Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: This podcast is a collaboration between costart and Touchstone Productions and the dads from the Crypt podcast.
[00:00:07] Speaker B: Frankly, your hat's rays look terrible. You've got to pay closer attention to your oral digene, or you'll end up looking like me. I want you to brush after every meal, floss and gargoyle twice a day.
[00:00:21] Speaker C: Hmm.
[00:00:23] Speaker B: Yes. Looks like I'll have to drill.
This won't hurt me a bit.
[00:00:37] Speaker D: Hello, and welcome to another episode of.
[00:00:40] Speaker A: The how not to make a movie podcast. I'm Alan Katz. Here's a stone cold fact. It is really, really, really hard to create an iconic character like tales from the crypts iconic crypt keeper, for one thing. You can't set out to create a character that will become iconic. That's because it's not up to the characters creators. It's up to you, the audience. It's your embrace, how warm it is, how long it lasts, that determines whether a character can even enter the iconic conversation.
[00:01:11] Speaker D: With the cryptkeeper.
[00:01:13] Speaker A: We ticked off all the boxes. We created a character that a wide and widening audience still embraces 30 some odd years after its creation. But how do characters like the cryptkeeper get created? Don't they just spring fully formed, more or less, from one person's fertile imagination?
Well, not really. Every horror icon's creation is complicated in its own way, and more than one person played a significant part. Take the Frankenstein monster. Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, Frankenstein's author, and her husband, the romantic poet Percy Byss Shelley, were traveling with friends through Germany down the Rhine river in 1816. At night, the traveling party told each other ghost story. Mary and her friends were all intrigued by the latest science, using electricity to spark dead limbs to life. And as they traveled down the Rhine through Germany, they heard local stories about a crazy alchemist named Johann Conrad Dippel. Dippel robbed graves and experimented on corpses at a very real place called, you ready for it? Frankenstein Castle. And then Mary Shelley, all of 21, filled in the blanks and published her book anonymously. She put her name on the second edition, though. In time, Mary Shelley's character found a literary audience. But then a guy named James Whale directed the movie version of the book in 1931, and whatever the character had been on the page became the character in the movie. And that's the Frankenstein monster most people think of when they hear the name Frankenstein. Remove any of those elements from the Frankenstein equation. There's no equation, as you'll hear if.
[00:03:01] Speaker D: You haven't already heard this episode, it.
[00:03:04] Speaker A: Took puppeteer Kevin Yeager to create the cryptkeeper puppet. Plus John Kassir to create the cryptkeeper's voice. Plus me to create the cryptkeeper's inner life. Plus Gil Adler, who directed and produced the Cryptkeeper segments. Take any of us out of the Cryptkeeper equation and this equation isn't happening either.
When Kevin and John and Gil and I got together for that very first time, we had never had this conversation before about the Cryptkeepers creation story. None of us knew the whole story ourselves until we shared it with ourselves. And you'll get to share that discovery with us. So, how do you make a crypt keeper? Well, it's complicated, but quite fascinating. And by the way, the young guy sitting in the dentist's chair during our teaser? That was me.
[00:03:52] Speaker B: I'm afraid it's going to have to come out. Oh, yes, it does. Now put your head back. Open. Wider.
Wider.
Got it.
They don't call me the tooth scary for nothing.
[00:04:15] Speaker C: John.
[00:04:16] Speaker D: Kasir.
[00:04:17] Speaker E: Kevin, my good man, where are you hiding the painting? Dude, not funny.
[00:04:26] Speaker C: Kevin Yeager. It's all the silicone of the foam.
[00:04:29] Speaker E: Latex, he was gonna say. Exactly.
[00:04:33] Speaker C: And the makeup effects lifts and all that stuff, you know?
[00:04:36] Speaker E: Right. It's got a lot of formaldehyde in. Ithemenhe. He's like. Actually, it's filters.
[00:04:42] Speaker C: You.
[00:04:44] Speaker F: Listen. I tried the formaldehyde myself, and look what happened to me.
[00:04:48] Speaker E: I know they told you not to drink it.
[00:04:52] Speaker F: Now you tell me.
[00:04:54] Speaker C: You in LA?
[00:04:55] Speaker E: I am in LA. I am in LA. I've been doing a lot of. You should all know that I've been doing a lot of conventions. I usually didn't do very many a year, but I had. Because of the pandemic, I hadn't done any in a long time. And I had so many requests and a new home, and I figured I could do a lot to that home.
[00:05:18] Speaker C: Oh, God.
[00:05:20] Speaker E: We're doing some of these conventions, and there isn't a single one that, you know, the kids didn't, you know, say, please, give my beast to all these fabulous people.
You know, Kevin, you're, you know, the most, maybe the most ripped off thing without licensing in horror. You know, that's the bordello of blood, you know, thing. Remember? It's like, people try to steal this. I use it to photobomb people with my little. When I do my little, you know, photo ops and stuff. But, I mean, that's great.
[00:05:57] Speaker C: You're in the crypt.
[00:05:58] Speaker E: I, you know, I just used it as a virtual background here. You know, some years ago, Jack Wall had given me, you know, a cd with all the photos that they took, you know, with really nice files on them. And I've kept them, God bless them. I can't believe he's. He's gone already.
[00:06:18] Speaker C: And, Alan, where are you? You're in LA. Oh, no. You said you're Highland park.
[00:06:22] Speaker D: I'm in Highland park. As we. As we sit here today. So here's. Now that we've got you all, here's what I'd love to do with you all today.
I don't know if you've listened to season one of this, of the podcast.
The premise of the podcast of season one was what happens when good filmmaking goes horribly off the rails, or as I put it, when filmmaking craft turns to crap.
And the whole first season was really about tales from the crypt and about the making of Bordello of blood. For the second season, we're going to open it up, and it'll be a combination of things. It'll be, for the most part, really horrible filmmaking experiences that other filmmakers that we know have had. And that's what we'll invite them in, because Gil and I will do this together now. And it's just all the filmmakers we know giving their horror stories comparable to Bordello of blood, good luck with that.
[00:07:31] Speaker E: But we're also involved in all of those horrible stories.
