I will give my left Nut to see the original Creature feature opening sequence. PLEASE try to obtain this valuable piece of Television history. So far, all i see is edited reconstructed versions. I will know it when i see it!!
Plocey! check out my new vid of "Creature Features" by searching, "Creature Features WNEW" ... it should be in the listing now. Lemme know what you think, good, bad or evil!
From what I remember of the opening, it featured a man wearing glasses facing upwards and grimacing as if something was about to get him. The glow effect made it a little hard to figure out what it was but thats what I remember from the opening. Does anyone else remember this
Now THIS is interesting ... I can see that too. I'll test that idea in Photochop® and see how it looks. If you're correct, then that man was none other than Lew Steele, The Creep, announcer for CF for a dozen years.
I found out about the Glenn Strange Frankenstein lead online at dvddrive-in.
Check it out! Third paragraph down. Plus, the dude gives a thorough accounting what was played over a ten-year span. Dig the ga-ROOVY TV Guide reprints!
"I found out about the Glenn Strange Frankenstein lead online at dvddrive-in."
That's why I sent it to Tap'for our CF repro, because of the features I remember, there was that ever present long frown and those half open eyes. That's what I remember most about the face even if it's not the right one.
Well we know the music is right though. Even if we never get it 100% right, it's our dedication, and we're stirring up memories and having fun and that's what's most important. Rock on!
I consider myself a student of my own memory, but like you, this one has me stumped.
For what it's worth, this is what my own memory adds:
You've perfectly captured the glow effect, but I think that each time the glow intesified, it was accompanied by lighting (I'm pretty sure the sound of thunder accompanied the music).
And either just before it, or just after it, I think there was either a mist or some kind of a dry-ice effect.
It's possible, '60s, I don't personally recall that aspect. Tapthat may corroborate that. It's possible you have this confused with WOR's "Fright Night" sequence from The '70s, which DID have a skull in a lab setting morphing into Frank.
My version is in B&W, 'cuz, until the mid'70s, we didn't own a color TV! Didn't even bother to buy a VCR 'til '95 or so.
You're right. I just found "Fright Night" on tapthat's channel, and that's what I was thinking of.
Oh, for a time machine... Most people would use one to go back to ancient rome or the birth of christ. I'd use it to go back and check my 70s TV memories!
As a NY fan I remember this well and have been hoping for the real intro to turn up forever! The AUDIO portion on tapthat2012's image is PERFECTLY ACCURATE!, but it wasn't the Frankenstein monster's face originally seen like that. The image was closer to the ROUGH version, but with pinkish/greenish color, not b&w
Do you recall if the bumper for "Thriller Theater" had lightning strikes on it? I may be thinking of the bumper from the '80s' version of "Fright Night" instead, however.
877, I believe "Thriller Theater" appeared around '73 or '74, and I remember the Chaney mummy still the best, the one in which Kharis is throttling an archeologist from behind. Sorry if that sounds wrong. It had thunder punctuating a creepy Hammond B3 score.
Earl ... the stumper is the music, didn't WOR basically recycle the music for "Fright Night"? I remember lightning strike sound effects, dunno if that was done visually as well. Really, the whole "Fright Night" sequence was a regurgitation of "Thriller Theatre" using different photos. Another small detail: was it "Thriller Theatre" or "Theater"? Gosh, I'm anal.
As a child I couldn't tell time yet I knew what 8:00 P.M. was on Saturday night. Creature Feature! That opening theme used to scare the crap out of me.
That is awesome! I grew up in Greenwuch and spent many a Saturday night glued to the TV watching Creature Features. Please keep up the good work, this show must live on.
That Varese LP is a great collection. I got a chuckle when playing back "Visitors ..." wearing headphones, and at 39 seconds in the left channel, one can hear some musicians giggling, just for a moment. Maybe it's the techs mastering the thing, who knows.
"FM" and "Monsters at the Movies" are great sources for photos. I have some, but my scanners not hooked up yet, so I've Googled all mine. Good luck!
Hope yours was a feast that couldn't be beat! I had my family over and did most of the work. Fun, but the house is a wreck.
