable building (as it were) was bright and dark at the same time, with signs and pictures giving an idea of what horrors we should expect therein. I reluctantly agreed, got the ticket, and walked into the big colorful structure.
Once inside, there was another boy near my age (I'm guessing 8 years old) on either side of me. We didn't know each other. As soon as we hit the area where the lights dimmed, our instincts took over and we immediately grabbed each others' hands and literally ran through. Grotesquely painted creatures dropped out of the ceiling, the path twisted and turned, different colored lights blinked on and off, and scary music played all the way through. It was like being in a different world. I was terrified...but I LOVED it.
I told my dad about it, and he smiled, asked me a few questions, and told me a few things about a similar phenomenon that he knew about: spook shows...this wonderful marriage of horror and magic that took place in theaters and buildings around the country. Spook shows (or "Monster shows", "Ghost shows") lived their heyday out in the forties through the late sixties (bleeding through to the seventies and very early eighties, in some places), though the first shows date back as far as the late twenties.
They were a unique form of entertainment similar to a traveling sideshow, in a way; they were propelled by different gimmicks, depending on which "Ghostmaster" was running the show. Some of the early ones relied on forms of seances, with tricks and sounds to further the illusion that they were, indeed, summoning the dead. Well, the ones that were really well done, that is, though even the extra cheesy ones had their charms and drawing power. In many of these shows, a magician would come out and often use audience participation to basically do magic tricks, such as a mentalist or spiritualist might perform. When that was done, generally a "blackout" would occur, where the audience would be enveloped in complete darkness and all manner of assorted creatures and monsters would drop from the ceilings and roam the aisles (a really fun way to describe the chaos of people in masks and makeup and different, mostly cheap effects that were bombarding the crowd).
Yes, like the carnival funhouse, there was some kind of false advertising going on...but during the best of these shows, and even some of the mediocre ones, everyone was having way too much fun to notice or care. Two of the most celebrated of the folks who ran the shows were a pair of brothers, Jack and Wyman Baker. Jack Baker was also known as Dr. Silkini, a name that people may still recognize, even if they don't know why or where he was from.
I become OBSESSED with uncovering everything I could about these midnight spectacles from another time, and the first thing I discovered was that there really wasn't much to be learned from the media that was already available. Still, armed with info that I DID find, the indispensable book GHOSTMASTERS by Mark Walker and an amateur but informative documentary by Jim Ridenouer awesomely titled SPOOKS A'POPPIN chief among them, I wrote my very first article for a magazine, and yes, it was about spook shows.
The lack of a great, thorough documentary that delved into the history of these wondrous shows has remained a somewhat unheralded source of frustration for many of us who would so desperately love to see it happen.
Until now.
Writer/Director Jeff Markin and writer Christine A. Potter are knee deep in the creation of what looks to be the awesome spectacle of yesteryear that we've been waiting for, a documentary appropriately (and majestically, in my own humble opinion) titled ALIVE!! ON STAGE!! THE RETURN OF THE MIDNITE SPOOK SHOW.
They have assembled a pretty amazing cast, including ghostmasters and horror personalities like Dan Roebuck, Bob Burns, Myron St. John, Keith Stickley and Philip Morris, among others. The Kickstarter campaign is active as of this writing, and help is still VASTLY needed to reach the goal. You can check out all the information here, and get in on the ground floor of what is going to be something extremely unique and memorable for horror, magic and history fans of all types:
ALIVE!! ON STAGE!! KICKSTARTER CAMPAIGN
I caught up with director Jeff Markin of PCJ Films, who has a pretty cool distinction of actually meeting Jack Baker. Jeff's father even designed the logo that Baker used throughout the seventies. Jeff and I had a spirited, super interesting late night discussion about spook shows, dark rides, the ghost masters, and most of all, his extremely ambitious and time consuming ode to the gentlemen who thrilled so many in the prized decades before video games was king. Here is part of that conversation.
HALLOWEEN MACHINE: There is so little info about midnite
spook shows out there, that's why I was THRILLED to hear about your project.
JEFF MARKIN: It took
me years to track down the Ghostmasters book. And back c. 2000 when I started
researching the subject, there was absolutely nothing on the Internet. By 2005,
there was a little more...That's the year I
decided I was going to make the film. I should have started then. We lost a few
more Ghostmasters in the years between then and when I actually started
filming.
Yeah, the Ghostmasters book is where we all wind up, it
seems...and that was a pretty penny to get a hold of. Did you ever get a chance
to see a spook show?
I saw Jack's show. It
was shortened and modified. I don't remember there being a blackout.
Wow. That's amazing. What do you remember about it?
I remember very little
of Jack's show. I do remember a trick he did with a plate because I had the same
trick and knew how it was done. And he did stuff with Mickey, a knotted
handkerchief who was his "ghost friend." And there was the
"shrinking 10 of diamonds." This was the free gift for sitting
through the show. I still have one.
That's fun. And funny, you knew one of the tricks.
It was just a
store-bought illusion. At the time, Ted Carrothers' Magic Studio in Toledo was
THE place for magic. Everyone hung out there.
So you were into the magic side of it even before you saw
Jack?
Yep. Magic &
monsters were my thing. The spook show had both.
Did you ever think about doing your own spook show?
Oh, no. I haven't done
any magic in decades. I'd be a laughingstock if I tried. I'd much rather watch.
Did you decide to do the doc after you saw the Keith
Stickley/Dr. Scream Revival show, then? Like, it cemented it? Or did you
already know going in?
I'd been threatening
it to myself since 2005, but that was the first time I ever said it out loud to
anyone outside of a few, close friends.
Heh. So that solidified it.
Yeah. A few months
later Keith and I had lunch and he introduced me to Rick Allen. Rick had been a
40 miler in the late 60s, early 70s under the name of Ral Kelmar, the Mad
Magician.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but in all my research, I only ever
found the "Spooks-A-Poppin' sort of semi-doc on the subject...there isn't
much else.
The Something Weird
DVD of Monsters Crash the Pajama Party incorporates some of the stuff from
Spooks-A-Poppin'.
Right, yes. I got that DVD right away. So crazy to navigate.
I was surprised at the lack of info. I had been fascinated by spook shows and
consumed everything I could find in a very short time. That's why I was
surprised that it took so long to get my article published in a mag (Fright Times)...people
passed on it repeatedly.
Really? No wonder
nobody knows they ever existed.
Do you hope the film rekindles interest in spook shows? Such
an intriguing era in time.
I don't think they'll
be making a comeback, aside from a retro-Halloweentime show like Keith
Stickley's revival. My film is taking the position that people needed new ways
to be scared and that the spook show evolved to accommodate those needs.
Looking at the horror hosts, musicians like Alice Cooper and Rob Zombie,
haunted house. And the ultimate progression, I think, is probably Teller and
Todd Robbins' Play Dead.
Only a few days remain to contribute to help fund this much
needed film. If you can help, click the Kickstarter link and do what you can.
It would mean a lot to a lot of people, including an eight
year old boy who once upon a time, closed his eyes and ran through the carnival
funhouse for fifty cents.
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| Dr. Evil |
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| Jeff Markin and Daniel Roebuck |