[00:07:36] Speaker D: The man's reach is incredibly vast.
There's a moment in episode five when I talk about what ultimately happened to me. I was out of it for almost two decades. I was out of it, and I was a dad, and I was coaching ultimate Frisbee.
[00:07:56] Speaker C: Wow.
[00:07:57] Speaker D: And. Yeah. And Billie Eilish. Why? I coach Billie Eilish because, you know, I do it in Silver Lake.
[00:08:03] Speaker C: Did she pay? Did she pay with song?
[00:08:06] Speaker D: You know, this was. It's funny. She's not much of a player.
Phineas, her brother is quite good.
[00:08:12] Speaker C: Wow.
[00:08:13] Speaker D: Quite good.
[00:08:14] Speaker F: Anyway, where were you, Kevin, when he needed that conversation with you to get the songs?
[00:08:18] Speaker C: I know.
[00:08:20] Speaker D: So, you know, ultimate Frisbee is, you know, I don't know if you know the sport. It's basically. It's just Frisbee. It's kind of like football, soccer, and there. It's very few rules, self officiating. But one day there was a question about the rules, and I had to go look it up. And who the fuck invented ultimate Frisbee? Joel Silver.
[00:08:41] Speaker C: No.
[00:08:42] Speaker E: Get out of here.
[00:08:43] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:08:44] Speaker C: How's that possible?
[00:08:45] Speaker D: That is. That is the button on episode five of season one.
[00:08:50] Speaker E: Somebody else invented it. He just paid them to take it away from them. He paid them nothing to take it away from them is.
[00:08:57] Speaker A: But.
[00:08:57] Speaker C: But angry Frisbee, I would believe you.
[00:09:01] Speaker F: Yeah, I think, Alan, it was the romanian Joel silver, I think, that you're talking about.
[00:09:08] Speaker D: So, you know, it's funny. Joel's reach is staggering. Sometimes it comes at you from the least expected places. You got to be so careful. Anyway, what I wanted to talk about, just the four of us, really, is the conversation that we've never had about each of our roles in creating something that we don't own.
[00:09:33] Speaker C: Yeah, right.
I had a piece of it, and I did see money the first year, and then Jack came on board, and that all. Wow.
[00:09:46] Speaker D: But we will talk about these things, too, because really and truly, this is a conversation that an awful lot of people outside of this conversation would love to hear, because it's never been had. And we each have contributed something quite significant to this creation that the whole world knows to this day.
There's something to be said for all of us and this thing of ours that Joel owns.
So I want to talk about that. But I also, since in season one, Gil and I, we had a chance to talk about how we got into this mess before we. And I'm going to consider that the interview has already started. You guys are good. And I'm recording it.
In season one, I had a chance, and Gil had a chance to tell our story, how we got into this, uh, how we got to tales from the crypt to begin with. We. No one suddenly landed there by accident.
[00:10:56] Speaker C: Uh, I it was an accident, but I'll get into that.
[00:11:02] Speaker D: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Well, okay. Since you started it, uh.
[00:11:08] Speaker A: All right.
[00:11:08] Speaker D: You. You, uh. You grew up in Kansas?
[00:11:11] Speaker C: No, I. Actually, my. My grandparents and my. My parents are dance. I grew up in Ohio. I was born in Illinois. Ohio. Yeah.
[00:11:19] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:11:19] Speaker F: I told you, Alan. I told you, those red shoes that he clicks three times, they weren't his.
[00:11:24] Speaker C: That gets me nowhere. I look really good at them, though.
[00:11:27] Speaker D: Oh, I will bet.
[00:11:31] Speaker C: No.
[00:11:31] Speaker E: Yeah.
[00:11:31] Speaker C: And so, anyway, how this whole thing started for me was I had a shop in Glendale, and I was fortunate enough to be across from Joel Silver's storage unit. And Joel used to come in every so often. He was working on the. He was Hudson Hawker around that time or something like that. And he would come in in his Joel way, and he would come in, what are you working on? What are you working on? And I said, oh, I'm just, you know, doing this or that. I had a lot of different projects going on, and one time he would just look around, and I'm telling you, 30 seconds. He'd walk in, would never even say hello. He just, he just come in and say, you know, what are you working on?
[00:12:11] Speaker D: What are you.
[00:12:12] Speaker C: Yeah. And, you know, what are you working on? What are you working on? And as I was still in sentence, telling him, he would walk out. I mean, I just would do this all the time to me. So who's this guy? Who's this guy? I have another story. First time I talked to Joel was about doing predator. It was called the hunter that goes way back. And actually turned it down because this guy on the phone was screaming the whole time. And I said, who is this madman? I can't. And I just. I ended up turning that down, funny enough. And Stan Winston had recommended me for it. Anyway, back to tables. So he would come over and say this. And he walked in one time and he said, what are you working on? I told him again and he said, okay. He said. And he said, what are you doing next? And I said, I'm going to take some time off and write and direct. And he said, I may have something for you. And that's how I, by accident, sort of, in a sense of having this storage unit across from Joel, met Joel, and that's how I got involved with.
[00:13:05] Speaker D: How you got crypt now. But like a lot of us, you'd been, you'd been circling around for a while.
You did some work on hitchhiker.
[00:13:15] Speaker C: Mm hmm. Yes. Mister Adler there.
[00:13:18] Speaker D: Yeah, yeah, yeah. You go back in 1987, you were doing mannequin design.
[00:13:22] Speaker C: Yes, yeah, yeah. We did an episode with James Reemar, right? Oh, yes, yes.
[00:13:30] Speaker D: Oh, boy. That's. That's funny how that connects, because then we all did, of course, a crypt with.
[00:13:34] Speaker C: That's right. In fact, I've got James's head in the back. I did a minute and the. Funny enough, my wife ends up doing. She's always on 7th heaven, and she ends up doing an episode where she's kind of kiss James Rewar. So the whole thing is circular. It all came back and, you know. Anyway, yeah, yeah. That was. And I don't know if I think it was Gil that called me. Was it? Do you remember at all, Gil? There's so, so many episodes and I. Lifetime ago. But I think it was. I think it was. Yeah, but I think you called. Called me or somebody contacted me and then about doing these, these four mannequins of the family that were in a house. I could barely remember the story, but it was.