I'll check that clip out again ... MY memory of watching those was trying to watch "KK vs G" without getting a stomachache! I was that scared! LOL, what a chicken.
Hi Duane, yeah, memory. Dropping in the phasing effects and music are easy, but that graphic is a dog to get right. Still under construction.
I've had cool messages from Shawnster and Tapthat, and Shawn remembers even more stuff than I. Tapthat's collections have been AMAZING. Check out his stuff, he's the volume poster among us. I'll update my stuff as we go along.
My memory MAY or MAY NOT be right for the face image, but the music always stuck with me note for note due to it's creepiness. That's no problem.
I do remember the face glowing like that, and oddly enough, the image used for this sort of resembles the face. What I remember the most were the sleepy eyes and the frown, that long, awful frown.
I think the glowing on the face was a BIT faster, almost a steady pulsation.
I only hope we can all pitch in and make a good one.
Is there not a tape of this floating around? The "Chiller" six-fingered hand is on the YTube. As for the CF face -- memory's quite foggy, but didn't it have a warmer, kinda pale orange hue to it?
The graphic is a very rough estimation. Tapes surely exist. We didn't have a color TV back then, that's why mine can never be definitive. As Shawn says, everybody's a pitcher! The more we scrutinize, the better the outcome.
I can already predict what will happen. We'll finish it, then the real McCoy will surface. "They'll Do It Every Time!"
That's pretty DAMN CLOSE to the original! But the actual sequence went on for over a minute in the song and the CF logo has to be present. But being this is a rough, it's damn close!
Thanks, Shawn! When was the last time we saw this, 1975? Shoot, that's when "One of These Nights" by The Eagles was released! Just a coupla weekends ago! To brush off 37 years of cobwebs is going to take a group effort. It'll all come back. We'll do it! Then, it's on to the '68 Chiller opening. NOBODY remembers that one, and it was good!
No. I remember watching "Killers from Space" at my Grandma's house one night, perfect for "Chiller", it was old and creepy, and the intro was different from the B&W circulating. It was a simple panel with "Chiller" in dripping letters backed by music closely resembling "Mechanical World" by Spirit ... and a tympani finish. It just stuck with me.
i remember being at a relatives house for xmas--the house was full and i asked my cuz to turn the tv to chiller and i remember clearly that they were playing the man in the gray flannel suit. it stuck in my head that chiller was gone--not realizing until recently that they had switched to a later time. its weird cuz i knew it played way after that cause that was in the early 70s.
I never knew how much stations messed with their schedules back then until I hit "Brian'sDVDdrivein". They were almost as bad as they are now ... but at LEAST they gave a show a decent amount of time to find its audience ... nowadays, programmers expect instant hits or they pull them. It's ridiculous ... nobody's a fan of the slow burn anymore. Think of all the programs across the media that would've died then if programmers had no faith.
even recent cable---from 90s on--changed a lot. look at nick at nite, tv land and sci fi channels-----lickily i recorded stuff back then--cause they suck now.
Ain't that the truth ... look what's happened to AMC. TCM is great, but they sucked AMC dry doing it. Ah well -- TCM is a great station, but not as many companies carry it.
I also loathe we have to pay a premium to get things like Boomerang ... I understand the obvious logic behind it, but I'll be GD'd to fork over more for a bloated TV bill. Shoot, it USED to be free! And it's gotten worse, really.
THE horror movie to see in '68, of course, was "Night of the Living Dead" ... now, I saw it well into my teens and was blown away by it, frankly, it's the only "cannibal zombie" movie worth bothering, IMO.
Anyway, I remember seeing or reading Roger Ebert's personal experiences regarding audience reactions to that one ... he recalled seeing MANY unattended children seeing it, and how badly freaked they got ... at first they laughed, but as the situation continued to worsen, they got badly frightened. Kinda the way the '31 "Frankenstein" flipped a few wigs back in the day, the way it should be!!!
My grandmother saw the movie back in the day, and she compared it to modern day neurosurgery, w\ regard to the attachment and re-attachment of limbs.
