R.I.P. Sammy Terry

It's a sad day for Hoosier horror fans: Bob Carter, who played Indianapolis TV horror host Sammy Terry, has died at age 83. 

Sammy Terry was known throughout Central Indiana as the host of Nightmare Theater on Channel 4. He hosted the show for three decades, from 1962 to 1989.

Every Friday night Sammy would hoist himself out of his coffin, utter his trademark sinister chortle and introduce various horror and sci-fi films. His sidekick was a large spider named George who spoke gibberish that only Sammy could understand.

In real life Bob Carter had a far less fiendish occupation: he owned and operated the Family Music Center in Indianapolis. He did his best to keep the two jobs separate and I'm sure many a customer bought an oboe from him without ever knowing they were in the presence of a ghoulish TV star.

Carter was married to his wife Phyllis for 59 years (!) and had four children.

In recent years Carter's health began to fade and his son Mark took over the Sammy Terry role, appearing at various horror conventions. Hopefully Sammy's legacy will live on through him.

I have very fond memories of watching Sammy Terry back in the day. In the pre-home video days of the 1960s and 1970s you couldn't watch movies on demand. If you wanted to see a particular film you just had hope it would come on TV some day. Sammy's show was a godsend, as he regularly aired old horror and sci-fi movies on Nightmare Theater. Sammy introduced me to Frankenstein and Godzilla movies and many more. I wouldn't be a horror fan today if not for him.

You can read more of my reminiscences about Sammy Terry here.

HorrorHound Indy 2012

This past weekend my pal KW Monster and I went to the semi-annual HorrorHound convention in Indianapolis.

For me the highlight of the convention was a reunion of most of the cast of ALIENS, one of my hands down all-time favorite movies. Among the stars in attendance was Jenette Goldstein, who of course played Lt. Vasquez, my favorite character from the movie.

I got to meet and chat with Ms. Goldstein, which was a lot of fun. That's me with her above, her normal sized head dwarfed by my giant one. She was much tinier than I expected, which seems to be the norm whenever I meet female celebrities. Despite the fact that actors appear to be sixty feet tall on the movie screen, they're generally not that big in real life.

If you look just behind me you can see actor Mark Ralston. He played Drake, Vasquez's smart gun partner. And if you look really close just behind my right arm you can catch a glimpse of Ricco Ross, who played Private Frost in the film. Hey, I got three celebrities for the price of one photo!

Vasquez and Drake, doing what they do best.

One of the most famous scenes in ALIENS is between Vasquez and Hudson (played by Bill Paxton). In it Hudson asks, "Hey Vasquez, have you ever been mistaken for a man?" Vasquez replies, "No, have you?" Haw! So ever the wiseacre, I walked up to Ms. Goldstein's table and said Hudson's line. She looked a bit puzzled and did her best to smile politely. Heh. That's me! Making celebrities feel awkward and uncomfortable since 1993.

!

In addition to ALIENS, Jenette Goldstein was in two of James Cameron's other movies. She starred in Terminator 2 as John Connor's foster mom (or I guess more accurately as a copy of her).

And she was an unlucky Irish immigrant mother who politely drowned with her family in Titanic.

Since she's been in so many of Cameron's movies I said that I missed seeing her in Avatar. She said she auditioned for the role of the Na'vi Queen, but alas didn't get it.

I told Ms. Goldstein that since Michelle Rodriguez's Trudy Chacon character in Avatar was very similar to Vasquez, she should have played her mom or big sister or something. For a minute she actually looked like she was thinking about the idea. Or maybe she just wanted me to go away. All I know is that if she shows up as Michelle Rodriguez's mom in Avatar 2, I am so gonna sue for story credit.

Also in attendance from ALIENS was Michael Biehn, who played Corporal Dwayne Hicks, Lance Henrickson who played Bishop, Cynthia Dale Scott who played Corporal Dietrich. Sadly, Private Spunkmeyer wasn't there, robbing me of my chance to yell his name across the crowded room.

Carrie Henn was there as well. She of course played Newt, the only survivor of the colony on LV-426. She's grown up just a bit since 1986. Henn had no previous acting experience when she was cast as Newt; she was hired because she didn't smile as she said her lines like all the professional child actor brats that auditioned.

I would have loved to have gotten autographs and photos of the all the ALIENS cast who were there, but since I'm not independently wealthy I could only afford one.

I also chatted a bit with Timothy Balme, star of Dead Alive, or as it's known in New Zealand, Braindead. It was one of director Peter Jackson's early films from his "splatterfest" period. I've seen hundreds of gory horror movies in my time and not one of them has ever made me sick. In fact I usually end up laughing at all the gore. Dead Alive was the exception. The climax of the movie features Mr. Balme wielding a lawnmower and chopping up hundreds of zombies into a frothy, bloody paste. It was the first, and so far only time that a movie actually made me feel a little bit queasy. Mr. Balme seemed quite proud when I told him that story.

There were also several actors from the Terminator franchise in attendance. Linda Hamilton, aka Sarah Conner was there. Edward Furlong, who was John Conner in T2 and Kristanna Loken, who played the female terminator in Terminator 3 were also there. At one point Kristanna Loken left her table to take a well deserved break. As she walked away she told a nearby fan, "I'll be back!" HAW!