[00:14:12] Speaker F: Yeah, it was.
[00:14:13] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:14:13] Speaker F: You know, Carl Schenkel, I think, was the director. German director.
[00:14:17] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:14:18] Speaker F: And I actually thought I called you, but I thought I was calling Joel Silver. No.
[00:14:25] Speaker C: I've got a picture with me posing on the set. And we shot that in Vancouver, didn't we not? Yeah. Yeah.
[00:14:31] Speaker F: In Port Coquitlam. I actually remember the house. I don't know. I couldn't take you to it now, but I. I remember it was Port Cutlam. And I kept thinking, why are we in Port Coquitlam, which is like a 15 minutes drive outside of Vancouver? Couldn't we find a house, like, near. Closer?
[00:14:46] Speaker C: I just remember how beautiful it was, how. I mean, the whole place is so gorgeous. Yeah. I have a picture someplace in my files here with me and in front of the mannequins, and James is photobombing me in the background. I had no idea he's sticking his head and making that crazy James Remar looking face. But, yeah, that was a quick. I think a quick job. Quick tv was a quick job for me, but yeah. And that's. I first met you.
[00:15:15] Speaker D: You also did have some Freddy's.
[00:15:17] Speaker C: I did, yeah. I did nightmare on Elm street two, three, four. And the first tv series, which Mister Adler also.
And that was all before tales.
[00:15:28] Speaker D: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm simply laying out, you know, for. For the audience that there were connections that preceded crypt, that, you know, some of us, we kind of bumped into each other a little bit beforehand.
[00:15:41] Speaker C: Who knew?
[00:15:43] Speaker D: As you also have a children of the corn on your resume, it's just not the one that we did.
[00:15:48] Speaker C: Yes, I was. I think I did work on three.
I went off to do. It was the middle of tales, and I think when I left, I couldn't do the wraparounds, direct the wraparounds. And Gil took over. I remember I went off and directed Hellraiser four, which is now an Alan Smithy. I'm very proud of that. Took my name off. But one of the producers was finishing children of corn three or four or something, I think it was three, and asked me to help him out. So I was doing that. Prior to directing, it was to doing the effects for children in corn. Which one did you guys do?
[00:16:21] Speaker D: Two.
We are guilty. I'm sorry. Responsible for reviving the whole stupid series.
[00:16:28] Speaker C: Oh, great.
It was dying, and then you guys gave it.
[00:16:32] Speaker D: It was dead. Nobody wanted to do it. There's a whole story. I'm not going to bother with it here. But there's a whole story how. That's how that silly movie got made.
[00:16:43] Speaker C: That's hilarious.
[00:16:44] Speaker D: But anyway. All right, so you know, there were. There were a lot of associations with Kevin before we got to the. To the cryptkeeper.
[00:16:52] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:16:53] Speaker D: John, how did you.
[00:16:55] Speaker E: I had no association with any of you assholes.
[00:16:59] Speaker D: Lucky you.
[00:17:01] Speaker F: And he did everything he possibly could to continue that.
[00:17:05] Speaker E: It's true, actually.
Am I turning green? It doesn't look like I'm coming on. Am I coming on when I speak?
[00:17:13] Speaker D: No.
You look lovely.
[00:17:16] Speaker E: Thank you. No, you have that thing where it turns green whoever's speaking at whatever time.
[00:17:22] Speaker D: Oh, yeah. No, you were yellowing up.
You were the highlighted speaker.
[00:17:28] Speaker E: Fabulous. There you go. All right. Are we seen all the time?
[00:17:32] Speaker D: No.
The YouTube version of this will simply be the gallery review.
[00:17:38] Speaker E: Got it. Got it. All right, cool. Just so I know, just so I'm not picking my nose in the middle of, you know, Gil's interview, I just want to know these.
[00:17:47] Speaker D: There's. There's no time off.
[00:17:50] Speaker E: My association was because of HBO and first in ten. Yeah, I had, you know, it's strangely, one star search as a stand up comic in 1985.
[00:18:08] Speaker D: Why do you say strangely?
[00:18:10] Speaker E: Because I wasn't a stand up comic at the time. I was doing an off Broadway show called three guys Naked from the waist down.
[00:18:17] Speaker D: Waist down, yeah. Yeah.
[00:18:18] Speaker E: Which starred myself and Scott Bakula and Jerry Kolker, who wrote the piece and who I told you, you reminded me of in all the positive ways. But, Alan. But, you know, just as a writer, a brilliant writer, I'm glad it wasn't.
[00:18:36] Speaker D: One of those Niagara Falls kind of relationships.
[00:18:39] Speaker B: Slowly I turn by step, inch by inch, inch by inch.
[00:18:46] Speaker E: There's got to be a crypt keeper one for that.
But literally, they, you know, they approached me while I was doing the show and said, we want you to be on star Search. And I said, what is a singer? Because it was a musical, you know, think dream girls, but with stand up comics. And it was a big hit off Broadway, and they saw me in it, and everybody thought that I was, you know, this untethered kind of, you know, Andy Kaufman ish, William Robin Williams kind of stand up. And here I was playing a part, and it said, no, we want you to come on as a stand up comic. And I was like, well, you know, I'm not really a stand up comic. And they go, well, you can win $100,000. I'm like, fuck. Have you seen my act? You know, so literally, you know, I was, you know, on there making up this shit as I was going along, and I didn't really have an act, so I was doing, you know, voices and characters. And I'd do, like, the wizard of Oz in two and a half minutes. And I, you know, they would give me two and a half minutes, and every time I won, I'd have to come back on, you know, and I'd have to come up with another bit. So, you know, Kevin's walking out on me already.
Anyway, it was something we said. Something. Yes, definitely something we said.
[00:19:56] Speaker C: Hello.