She passed away in 2001, but told me some time before that, that seeing neurosurgery on TV was a milestone for her, because she went from seeing a movie where it was only a fantasy, to the day almost 60 years later that it was a medical procedure based on science FACT. Pretty cool, huh? ;)
HAHAHAHA!!! he wrote me about this early this week. I know, it needs alot of work, but given time, someone will get it right!
Do you remember there being a semblance of a nose? I don't ... that's probably why it never looked like a face to me, and EXACTLY why it scared the hell out of me!
i've going crazy looking for a chiller or creature features on tape---there seem to be enough people in ny with vcrs and beta--and plenty of fans of horror, to have taped a few. maybe clips like ours will stir interest. good luck with it--will be working on new version soon
I've been wanting to see this again for YEARS ... I always get the jones to "get back into it" around September for the past two years, but I always run out of time. Sounds familiar? I burn so much time searching for images of the Frank face, distorting it, that by the time I get to compiling it in iMovie, it's All Soul's Day!
So this year, I thought, "Frig it, just grab that crappy freehand pic and put it out that way." So I did. It's a start, but just wait 'til next year! Sounds like Linus and The Great Pumpkin, no? :D
This has seriously jarred my memory banks-this face looks like the one on the OLD CF, but for some reason, I can't remember if there were nose AND eye holes.
Perhaps it's the majority of the accuracy that prevents me from remmebering the total face.
The glowing cross fades and dissolves are dead on though. I got shivers down my spine
you son of a gun! me and shaunster have been discussing doing this for awhile. i had the lou steele one i did on my previous channel, but i had used the music from the movie.---cool
I will give my left Nut to see the original Creature feature opening sequence. PLEASE try to obtain this valuable piece of Television history. So far, all i see is edited reconstructed versions. I will know it when i see it!!
plocequ1 3 years ago
Hey, Plocey! Satisfaction Guaranteed, or Your Nuts Back!®
You'll know it when you see it. The hairs will stand on the back of your neck ... that is, if The Creep hasn't wrung it yet!
Saturday8pm 3 years ago
i found one from 86--same music but different graphics. we are getting closer! stay "tubed" for more!
tapthat2012 3 years ago
DAMN! Good news ... HELP ... ANYONE ... SAVE MY HALLOWEEN and TIME and post the GD intro!!! :0D
Saturday8pm 3 years ago
Plocey! check out my new vid of "Creature Features" by searching, "Creature Features WNEW" ... it should be in the listing now. Lemme know what you think, good, bad or evil!
Saturday8pm 2 years ago
From what I remember of the opening, it featured a man wearing glasses facing upwards and grimacing as if something was about to get him. The glow effect made it a little hard to figure out what it was but thats what I remember from the opening. Does anyone else remember this
4knobby7 3 years ago
Now THIS is interesting ... I can see that too. I'll test that idea in Photochop® and see how it looks. If you're correct, then that man was none other than Lew Steele, The Creep, announcer for CF for a dozen years.
I found out about the Glenn Strange Frankenstein lead online at dvddrive-in.
Check it out! Third paragraph down. Plus, the dude gives a thorough accounting what was played over a ten-year span. Dig the ga-ROOVY TV Guide reprints!
Saturday8pm 3 years ago
"I found out about the Glenn Strange Frankenstein lead online at dvddrive-in."
That's why I sent it to Tap'for our CF repro, because of the features I remember, there was that ever present long frown and those half open eyes. That's what I remember most about the face even if it's not the right one.
Well we know the music is right though. Even if we never get it 100% right, it's our dedication, and we're stirring up memories and having fun and that's what's most important. Rock on!
Shawnster65 3 years ago
Hey ShawnBackfromtheDead!
Knobby does have an interesting insight into this that's worth exploring. As you can tell, I've done NOTHING about it yet.
Saturday8pm 3 years ago
I consider myself a student of my own memory, but like you, this one has me stumped.
For what it's worth, this is what my own memory adds:
You've perfectly captured the glow effect, but I think that each time the glow intesified, it was accompanied by lighting (I'm pretty sure the sound of thunder accompanied the music).
And either just before it, or just after it, I think there was either a mist or some kind of a dry-ice effect.
60sThru80s 3 years ago
...there was something there that spoke "laboratory" beyond just the face.
