From Zombos Closet

July 2025

Dracula Has Risen
From the Grave
Radio Spots

/ Granny Creech's Radio Spot Crypt, Radio Reaper's Radio Spot Reliquary / Leave a Comment

Dracula Has Risen From the Grave bandaid poster

 

Hello, My Children!

Whew, is it hot! It is hotter than an overcooked vat of my Witch’s Brew!

I was just sitting here in my parlor when I received a phone call from the Radio Reaper. He was all in a tizzy:

“Granny,” he said, breathlessly, “have you seen Zombos’ recent posting?  It is the pressbook for Dracula Has Risen From The Grave. I have some radio spots for it but I’m too busy to fix them up and send them to him. Can You do it?”

“Sure, Reaper,” I said. “I will be glad to. Send me the files and I’ll get right on it.”

He did and I did, and I must admit they were right up my alley. I wasn’t too familiar with the movie or the spots, but after hearing them, I was glad I got to write something about them.

They are not the usual radio spots I am used to hearing! If you have never heard them you are in for quite a treat. They are full of puns and I LOLed through most of them (that’s text jargon for those of you who do not know). I called up my grandson Big Abner and let him hear them and he LOLed, too.

Hee hee.

These spots are quite unlike anything I would have thought the Warner Bros./Seven Arts marketers for Hammer’s vampire movie would have resorted to so I had to look it up on Wikipedia to see if it was a spoof or a tongue-in-cheek feature. But, no, it was played in all seriousness…even rated “G”, which is surprising in itself. However, the one-sheet poster should have been a dead giveaway for the advertising tone. I didn’t read anything about what Hammer Films thought of the American campaign so I guess all was well, since it became Hammer’s most profitable movie (according to IMDb).

Reader reviews on the Internet Movie Data Base (IMDb) mostly agree that it is one of the best in the Hammer series. I haven’t seen it so I can’t attest to that fact or add my opinion. It is the fourth of the series and was made in 1968.

So, here are the spots, courtesy of the Radio Reaper’s Reliquary. We hope you enjoy them and get a laugh or two from them. If nothing else, they have quite a bite….sorry….
Now, on with the pun-ishment!!

If you have radio spots you would like to share with Granny or just want to exchange spells, you can reach her at [email protected].

Dracula Has Risen
From the Grave
UK Pressbook

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One of the pleasures reading these old pressbooks is learning all the creative ways promotion was done before social media. In this UK pressbook for Dracula Has Risen From the Grave, there’s the public service announcement from a mobile van driving through town and the lighting of the theater lobby a nice ominous green to prime the audience’s mood. Then of course you have the catchlines: “Harrowing Ferment of Feat; Not for Those of a Nervous Disposition; It Will Fascinate and Stun You, etc.” Interestingly enough, those catchlines can work with just about anything these days too.

Dracula has risen from the grave UK pressbook. Dracula has risen from the grave UK pressbook. Dracula has risen from the grave UK pressbook. Dracula has risen from the grave UK pressbook. Dracula has risen from the grave UK pressbook. Dracula has risen from the grave UK pressbook. Dracula has risen from the grave UK pressbook. Dracula has risen from the grave UK pressbook.

2 Niguads Et
L’Homme Invisible (1951)
French Pressbook

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Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man, part of their movie meetings with the Universal Studios’ classic monsters, was and still is a fun romp for the comedic duo. While it takes elements from the many Invisible Man movies before it, interestingly enough, Bud and Lou seem to forget they met the invisible man (well, at least one of them) at the end of Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein. It would have been fun if the studio had followed up on that, but it got lost by doing Abbott and Costello Meet the Killer, Boris Karloff instead. During this time, the duo had finally settled with the IRS regarding back taxes, but their partnership was breaking up. They held it together during filming, but when it came time for Lou to slap Bud around in their scenes, the jabs were harder than usual. If you are new to Abbott and Costello, watch The Time of Their Lives (1946) first. The fantasy, the comedy, and the romantic pull are all just wonderful.

By the way, the third film in the invisible man series is The Invisible Woman (1940). Directed and scripted like a screwball comedy, sort of, it falls short on both the comedy and the sci fi/horror aspects. It’s worth a look due to its special effects and actor John Barrymore, along with the lively Virginia Bruce. For some reason, the risqué element of her being nude, albeit invisible, caused a bit of concern. Of course, none of the nude invisible men faced that problem for some reason.

Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man French pressbook

Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man French pressbook

Reel Fantasy Issue 1, January 1978

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If you thought Quasimodo’s Monster Magazine was cheaply printed, you haven’t read Reel Fantasy. There was only this first issue, but if you look beyond the pulp paper, sloppy print quality, lazy layout, and poor photo reproduction, the articles showed determination and an attention to the movies and television shows shaping our dreams and nightmares in 1978. The extensive coverage on Star Wars was informative and fascinating to read, along with the 1977 television roundup, and articles on Laser Blast, Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger, and Damnation Alley. There’s also an interview with Jane Seymour, before she opened her hearts to become the Kay Jewelers spokesperson. And the piece de resistance is the back cover advert by Howard Rogofsky. Long in the tooth comic book collectors know that name for sure.

Reel-fantasy-1-cover

…

Reel Fantasy Issue 1, January 1978Read More »

Star Wars (1977) Radio Spots

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Star Wars a New Hope, award scene

Welcome, all lovers of outer space adventures! Welcome to my Radio Spot Reliquary.

It was late May of 1977 when a relatively unknown movie opened in theaters and set off a chain reaction never before seen…a reaction that is still going strong almost fifty years later. Through sequels, comic books, books, cartoon series, and countless streaming spin-offs, the adventure continues to this day. Never has a handful of characters been so totally embraced by the cultures of the world as have these brave and gallant heroes battling seemingly overwhelming odds. Visually magnificent with groundbreaking visual effects, this motion picture set the standard for space operas to follow.

Radio-wise, the marketing campaign for this film never let up. The first five radio spots released were from May, 1977 and the next three were from mid-summer. The next fifteen story spots done in serial form were from its re-release in July, 1978 (shoot, at some theaters it was still playing as late as December, 1977!), and the last ten were from its re-release in 1979…”It’s Back!”

So, listen to the radio spots from the movie that started it all…a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. The Force! Droids! Aliens! Heroes and a Princess! Jedis! Light Sabers! Star Destroyers! The Death Star! Star Wars!

 

 

Re-release in July, 1978

 

Re-release in 1979

Crossing the Streams:
Blindspot, Surrealestate, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D

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AI image of bookcase filled with books and movies, with an old television set in front.

Binge watching the streams and eye-balling the books falling off the shelf. What a life.

Finished the fifth season of the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D and I’m wondering how much to the Hydra well they will go. I like that each season builds on that never-ending threat, sort of, but constantly making S.H.I.E.L.D destroyed by the lop off one head, two more take its place thematic is getting scripturally claustrophobic. And there’s the time travel goto that seems more a what-do-we-do-next necessity than an inspired creative exercise. I liked the first season more, where there was a solo episodic feel to the stories instead of a multi-threaded continuing narrative as the team came together with Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg–just sublime in the role, really). That team has the requisite techie nerds/hackers du jour/problem solvers duo of Leo Fitz and Jemma Simmons (lain De Caestecker and Elizabeth Henstridge), May (Ming-Na Wen) the martial arts prone pilot with a grim past; Ward (Brett Dalton) the dashing and heroic agent who turns out to be…but that would spoil it for you; Mack (Henry Simmons) who provides the moral compass and some solid knuckles; and Skye(Chloe Bennet) who can whip up a quake in a second. Interestingly, you can find some similarities between the Skye and Jane Doe (Blindspot) characters. Luke Mitchell, who plays Lincoln Campbell, an inhuman here, and Roman, a mean human in Blindspot, also generates a similar ambivalence in both of his characters across the two series.

Surrealestate is back for its third season on Hulu. A novel touch has a real estate group tackling the more paranormal aspects of their properties with August (Maurice Dean Wint),  the nerdy guy who builds their ectoplasmic-fantastic gadgets to deal with the supernatural; the good hair guy, Luke Roman (Tim Rozon), who leads the group and can sense through the ether and talk to ghosts; his partner Susan (Sarah Levy) with her telekinetic and pyrotechnic abilities; and Clytemnestra (Elena Juatco) or just Lomax for short, who seems the more grounded-to-the-ordinary side of things person among them. Zooey (Savannah Basley), former receptionist and office manager, but now law career-minded–one foot in, one foot out–character, rounds out the main cast. There was Phil (Adam Korson), a former priest who worked with the group, but he was in seasons one and two. Being a Canadian production, like the X-Files first five seasons,  it has that narrative je ne sais guoi quality that differentiates it from American television storytelling. At first I thought a show about ghosts every episode would be redundant, but Surrealestate goes the heavenly highway route as seen in Touched by an Angel, Highway to Heaven, and Ghost Whisperer. But, and it’s a big but, it manages to avoid the saccharine aftertaste and leans more toward sinister shenanigans that need to be excised. That’s not to say that each story doesn’t wrap up to a white light ending, but in these stories, the characters and storylines are presented with more salt and less sugar. …