[00:19:58] Speaker E: And, but so, you know, when I was, my first series was first in ten, which was HBO's first series, and, you know, I got a call from my agent saying, listen, they want you to come audition for tales from the crypt. And I was like, oh, my God, they're making that into a series. I had collected the comic books as a kid. I couldn't believe it, you know, I used to have to hide those comic books from my mother. I'd put them in my Casper comics, you know, because they were like, oh, yes, delinquency. You know, of course, it's so funny. I tell people to, you know, watch our behind the screams, you know, in the dvd set. And, you know, how about how bizarre it was that those comic books were, you know, pre code were so, you know, scandalous.
[00:20:46] Speaker D: They were subversive. They were genuinely subversive. That, that's why they were great juvenile delayed delinquency.
[00:20:52] Speaker E: So I was like, yeah, I want to go down an audition. And then when I found out I get to go down to Kevin Yeager's studio to audition, I was like, oh, my God. I couldn't believe it. I remember walking into the studio and just, you know, nobody stopped me. Nobody went like, what are you doing here? And I just kept walking around looking at all this stuff because Kevin was in the back, you know, recording people on a boombox, as I remember, with, like, a little lav.
[00:21:17] Speaker D: No, I'm going to stop you for 1 second, John, because you're about to get into, into prime territory, and we'll never go back to.
[00:21:24] Speaker E: Okay, great.
[00:21:24] Speaker D: I wanted to, I wanted to just talk a little Baltimore before you got full cryptkeeper.
[00:21:30] Speaker E: You got it.
[00:21:31] Speaker D: Because we both come from Baltimore.
[00:21:33] Speaker E: Oh, how did I not know that?
[00:21:36] Speaker D: I don't know that we ever talked about it before.
[00:21:40] Speaker E: Embarrassed to be from Baltimore.
[00:21:44] Speaker D: Well, hey, you know, I moved to New York first, and then I moved as far away from. As I could. I would have moved further, but I ran out of real estate.
[00:21:53] Speaker E: I came from a really good part of Baltimore.
[00:21:56] Speaker D: Yeah, well, well, good for you.
[00:22:00] Speaker E: I love Baltimore.
Yeah, go on, Edgar Allan Poe. Come on.
[00:22:05] Speaker D: So, so you still have a good relationship with. With Baltimore.
[00:22:09] Speaker E: Yeah. My family's all still back there. My dad's 98 years old, my mom, 92.
[00:22:15] Speaker D: You went to Lockraven High. Did they live out in that part of.
[00:22:19] Speaker E: Yeah, by their locker room reservoir. And, you know, it's a nice part of Baltimore.
[00:22:23] Speaker D: Yeah, it's very cool.
[00:22:25] Speaker E: You know, a lot of people didn't even know Locke Raven was, you know, named after Raven. You know, the raven by Edgar Allan Poe. They were like, oh, it must be because there's a lot of ravens around the reservoir. It's like, no, yeah. Reservoir was named after the Edgar Allan Poe, you know, story of the Raven.
[00:22:43] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:22:44] Speaker E: But it was kind of a dark place to grow up. We used to have. We used to have something called Twilight movie, and it'd be like, 04:00 in the afternoon. I have done my homework. My mom was making dinner. We had five kids in my family, Channel 13.
[00:22:59] Speaker D: It was chat. It was WJZ.
[00:23:01] Speaker E: There you go.
[00:23:02] Speaker D: And I watched that, too. Keep going. Keep going.
[00:23:05] Speaker E: Well, you know, it would have everything from, like, Doris day movies to, you know, attack of the 50 foot woman moth, Marx brothers. Marx Brothers, WC fuels, you know, and then they would also have all that. All the universal horror monster movies and the Roger Corman stuff, like Tingler and House of Wax and, you know, the fly and that kind of thing. And so that was what, everything that I loved. I couldn't believe that, you know, all the stuff that I loved growing up was the kind of thing that I was getting auditioned for, you know? So it's. It was kind of fitting, you know?
[00:23:38] Speaker D: And so suddenly, there you are. Now you're in Kevin's studio walking around, and you're about to audition for this thing now. So you had seen.
All right, so was. Was the crypt keeper's. The face, as we know him, was that finished? By the time?
[00:23:54] Speaker E: You know, there were different. There were different versions of it, as I remember. You know, Kevin had on one of his. On one of his, you know, table top benches that he was working on, and they were all similar at that point. But, you know, Kevin had later showed me some other sketches and some of his, you know, clay figurines that he had sculpted, but I think that most of them, there was one that had a nose, but I think the other two had no noses. You can correct me if I'm wrong, Kevin.
[00:24:21] Speaker C: No, that's right.
[00:24:22] Speaker E: This is what I remember. And. But they, you know, I generally got the picture of, you know, the rotting flesh and the, you know, and it was funny. Cause there were a couple of other hackers in there preparing to audition for Kevin. And they were. I remember them looking at the scripts, Kevin, and going, be careful what you ask for. This is terrible. They're like, what is this shit? And I could see them trying to be really scary and mean and all this stuff. I'm like, you guys don't get this. This is fucking Shakespeare to this guy, you know? And I'm going, okay. You got, you know, the Alfred Hitchcock style of punting, and you've got the, you know. And then, of course, you know, I had been doing the wizard of Oz in my act. I was like, you know, I'll throw in the Margaret Hamilton laugh and all this stuff. And I go. And I can see Kevin. When I get into Kevin's little back area where he's recording people, I could see that he's like, been sitting there for hours going, what?
[00:25:25] Speaker D: You do one more actor, dude?
[00:25:26] Speaker E: Yeah, I gotta hear one more fucking version of something that doesn't work.
[00:25:31] Speaker B: And I start doing this for him. Hello, kitties.
[00:25:36] Speaker E: And he starts, he goes like this. He's pointing at me going like this, you know, keep going in that direction, you know, and I'm laughing at him. Laughing at me. And I'm going, oh, this is perfect. The cryptkeeper laughs at his own jokes. This is perfect, you know? And I start doing it for him. And that's mostly what I remember about that. About how, like, I was like, oh, good. He liked it, you know, of course, I'm sitting there thinking, it's. It's HBO. Nobody's got HBO yet. Hardly anybody has HBO. Nobody's gonna see this. I'm already on an HBO series.
[00:26:08] Speaker C: I think it was the first tv series, too, that HBO was doing, I think.