60sThru80s 3 years ago
It's possible, '60s, I don't personally recall that aspect. Tapthat may corroborate that. It's possible you have this confused with WOR's "Fright Night" sequence from The '70s, which DID have a skull in a lab setting morphing into Frank.
My version is in B&W, 'cuz, until the mid'70s, we didn't own a color TV! Didn't even bother to buy a VCR 'til '95 or so.
Saturday8pm 3 years ago
You're right. I just found "Fright Night" on tapthat's channel, and that's what I was thinking of.
Oh, for a time machine... Most people would use one to go back to ancient rome or the birth of christ. I'd use it to go back and check my 70s TV memories!
60sThru80s 3 years ago
LOL, at least we wouldn't be thrown to the lions watching the boob tube!
Hmmm ... where would I want to go? Possibly back to '64, aboard Further with Kesey and His Merry Pranksters, and join 'em at a Beatles concert.
Saturday8pm 3 years ago
As a NY fan I remember this well and have been hoping for the real intro to turn up forever! The AUDIO portion on tapthat2012's image is PERFECTLY ACCURATE!, but it wasn't the Frankenstein monster's face originally seen like that. The image was closer to the ROUGH version, but with pinkish/greenish color, not b&w
ioibo 4 years ago
I here ya, Lobo, that's why Tapthat calls it the "2008 Version".
Because of the uniqueness of the original graphic, there's no
way to replicate it exactly. 'til the real one comes along, accept all substitutes!!!
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
as a kid in jersey i remember creature features and chiller theater,and alot of sleepless nights,awesome job.
bandit005 4 years ago
I'd love to see the intro to WOR-TV's (channel 9) THRILLER THEATER which aired weekday afternoons at 4:30, ca. 1970-72!!!
877dqsjq33 3 years ago
any memory of the opening to it?
tapthat2012 3 years ago
A series of still photos, including Bela's Dracula on a staircase holding a candle. I have no memory of the music.
877dqsjq33 3 years ago
Do you recall if the bumper for "Thriller Theater" had lightning strikes on it? I may be thinking of the bumper from the '80s' version of "Fright Night" instead, however.
EarlSnohomish 3 years ago
877, I believe "Thriller Theater" appeared around '73 or '74, and I remember the Chaney mummy still the best, the one in which Kharis is throttling an archeologist from behind. Sorry if that sounds wrong. It had thunder punctuating a creepy Hammond B3 score.
Saturday8pm 3 years ago
"Thriller Theater" actually aired as early as 1971. When it came off the air around '75, WOR ran "Chiller Thriller" on Saturday mornings instead.
EarlSnohomish 3 years ago
Earl ... the stumper is the music, didn't WOR basically recycle the music for "Fright Night"? I remember lightning strike sound effects, dunno if that was done visually as well. Really, the whole "Fright Night" sequence was a regurgitation of "Thriller Theatre" using different photos. Another small detail: was it "Thriller Theatre" or "Theater"? Gosh, I'm anal.
Saturday8pm 2 years ago
Actually, it looks like "Thriller Theater" was indeed off by 1972 and replaced by "Blockbuster Movie," according to inestimable YouTubie wmbrown6.
EarlSnohomish 2 years ago
As a child I couldn't tell time yet I knew what 8:00 P.M. was on Saturday night. Creature Feature! That opening theme used to scare the crap out of me.
thefilmbug 4 years ago
That is awesome! I grew up in Greenwuch and spent many a Saturday night glued to the TV watching Creature Features. Please keep up the good work, this show must live on.
321MC321 4 years ago
Yo, MC5! Yes, some of us are trying to recreate this great intro.
I meself can't resume my effort for a few months due to
prior commitments. But rest assured, something will
come of this, we promise!
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
Damn that brings back memories fo the early 70s when Id watched it every Sat. night on Channel 5 NY, Id love to see the whole thing
JamesNJ1 4 years ago
We're trying, James! Can't find the right image yet though.
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
ok thanks, very much oppreciated, that's the creature feature onpening that I rember as a kid
JamesNJ1 4 years ago
I'm going to agree with DuaneReade3000-I believe the face had an orange almost reddish hue to it. It was more towards the redder side.
