The horror host is a glorious artifact of 20th century popular culture, a grinning pyschopomp that guided millions of souls into B-movie hell. Almost every local station had one, as horror host anthologies were cheap to produce and a lot of fun to watch. Shit, yours truly once tried to revive the genre as an El Santo-style monster-hunting luchador known as El Unicorn.
Like horror as a wider genre, the world of the horror hosts was overwhelmingly male. Sure, you can’t discount the contributions of Vampira and Elvira, but those two, despite their iconic status, are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to mistresses of the dark.
Crematia Mortem
Crematia Mortem hosted an endearingly threadbare version of Creature Features, which ran out of Kansas City, Kansas from 1981-1988. While very few horror hosts had anything resembling a healthy budget, Ms. Mortem was obliged to make her series work with little more than a high-backed chair and a casket to sleep in. Even much of her supporting cast was played by disembodied voices from off-camera.
The voluptuous Ghostess with the Mostess was played by local news announcer Roberta Solomon, who gamely strapped on a purple corset over black lingerie to introduce cinematic tripe with almost Gilda Radnerian charm.
Moona Lisa
Hailing from outer space — by way of San Diego’s channel ten — Moona Lisa was a departure from a lot of conventional horror hostess iconography. Rather than a ghoulish gal in a tattered dress, Moona was a space-age go-go queen, more Barbarella than Vampira.
Rather than a haunted castle, Ms. Lisa held court from the lunar surface, reclining on styrofoam moon rocks with artificial fog and non-artificial snakes snaking about the set. She also knew how to keep abreast of current events; she had her own band of Beatles parodies known as The Roaches, and she found a way to insert herself into real footage of the moon landing.
Stella, the Maneater from Manayunk
Saturday Night Dead ran on NBC’s Philadelphia affiliate from 1984 to 1990. As you might imagine, the name was a riff on SNL, NBC’s comedy flagship that is infrequently (if memorably) morbid. Its hostess was the delightfully sleazy Stella, the infamous Meaneater of Manayunk.
Rather than a conventional vampire, witch, or other beastie, Stella was a vamp of the Theda Bara school; why, if she literally ate a man, she’d have to find another stud for her dungeon. Under Stella’s feather boa and push-up bra was local Philly actress Karen Scioli, whose go-to gig for the better part of a decade was snarking about cinematic wet farts like Super Monster Gamera (1980) from atop a vibrating motel bed named “Beda Lugosi.”
Jami Deadly
Jami Deadly is a genuine renaissance woman; aside from hosting Deadly Cinema from 2003-2005, Ms. Deadly is an actress, singer, burlesque dancer, glamor model, and one of the world’s leading Marilyn Monroe impersonators. Billing herself as “the average blonde bombshell,” her character lived in a cemetery and spent most of her time cracking wise during goofy movies, colloquially known as, “the dream.”
Deadly Cinema consists of only eight episodes — such anti-classics as Werewolf in a Girls Dormitory (1961) and The Snow Creature (1954) — originally broadcast on a student channel out of the University of North Texas. Despite Deadly Cinema‘s relatively obscure origins, it’s managed to become a cult classic on a much larger scale, an achievement probably best credited to Ms. Deadly herself.
Penny Dreadful XXIII
Penny Dreadful hosts Shilling Shockers, the premier horror host program of the greater Boston area. Penny has been unusually successful, and her program is currently airing its ninth season on various New England local stations. She’s even covered some of the same films that we have, including Jesse James Meets Frankenstein’s Daughter (1966), M (1931) and outings from kaiju stars like Gamera and Gappa.
Apart from sheer longevity, Ms. Dreadful also has a pair of Rondo awards to show for her hex-cellent work in her chosen field. She’s also one of the very few still-active horror hosts to be inducted into the Horror Host Hall of Fame, alongside such all-time greats as Zacherley, Joe Bob Briggs, and, uh, Gilbert Gottfried.
Pearl Forrester
Although Mystery Science Theater 3000 was a much higher-concept show than, uh, any other, really, its nucleus was still a traditional horror-hosted B-movie anthology. For those cold, deprived souls not in the know, the series revolved around a man and his robot friends being forced to watch shitty movies as part of a mad science experiment. The original architect of this plan was Dr. Clayton Forrester (Trace Beaulieu), but his role was eventually taken over by his mother, Pearl (Mary Jo Pehl).
Pearl was a much stronger character than her incompetent and insecure son, and she kept a short leash on her own henchmen, Bobo and Brain Guy. Although Pearl ultimately failed to drive Mike Nelson, Crow, and Tom Servo mad with fare like The Final Sacrifice, horror hosting is in her (fictional blood). After all, her granddaughter Kinga (eternal Matt crush Felicia Day) is poised to carry on Pearl’s legacy of deep hurting in MST3K’s 2017 revival series.