[00:26:12] Speaker E: Well, I had been on first and ten, and then also some Brian Ben.
[00:26:16] Speaker D: Ben show.
[00:26:17] Speaker E: Yeah, dream on. I had. I was recurring on dream on, but.
[00:26:20] Speaker D: But those were tv shows.
[00:26:22] Speaker E: Yeah, this was, this was like the anthology series. I mean, it. There's a great story that you probably guys all know about how, like, when they showed these in the theater as a, you know, cast and crew screening and a promotional thing, that there was some guys sitting in front of me that were like, crew guys or something, and they're like, oh, my God, this is great tv. And the other guy goes, it's not tv, it's HBO. And the two, you know, the two execs look at each other like, oh, we're stealing that. And they did, you know, it was like, it was amazing. But, you know, Kevin I got a call. They said, you know, Kevin really liked you, wants you to go, you know, see Joel Silver and Richard Donner. And I had to drive all the way out into the corner of, you know, the end of Radford, wherever that hits, you know, like by the Santa Monica. I mean, you know, the Mojave desert somewhere. I don't know where you guys were, but they were in some little trailer that was all like, fake paneling. And I did it for them. And they were like, great, we'll see you on the set. And I was like, oh, my God, it's got to be the easiest thing that I ever got.
[00:27:32] Speaker C: Well, you deserved it.
[00:27:34] Speaker E: Thank you.
[00:27:35] Speaker C: The deal I made with Joel was about directing and writing. So he said that you can eventually do this, that Bob Zemeckis was going to be the one to audition and do everything. But he goes off and he was working on, I think, two or three of back to the future. I can't. He became unavailable. But they always said, you can. You can run it. And it was, I think they were frightened of puppets. I think that's the overall scared them. So they go, can you do, handle this? I said, sure, sure. You know, and I, and, you know, we had Rick Overton. You remember Rick Overton? Yes, stand up comedian.
[00:28:06] Speaker E: Good. For sure.
[00:28:07] Speaker C: Michael Winslow came in. You know, the guy that does all the things from police, academic. They did police, yeah, academy. And they did, you know, nice auditions. But I got to tell you that what happened was, and what I'd had everybody do is come look at the cryptkeeper so that they could have a visual, right. And, you know, like you said, the rotting throat and all that, and told. Told them what I was doing. Not sure if the nose is going to stay or not, all that stuff. So that's right. On with what John was saying. And then I had them first go back with a casting director and, and just read the lines without me being in the room because I didn't want to first hear it without seeing John's face. I wanted to imagine the crypt keeper and match that up without seeing that. So that's what I did with everybody. And I remember Michael Winslow came out and he was very, very cocky. I don't mean in a bad way. He was kind of like, I just gave you the crypt, you don't have to look at anybody else. It was that kind of attitude. And he just wasn't right at all. I mean, it was like he did things that, where I couldn't even understand him. But what got me about John, when he came in, and he. So he did the audition first. I mean, he laid it down on tape. It was just cassette tape, you know, back then. I went in and listened to it, and I think I remember pulling him back in to have him doing it again in front of me. And that's why I think what he's saying, the reaction was seeing him.
[00:29:24] Speaker E: I didn't remember that.
[00:29:25] Speaker C: I couldn't believe that. I couldn't believe that voice came out of this nice guy, this normal looking guy. And I wanted to see it for real. Like, what is that voice? And then what got me, what killed it was the laugh. I mean, and I was. My assignment was to bring in three voices out of all the. They sent me, I don't know, 20 people or so, and almost these stand up comedians like John. And so they said, just pick three, and we'll all decide together. And so I walked in, and this is no lie. I walked in with one tape, and it was yours, and I gave it to Joel. I went into his office, and I sat. We had this little console on the side of his desk, and, you know, we both pulled up chairs, and he popped it in. You know, he's like. He was like a kid. He just loved this stuff. And he was just real close to the. To the speaker. And I said, I don't care what you say. I don't. You know, you can go look at other people. I'm not interested. I said, this guy. Is it the voice? Is it. The laugh is incredible. You're. I've looked at 20 guys. They don't even hold a candle. And I'm not just blowing smoke up your heiny. I'm telling you, this was. You blew me out of the water. And to this day, it's like that voice is just the classic voice with a character, because that's. That's how great it is. So I said, here it is. That's it. That's all I have to say. And so then he said, well, I'll call him and have him come in. And that's. I think you went out to meet them. I wasn't there. But you went out to meet Joel and then Donner. But I already said, I'm not doing. I basically say, I'm not doing. I'm not kidding. I said, I'm not interested. This guy. This guy has everything. And as soon as Joel heard it, he just. Huge smile on his face, and he was shaking his head, you know, doing all that stuff. So I knew you were in at that point, but they had to make sure that at least one of the executives had signed off on it, too. And that was dick.
[00:31:06] Speaker E: That's awesome.
[00:31:06] Speaker C: And that was, that was what I remember, you know, about. About the whole process and finding John. And I was so, so happy because what happens? And, you know, you guys all know this, auditioning people. You got to look at, you just want the person to walk in and give you the character. You know, you just want them to say, here's your lead character. Right? And that's what John did. He walked in and it was just.
[00:31:27] Speaker D: Like, oh, my God, it's like buying a house.
It's like buying a house, you know, within a matter of seconds. Yes, this is it. Or there's a fatal flaw here.
[00:31:37] Speaker C: Yeah, absolutely. So that. I mean, it was just, that's. I was so happy when he left. I can't. I'm smiling like that. I was so happy when you left because it was just like, this is the guy. They're not going to argue with me. I know they won't. And I think that gave me the confidence to walk in and because, you know, as we all know, it's hard to tell Joel what to do, but he. But I just had confidence because I knew that they would say. They wouldn't say no.