Long before this suggestion was posted, it was my opinion form early memory. I even did a rough of one that I have saved.
However, with the buzz and excitement over creating it, and seeing all the roughs, I sort of forgot it.
Shawnster65 4 years ago
Find it, post it!
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
oh, btw, sat. shawnster send me the music for the clip, now i gotta dig out the old FM's to look for a good glenn strange foto.
tapthat2012 4 years ago
That Varese LP is a great collection. I got a chuckle when playing back "Visitors ..." wearing headphones, and at 39 seconds in the left channel, one can hear some musicians giggling, just for a moment. Maybe it's the techs mastering the thing, who knows.
"FM" and "Monsters at the Movies" are great sources for photos. I have some, but my scanners not hooked up yet, so I've Googled all mine. Good luck!
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
happy tukey day!!! check out my wor-tv ny king kong clip!!!
tapthat2012 4 years ago
Hope yours was a feast that couldn't be beat! I had my family over and did most of the work. Fun, but the house is a wreck.
I'll check that clip out again ... MY memory of watching those was trying to watch "KK vs G" without getting a stomachache! I was that scared! LOL, what a chicken.
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
This is terrific -- are you re-creating this just from memory? And what about "The Creep?"
DuaneReade3000 4 years ago
Hi Duane, yeah, memory. Dropping in the phasing effects and music are easy, but that graphic is a dog to get right. Still under construction.
I've had cool messages from Shawnster and Tapthat, and Shawn remembers even more stuff than I. Tapthat's collections have been AMAZING. Check out his stuff, he's the volume poster among us. I'll update my stuff as we go along.
Comments, suggestions -- ALWAYS welcome!
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
My memory MAY or MAY NOT be right for the face image, but the music always stuck with me note for note due to it's creepiness. That's no problem.
I do remember the face glowing like that, and oddly enough, the image used for this sort of resembles the face. What I remember the most were the sleepy eyes and the frown, that long, awful frown.
I think the glowing on the face was a BIT faster, almost a steady pulsation.
I only hope we can all pitch in and make a good one.
Shawnster65 4 years ago
Is there not a tape of this floating around? The "Chiller" six-fingered hand is on the YTube. As for the CF face -- memory's quite foggy, but didn't it have a warmer, kinda pale orange hue to it?
DuaneReade3000 4 years ago
The graphic is a very rough estimation. Tapes surely exist. We didn't have a color TV back then, that's why mine can never be definitive. As Shawn says, everybody's a pitcher! The more we scrutinize, the better the outcome.
I can already predict what will happen. We'll finish it, then the real McCoy will surface. "They'll Do It Every Time!"
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
We got a color TV around '70. And then all I watched were old movies in black & white. But yeah, I'm pretty sure the graphic had a orange-y color.
DuaneReade3000 4 years ago
Cool! an orange bkgd with red highlights, as Shawn suggested.
The BEST "Chiller" clip on YouTube® is Tapthat's "Chiller Bumper". EXCELLENT resolution, color and audio.
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
That's pretty DAMN CLOSE to the original! But the actual sequence went on for over a minute in the song and the CF logo has to be present. But being this is a rough, it's damn close!
Shawnster65 4 years ago
Thanks, Shawn! When was the last time we saw this, 1975? Shoot, that's when "One of These Nights" by The Eagles was released! Just a coupla weekends ago! To brush off 37 years of cobwebs is going to take a group effort. It'll all come back. We'll do it! Then, it's on to the '68 Chiller opening. NOBODY remembers that one, and it was good!
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
what was the 68 chiller---isnt it the b-w one that been circulating already?
tapthat2012 4 years ago
No. I remember watching "Killers from Space" at my Grandma's house one night, perfect for "Chiller", it was old and creepy, and the intro was different from the B&W circulating. It was a simple panel with "Chiller" in dripping letters backed by music closely resembling "Mechanical World" by Spirit ... and a tympani finish. It just stuck with me.
