Cavalcade of Awesome

In Fall 1988, Elvira was getting ready to release her first movie, Elvira Mistress of the Dark. And, of course, she got some coverage in the September 1988 issue of Fangoria (issue #77).

I’m honestly surprised she didn’t get a full cover for her first movie. She always had a great relationship with Fangoria.  But if you are going to get bumped, Freddy Krueger in a new movie is the news that’s going to bump you.  *Especially* in 1988.  And *especially* if the magazine has available to them a pic of Freddy with a baby arm coming out of his head for the cover.

This article is an interview with Cassandra Peterson about making the movie Elvira Mistress of the Dark.  She talks about having the longest bit of dialogue to do on the first day and that no one really explained to her how to play the character on the big screen.  Sometimes she was playing it too big, sometimes she played it too small.  It took several days to work it out and get comfortable.  She also makes sure to play up the humor in the movie.  She wants people to know it’s not a horror movie per se, it’s a comedy.  And she hopes that people understand that when they go see it.

It’s a pretty good article, but it always is with Cassandra Peterson.  She’s always funny.  Unfortunately for this movie, New World Pictures went bankrupt the day the movie was released and instead of opening on 2500 screens, it opened on 600 screens.  Even though it tanked at the box office, it has since picked up a big cult following on the home video market.

I think I’ve made it pretty clear that I love Elvira and I have since the mid to late 80s. As you see, I bought her appearances in magazines, I loved it when she was the Coors Light “spookswoman”, and when she had bizarre cameos in movies like Stroker Ace.  We even covered her 1986 MTV Halloween Special on the Nerd Lunch 2017 Halloween Special.  But for some reason, I never got around to watching either of the Elvira movies.

So tomorrow, for Fangoria Movie Friday, I’m going to take a look at her first movie, Elvira Mistress of the Dark, from 1988.  Should be fun, I can’t wait.

Also, check out the blog Countdown to Halloween for more Halloween-y, bloggy AWESOMEness.

This entry was posted on October 3, 2019 at 7:00 am and is filed under Fangoria, Halloween, holiday, magazine, movies with tags AWESOME-tober-fest, AWESOME-tober-fest 2019, Elvira, Fangoria, Halloween, movies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.