[00:32:00] Speaker E: You know, it's amazing because you, you know, very often. And back then, I had been auditioning for, you know, major pilots and stuff like that. You know, here I was on a series, but it was HBO, which was easier to get. I mean, I think I was supposed to do two episodes, and they laughed the whole time I worked. And I wound up on it six years, but it was. But, you know, first intent, but, you know, the rest of the stuff, I mean, they, they make a contract with you where you're like, you're going to get paid $25,000 a week if you get it, and you get nothing if you don't. And then you have to go be funny in the room and you're like, holy shit, you know? And I was thinking, okay, this is, this is HBO. You know, maybe people won't even see it. And it's something I loved as a kid, and I'm just going to make this as fun as it is. And I already knew that I had just. If I had walked out of Kevin's studio and had a lot of fun with Kevin, that was all I cared about, you know, got to see some of his stuff on the wall and all that stuff. And, you know, so in some ways, it became like, the easiest thing that I ever got because I just. Because it was.
[00:33:01] Speaker C: It was also one audition thing, basically. It wasn't. You had to go back and do it, have callbacks.
[00:33:06] Speaker E: That's it.
[00:33:07] Speaker C: That was it. Let me ask you something. Just because at one point, either the first year, the second year, something, they came to me and said, we're not. We're not being able to make a deal with John. Something happened with your deal.
[00:33:21] Speaker E: I wanted more. I wanted more than scale.
I wanted double scale instead of wanted.
[00:33:27] Speaker D: To get paid scale plus 20, you.
[00:33:30] Speaker C: Something happened. And Joel said, we have to find another crypt keeper voice. And I just. I was like. I was, like, falling apart. Like, what are you talking about? So they go out to Burbank Sound studio in Burbank, and this old guy. I don't know who it was. This old guy is behind this mic. They said, just go over there and listen to him. So I went over there, and he was fucking terrible. Excuse me. He was.
He was so bad. And he was. He looked at me, like, at the time, like 58 or something. It was just like, what? Some old friend of Donner's probably. I don't know, but he was just. And kind of, thank God. And I just called up Joe. I said, you guys are out of your mind. You guys are out of your mind. I don't know who this guy is. You got to go make a deal backwards. So what happened with. Can you talk about what happened with that?
[00:34:15] Speaker E: Oh, yeah. Well, you know, I mean, literally, you know, I had already done two seasons at scale, which was fine. And, you know, I mean, it's hard, hard work. And I was doing two other series. I was on a network series as well at the time, and I was like, you know what? They could pay me double scale. Or my manager, you know, who's. She's no longer with us. She died at 40 from cancer, but she used to be right in Joel's face. She was, like, one of the only people I've ever seen who wasn't scared of Joel Silver at all. She'd be like, Joel, you're sitting at a Frank Lloyd Wright desk. Sell that desk. Whatever money you get for it, give it to John. He'll never ask you for another. How's that? All right, I'll give him double scale. You know, whatever. I. You know, but literally, we just want to double scale. Just to just let us know that I was coming in and getting paid something besides scale, you know, because they never gave me more than a day player contract.
[00:35:09] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:35:10] Speaker E: You know, I mean, like you were saying, they. Once they started licensing it, they were licensing the show for nothing. I was getting residuals for $0.13. You know, I was just like, that's because how little they paid me. But it was fine. Everybody was working for what they could get paid to make something really special. But, you know, there were such jerks about it. I was like, who cares? You know, it's like, I love doing this show, but, you know, you guys can pay me double scale, you know, and. And they were like, well, we're gonna fire you then.
[00:35:40] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. That was just a big threat. I think the whole thing, seeing this other guy audition was something they were just trying to say, hey, yeah, we're in auditions for southern people. Just, like, managing that now.
[00:35:52] Speaker D: This was after the second season.
[00:35:54] Speaker C: I can't remember when it was. I almost want to think it's. It was even the first season, like, after the first few episodes, there's.
[00:35:59] Speaker D: I.
[00:35:59] Speaker C: Do you remember, John, when it was.
[00:36:00] Speaker E: Well, you know, they had done the three episodes, and then we didn't know if they were going to get it picked up. Of course, they brought in Gil.
[00:36:05] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:36:06] Speaker E: And, oh, yeah, we can afford to do this.
[00:36:08] Speaker D: No, no, we didn't come in until the third season, Gil and I.
[00:36:12] Speaker E: So it was after the second season.
[00:36:14] Speaker D: Yeah. So. Because that's. I just wanted to square up, because I remember it happening while Gil and I were running the show.
I would have been surprised if it happened twice, but it only happened once. Joe only tried to can your ass once.
[00:36:30] Speaker C: He tried to can all the puppeteers.
[00:36:33] Speaker E: At one point, too, I was going to say that.
[00:36:36] Speaker C: Called me in the office. I brought my younger brother Chris with me. You guys remember Chris at all?
[00:36:40] Speaker D: Sure. Sure.
[00:36:41] Speaker C: We're still working together. But he.
[00:36:44] Speaker E: He.
[00:36:44] Speaker C: I said, you got to see. I want you to be a witness. I don't know what's going to come out of this guy's mouth. So come in. And he. At one point, he said he was. He just would work himself up into, like, this, you know, anger.
[00:36:55] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:36:56] Speaker C: And, you know, being the powerful producer, you know, front that he would put on. But he said, you know, if I could take all the puppeteers, because what he wanted to do was get it down to one puppeteer. I said, joel, you know, if it's not broke, why fix it? You know, it's working. You know, there's six people, and we may be able to shave one off, but I, you know, to do all that now, it's a whole reworking. It would cost more money. To figure that out, you need computers, which were just starting, you know, to record and play back. I said, you know, let's just keep it. And he just started getting worked himself up, and so he starts screaming, if I could take all the puppeteers and put them in a box and sink them to the bottom of the ocean right now and get away with it, I would do it.
[00:37:33] Speaker D: I would fuck it.
[00:37:34] Speaker C: He's screaming. I would do it, you know, and I just looked over at my brother Chris, like, you know, you taking all this down? Because.
[00:37:43] Speaker E: I wind up in a box in the bottom.
[00:37:45] Speaker D: Make sure to write clearly.