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
i remember being at a relatives house for xmas--the house was full and i asked my cuz to turn the tv to chiller and i remember clearly that they were playing the man in the gray flannel suit. it stuck in my head that chiller was gone--not realizing until recently that they had switched to a later time. its weird cuz i knew it played way after that cause that was in the early 70s.
tapthat2012 4 years ago
I never knew how much stations messed with their schedules back then until I hit "Brian'sDVDdrivein". They were almost as bad as they are now ... but at LEAST they gave a show a decent amount of time to find its audience ... nowadays, programmers expect instant hits or they pull them. It's ridiculous ... nobody's a fan of the slow burn anymore. Think of all the programs across the media that would've died then if programmers had no faith.
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
even recent cable---from 90s on--changed a lot. look at nick at nite, tv land and sci fi channels-----lickily i recorded stuff back then--cause they suck now.
tapthat2012 4 years ago
Ain't that the truth ... look what's happened to AMC. TCM is great, but they sucked AMC dry doing it. Ah well -- TCM is a great station, but not as many companies carry it.
I also loathe we have to pay a premium to get things like Boomerang ... I understand the obvious logic behind it, but I'll be GD'd to fork over more for a bloated TV bill. Shoot, it USED to be free! And it's gotten worse, really.
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
"Killers From Space," like a lot of
the Chiller movies, were either very creepy, or cheesy.
What I remember most, was how they used
the commercial breaks to showcase the horror movies of the day that were playing at the theatres.
I saw loads of commercials for "Zombie", "The Night Child" "House Of Exorcism", ect. Chiller aimed to keep you
scared, and that's jst what they did :)
Shawnster65 4 years ago
THE horror movie to see in '68, of course, was "Night of the Living Dead" ... now, I saw it well into my teens and was blown away by it, frankly, it's the only "cannibal zombie" movie worth bothering, IMO.
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
Anyway, I remember seeing or reading Roger Ebert's personal experiences regarding audience reactions to that one ... he recalled seeing MANY unattended children seeing it, and how badly freaked they got ... at first they laughed, but as the situation continued to worsen, they got badly frightened. Kinda the way the '31 "Frankenstein" flipped a few wigs back in the day, the way it should be!!!
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
My grandmother saw the movie back in the day, and she compared it to modern day neurosurgery, w\ regard to the attachment and re-attachment of limbs.
She passed away in 2001, but told me some time before that, that seeing neurosurgery on TV was a milestone for her, because she went from seeing a movie where it was only a fantasy, to the day almost 60 years later that it was a medical procedure based on science FACT. Pretty cool, huh? ;)
Shawnster65 4 years ago
The Frankenstein movie, I mean.
Shawnster65 4 years ago
HAHAHAHA!!! he wrote me about this early this week. I know, it needs alot of work, but given time, someone will get it right!
Do you remember there being a semblance of a nose? I don't ... that's probably why it never looked like a face to me, and EXACTLY why it scared the hell out of me!
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
what made you do this all of a sudden?
i've going crazy looking for a chiller or creature features on tape---there seem to be enough people in ny with vcrs and beta--and plenty of fans of horror, to have taped a few. maybe clips like ours will stir interest. good luck with it--will be working on new version soon
tapthat2012 4 years ago
I've been wanting to see this again for YEARS ... I always get the jones to "get back into it" around September for the past two years, but I always run out of time. Sounds familiar? I burn so much time searching for images of the Frank face, distorting it, that by the time I get to compiling it in iMovie, it's All Soul's Day!
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
So this year, I thought, "Frig it, just grab that crappy freehand pic and put it out that way." So I did. It's a start, but just wait 'til next year! Sounds like Linus and The Great Pumpkin, no? :D
Saturday8pm 4 years ago
This has seriously jarred my memory banks-this face looks like the one on the OLD CF, but for some reason, I can't remember if there were nose AND eye holes.
Perhaps it's the majority of the accuracy that prevents me from remmebering the total face.
The glowing cross fades and dissolves are dead on though. I got shivers down my spine
last night as I watched this.
Shawnster65 4 years ago
you son of a gun! me and shaunster have been discussing doing this for awhile. i had the lou steele one i did on my previous channel, but i had used the music from the movie.---cool
tapthat2012 4 years ago