Elvira was there as well, but she was in some special room with a huge line and we didn't want to stand in a queue for three hours, so we didn't meet her. We caught a glimpse of her though, so I can confirm that she does indeed exist.

Local Indianapolis horror host Sammy Terry was also there. Well, sort of. Bob Carter originated the role way back in the early 1960s, and retired in recent years. His son Mark has now taken over the part and is making appearances at conventions as Sammy. Once he's got the makeup on he looks just like the original Sammy and he's got the spooky voice down as well. I saw many fans telling him how much they enjoyed watching him when they were kids. I don't think they realized they were really talking to Sammy Terry 2.0.

There was the usual dealer room full of horror and sci-fi merchandise, but I managed to restrain myself and not spend all the mortgage money on stuff I want but don't need.

There was an entire room devoted to nothing but horror masks and makeup. The Werepups people had one of the coolest booths. They make these incredibly realistic baby werewolf dolls. They looked absolutely real. They had translucent skin, realistic eyes and peach fuzz all over their little bodies. The woman in the photo above was subtly moving her sample werepup around and it looked uncannily like a real, fussy squirming baby- that just happened to be a lycanthrope. In fact one lady walked by and saw her holding the werebaby and exclaimed, "Oh my god, don't drop him!" I guess motherhood knows no species bounds.

On big surprise: I didn't spot a single Utilikilt at this show. That's definitely a first. I have to admit I was a little disappointed, as I had nothing to mock.

There were a few cosplayers there, as always. One question I have: every time I go to this show there is always at least one little kid dressed as Chucky the Homicidal Doll. Red hair, overalls, butcher knife, the works. Do their parents dress them like that and the kids don't really understand who they're supposed to be? Or are these four year olds big fans of the Chucky franchise and demand to go out dressed as their hero? Just wonderin.'

Sammy Terry

Sometimes I feel sorry for kids today. Sure they've got phones the size of matchbooks, hyper-realistic video games and blankets with sleeves, but they're missing out on the fun of watching a good local TV horror host.

When I was a kid, a horror host named Sammy Terry was the star of Nightmare Theater on Channel 4 in Indianapolis. We lived 70 miles away from Indy and if I turned the TV antennae just so and all the atmospheric conditions were right, I could pick up a snowy image of Nightmare Theater and see Sammy every Friday night.

Each week Sammy Terry would raise the lid of his coffin, hoist himself out, utter his trademark evil laugh and introduce that week's movie. He had a rubber spider on a string named George, who served as his sidekick and spoke in high-pitched gibberish that only Sammy could understand.

Sammy would interrupt the movie periodically for some truly awful puns and one of his patented scary soliloquies. He'd drone on and on in his drawn out "spooky" voice for what seemed like half an hour, talking about all manner of macabre topics. Due to the late hour I'd sometimes doze off during one of his interludes and when I'd wake up 20 minutes later he'd still be talking!

Despite his penchant for rambling, I loved Sammy and his show and never missed it for years. Back in the pre-home video days, if you wanted to see a particular movie you just had to wait until it showed up on TV. There were no video stores and only 3 major networks. Shows like Sammy's were the only place you could see old horror and sci-fi movies. He introduced me to Frankenstein and Godzilla movies and many others, and for that I am truly grateful to him. I wouldn't be a horror fan today if not for Nightmare Theater.

Even though I loved the films he aired, I rarely managed to see the entire movie. Most of the time I'd fall asleep halfway through the show and wake up on the couch at 3 a.m. with the TV blasting away a blank screen full of snow. It just came on too late for me to make it through all the way.

Sadly, most of Sammy's shows are lost forever. A few years ago I worked with a guy who interned at Channel 4 in the 1970s, and he said back then it was common practice to videotape a show, air it, and then tape the next week's show over the previous one. Apparently videotapes were prohibitively expensive back then and in those pre-home video days no one dreamed there'd ever be a market for old TV shows. It makes my head hurt just thinking about all the hours of Sammy's show (and dozens of other samples of TV history) that are gone forever.

By the way, I watched his show for many, many years before one day I finally got his name. Sometimes I can be a little slow. Sammy's retired now, but still occasionally appears at horror conventions around the Hoosier state.

I wish there were still horror hosts on TV, but in an age in which you can own or download any movie you might ever want to see, there's probably not much point in it. Plus, most local horror shows operated on shoestring budgets. Each week Sammy would rise up out of his plywood coffin and stand in front of a cardboard set. He was literally creating something out of nothing. I'm not sure today's more sophisticated kids would stand for such nonexistent production values. Sadly, horror hosts have gone the way of buggy whips and powdered wigs.

Anyway, here's my version of Sammy Terry and his pal George the spider. I didn't notice it back when I was watching him on a snowy TV set, but in reality Sammy's yellow gloves appeared to be everyday dishwashing gloves, with what looked like "veins" drawn on with a marker (!). No idea why he'd have veins on his gloves, but whatever.

Drawn in Photoshop on the graphic tablet.

Here's the original rough sketch of Sammy & George.

And here's a tighter sketch of him.