[00:37:47] Speaker C: So, yeah, that was just a funny thing, you know, the first time I came in to show Joel the pictures of the sketches I did, he keeps me waiting, you know, like, I remember Gil and I waited for 45 minutes one time in his lobby, like everybody, right? So he says, okay, joel, see? And they walk in, and he's on the phone pacing back and forth. And this is when he was at. Before he took over Donner's office, when he was in his smaller office. And I looked to the couch, the side of the couch, and Steven Spielberg is sitting down, not to drop. He's sitting there on the couch, patiently waiting for Joel to talk to him. And he hadn't talked to him yet, so he waves me in, sit down. And so I go to sit down, and I'm just. I say, hey, how you doing? I look over at Steve, and he goes, fine. How are you? Fine. And then I said. I said, you here for tales? He said, yeah, you know, I did this show, you know, what was that show that he did, that tales?
[00:38:39] Speaker D: It was amazing stories.
[00:38:41] Speaker C: Yes, amazing story. So. And he said, joel wants to be involved with this, and I'm not sure, you know, and I said, oh, I'm doing the host the show. And so I pulled out the book, and so Stephen and I are looking at the pictures, and he picked one that he thought. I asked. I said, if you would pick one of these, which one it would be. It was my least favorite that he picked, but he picked one that had, like, a riff raft from Rocky horror looking kind of what I did. That was his favorite. And then finally, Joel gets off, and then Stephen, you know, they had a few words about, no, I'm not. I'm not interested, and thank you for bringing me in. And then he split, and I finished my meeting with Joel. But that's. That was kind of a funny little thing. So he had a little bit to do with tales in the crypt.
[00:39:22] Speaker E: That's awesome. You know, I mean, he did hire me to come back and do a cameo in casper.
[00:39:27] Speaker C: Oh, yes, yes.
[00:39:29] Speaker E: Because he loved the crypt keeper so much.
[00:39:31] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:39:31] Speaker E: We auditioned for one of the uncles, you know, the three ghost uncles, and I didn't get it. But then I, you know, like, my manager calls me and goes, I just got a call from Steven Spielberg. I was like, what? They go, yeah. He asked if you would be so kind as to come do. And I'm obviously, he had made a deal, you know, with Joel or whatever, to have the crypt keeper do a. Yeah. You know, and obviously they would have needed you or the.
[00:39:57] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:39:58] Speaker E: And, um, so it pre recorded, of course, but, yeah, so, you know, I mean, they called me. I was like, how bizarre. How bizarre to go. He loves the crib keeper, so he didn't pick the right one, but he wound up loving the one you picked.
[00:40:13] Speaker C: Yeah, I guess so.
[00:40:17] Speaker E: So anyway, it's all on you, Alan.
[00:40:20] Speaker C: That's all on you, babe.
[00:40:21] Speaker D: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So then when Gil and I told the story in the first season how we got sucked into this, Gil was. HBO really trusted Gill with problematic shows. He had just solved a big problem for them on their, was it the Vietnam war stories in Savannah? And suddenly they had this show called tales from the crypt with these big executive producers. And the second season had gone wildly over budget, and there's going to be one more season, just a third season, and someone needed to see it out.
And so I think the expectation was that Gil would manage the budget more prudently than it had been managed during the second season.
And I was Gil's writing partner, and I think what got me in the door, well, being Gil's writing partner got me in the door, or what I think sold me to Barry Josephson was my whole approach, really. I love the comics as well.
When I watched the show, my biggest question about the cryptkeeper was, what does he do when he clocks out at the end of the day?
[00:41:36] Speaker A: What does he do when he's not.
[00:41:38] Speaker D: Being the cryptkeeper, when he goes home and he takes off the cryptkeeper stuff?
[00:41:44] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:41:45] Speaker D: Who is he really? And that's the cryptkeeper that I wanted to spend time with. And fortunately, Barry was cool with that.
You know, the puns, unfortunately, came with the territory.
That was not.
[00:42:01] Speaker E: That's the thing that keeps him quotable. Why everybody.
[00:42:04] Speaker D: Oh, gosh. Yes. Now, I.
[00:42:06] Speaker F: Well, in actual fact, when you said that to Barry, and I think it was related to Joel, and I think they were sort of, like, nodding their heads.
[00:42:14] Speaker C: Uh huh. Uh, huh.
[00:42:15] Speaker F: I don't think they had a clue what we were talking about.
[00:42:17] Speaker D: Oh, certainly not. Oh, no, no, no. I don't think they expected where ultimately, you know, we, you know, the cryptkeeper was, was an incredibly fun character through the first two seasons, but, but they're gotten a kind of, kind of sameness to him. You know, the lower birth episode is different because it's about him.
[00:42:36] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:42:36] Speaker D: Um, but, you know, when we suddenly opened, opened the crypt keepers world, he suddenly became more marketable.
[00:42:46] Speaker C: Yeah. And you guys wrote the, the one where, um, he's in bed with some. With cor.
[00:42:52] Speaker D: Yes.
[00:42:54] Speaker C: They give the head. Keep it, too. Yeah, that was, that was what I thought. Okay, we're going now.
[00:42:59] Speaker B: I love a ghoul who give you head and then let you keep it.
[00:43:03] Speaker D: Yes.
You know, I was always rather fond of the hole in Juan.
[00:43:09] Speaker E: Golfing as my Caddy Juan. I just got a hole in Juan.
[00:43:17] Speaker D: I gotta tell you that. I would write them in batches. It was the only way to do it. I would sit down and as we were going to record them in batches, this was going to be usually 48 hours of absolute pain.
[00:43:31] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:43:31] Speaker D: Absolute pain. Writing those was so fucking hard, I can't tell you.
[00:43:36] Speaker C: Well, I, you know, the first couple seasons, I got to help out and write some of them, and they are extremely hard to do.
[00:43:42] Speaker D: Oh, my God.
[00:43:43] Speaker E: Tried delivering them for over 30 years because people still interview me as the crib keeper and stuff. And I have to not only try to quote some of the ones that you guys wrote over the years, but also come up with on the fly. And it's. It's amazing how much my brain works that way now. And I don't know. I got kind of a love hate relationship with it, but, yeah, that's.
[00:44:08] Speaker D: That is. That's exactly what it is. It is you. When. Because when you come up with a really good one, it's. Man, it's transcendent. It's. It's like one of the funniest jokes ever.