Crossing the Streams:
Blindspot, Surrealestate, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.DRead More »

For Whom the AI Bell Tolls:
Book Cover Illustrators

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AI image of robot drawing book coverThat screaming you hear is from the servers of AI grinding the bones of book cover illustrators. Just to add more salt to this wound, this article’s outline was generated by Perplexity AI. But I completely ignored its outline, which could be biased, even just a little.

The words you’re reading are mine, with a small dash of Hunter S. Thompson to give it them some bite. Just because the AI gave me an outline doesn’t mean I need to stay within its lines. I’m still the human in the loop. For now, anyway. By the way, the illustration for this article was also generated by Perplexity. You can stone me later. For now, just keep reading.

AI is coming for your job, man! That’s the bottom line, end of your story. Music, graphics, real humans writing real articles instead of robo-ridden slush, all of that’s fading away like a Picasso left out in the sun. Soon enough we’ll all be like Charlie Chaplain caught up in the gears of that monstrous machine, or one of the worker-drones in Metropolis, slaving away at the gears of that monstrous machine while whatever it produces, without any human skin in the game, nor human experience, nor human sweat, nor human experience’s highs and lows, sucks the electricity out of us non-cloud city dwellers to deliver, like a Dasher pumped by a large tip, what we used to pay skilled people for. …

For Whom the AI Bell Tolls:
Book Cover IllustratorsRead More »

Jaws (1975)
The Review Radio Spots

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Jaws movie reviewer radio spots
Remember when professional critics’ reviews actually had a yay or nay power over movies? Here are radio spots highlighting the glowing reviews for Jaws, courtesy of Granny Creech and Radio Reaper.

Spielberg’s first big hit contained elements he repeated in many of his movies. A night sea hunt for the shark provides an early example of his favorite visual hallmark, a beam of light made visible by fog. He would continue to devote close attention to characters, instead of hurrying past them to the special effects, as so many 1990s f/x directors did. In “Jaws” and subsequently, he prefers mood to emotional bludgeoning, and one of the remarkable things about the picture is its relatively muted tone. The familiar musical theme by John Williams is not a shrieker, but low and insinuating. It’s often heard during point-of-view shots, at water level and below, that are another way Spielberg suggests the shark without showing it. The cinematography, by Bill Butler, is at pains to tell the story in the midst of middle-class America; if Spielberg’s favorite location would become the suburbs, “Jaws” shows suburbanites on vacation. (Roger Ebert,

Brides of Dracula
and Kiss of the Vampire
Radio Spots

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Brides of Dracula publicity still
Lovely Yvonne Monlaur in the grasp of Baron Meinster, portrayed by David Peel.

I received a call from my ornery grandson, Big Abner, the other day, and I could tell right off he was up to something.

“Granny,” he said, “I just watched two movies and they really sucked!”

My mind raced, going over all the low-budget, Z-movies I could think of.

“Which ones?” I asked, taking the bait.

“Brides of Dracula and Kiss of the Vampire!” he said with a big laugh. “Get it? Do you get it?”

“Yes, Abner, I get it, you big goof. Was there anything about them you liked?”

“Yep, two things,” he responded. “Beautiful women and beautiful vampire women.”

I sighed and told him to get back to work.

After he hung up I began to think about what he said, and there was some truth to it. Hammer Films ushered in a new retelling of the old Universal classics with The Curse Of Frankenstein (1957) and Horror of Dracula (1958), both color productions that featured lots of blood and graphic stake-driving scenes not pictured in the old versions. And each was complete with ghastly monsters and…beautiful women, often in bosom-baring low-cut dresses as befitted the time period in which the movie was set. They were hits and Hammer Studios began a series of movies on the Frankenstein and Dracula legends. …

Brides of Dracula
and Kiss of the Vampire
Radio SpotsRead More »