[00:44:19] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Well, John, you're great at improving him, too. I mean, we did that horror hall of fame.
[00:44:26] Speaker E: Oh, my God.
[00:44:27] Speaker C: Remember that? And we were. That was live television. Well, at least we were recording it live. We couldn't make any mistakes.
[00:44:33] Speaker E: Brock winkless. And they're really good at just following me, too.
[00:44:39] Speaker C: In the sticks and watching your mouth and everything you were doing, and you were just off doing your own thing. So he had to follow along. But you guys pulled it off.
[00:44:48] Speaker E: They're unbelievable. The puppeteers were unbelievable. But this is also about the time, too, was at what point did we. Were you able to, you know, add some servos and have the cryptkeeper be able to speak where we could have him be faster and funnier?
[00:45:02] Speaker C: The first season, the whole idea was, do you remember Jack, the character Jack from american werewolf in London as he slowly rotted, David Naughton's friend who gets attacked, rotting. And so we kind of talked about that a lot, about having no lips and so, you know, having all that rotted away. And then we. After the first season, you know, even the first three, it was like, okay, there's something missing here. We need to. Because you can't see him pronounce it. It's just ends up being a, you know, a or whatever, you know, moving his lips. And I remember Bob, I heard from Joel, you know, Joel was no, you know, had no, you know, issues with telling me how other people felt or whatever. So he just said, you know, Bob hates the crypt keeper. I said, what do you mean? Hates the crypt keeper? He said, he hates. He hates the way he talks. I said, what are you talking about? He said, he just says he doesn't speak very well. I said, well, what do you mean? What can I do? What's going on? So I walked up to Bob at a Joel silver party in one of his Frank Lloyd Wright houses on.
And I walked right up to him. I said, so I heard you hate the crypt keeper. Can you tell me about that? And Bob was like, no, no, no. Wait, wait, wait. That's not what he said. But he was saying basically that the lips weren't moving and that, you know, it didn't look very good because the lips weren't right. We had a long talk about it, so I went right back, and the next season or the next few, and I re sculpted him, so I gave him full, you know, full lips, even though it was chunks missing. I gave him full lips. And then we did put more servo work into those lips. And so he came back. I think it was season two, at least on. I know, on lower birth. By the time I was directing that episode that he had full lip mobility, and so we improved him.
[00:46:34] Speaker E: Yeah, well, you know, because I remember I auditioned, you know, for you with, you know, him being able to do, you know, being a stand up comic. I was, you know, bringing all this kind of delivery to him. And the first time we went in the studio, Kevin's like, the mouth is like, you know, only opens about this. Can we make him? And I go, okay.
[00:46:54] Speaker B: Well, I'll talk slower and more ominous.
[00:46:58] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah.
Quiet stuff. And then you'd go really big. I love that John. How John would do that. He would take it and his voice would go real, that guttural kind of. It hurt almost to listen to it. It was so painful to listen to.
[00:47:13] Speaker B: I'd be like that, you know, down.
[00:47:14] Speaker C: It like that kind of thing. And then it suddenly would be this way, up high. By the way, did you guys know that the very first time you hear the crypt keeper in the very first episode, I can't remember if it's Zemeckis's or Donner's. The very first one. It's my voice. And the only reason is, is because we were missing the intro of where he says, you know, good evening, tales from the crypt. Good evening, boys and Boyles and ghouls, and welcome to the crypt. And the first time we were missing that. So I just stood in to do it on, you know, live on the thing, just to fill it in. And then John was going to come. We never had John come back in the. And I couldn't believe it stuck. So I feel a part of you.
[00:47:56] Speaker E: You are, dude.
[00:47:57] Speaker C: It's actually.
[00:47:59] Speaker E: I mean, now I'm finding out. I probably never would have got the part if you, Zemeckis, hadn't been doing his movies.
[00:48:06] Speaker C: That's right.
[00:48:07] Speaker D: It's our own release.
[00:48:08] Speaker C: I was meant to take over eventually, but what happened was Zemeckis went off and then Donner was going to take over and direct, and then I would eventually build. Bill Tytler at the time was producing, and he's, you know, he was saying, we'll get to you, like episode six or maybe next season or something. And then I did a bunch of storyboards. And again, I think people were frightened of it being a puppet and didn't understand it, so they. They ended up. I showed him the storyboards and I walked him through the whole thing. And Tyler's there, and we're on the set. We're actually on the set of the crypt right behind you, someplace over there. And.
And he said, okay, great, kid. Good luck, and slapped me in the back and walked off. And Tyler freaked out, ran after him. And that was it. And that's how I actually got it, because he said, he'll be fine. He'll be fine. He'll be fine. So then Bill was there on the set, over. He was calling action and cut with me. And I finally asked. I said, can I talk to you for a second? I took him off set and I said, we can't both be doing this. If I'm doing this, you can't be here. I said, I need you to leave, or I'm. I can't do this. So he was. He kind of went, okay, sorry, I'm just a little. You've never directed before. I did some second unit, but he was like, you never really directed before. So I just. I'm nervous. I said, well, just. Just let me give. Give me. Give me a few, you know, give me the day. And if you don't like what you see the next day, you can replace me or do it yourself or whatever. And so then I got the word that was okay.
[00:49:30] Speaker E: Wow.
[00:49:30] Speaker C: They gave me. But I almost didn't get the job because of, you know, because of that, but.
[00:49:35] Speaker E: And they're. And they're brilliant. I mean, they're. They're fucking brilliant. Oh, my God. You know, little did we know. And now that I'm, you know, go to a lot of conventions and stuff. At first, over a certain number of years of the show, you know, being, you know, moving its way to Sci-Fi and this kind of stuff, I would go to a convention and some people would come up, oh, I love tales from the crip, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But once we got to the age group of kids who had been sneaking to watch this show became adults, young adults, my lines turned into, you know, huge lines of people who swear that the crypt keeper was their gateway drug to horror, you know? And I say that as a joke to them, and they don't laugh.
[00:50:22] Speaker B: They go, yeah, I'm so glad to have popped your scary.
[00:50:32] Speaker F: I can't tell you how many times. Many times Alan and I were asked, and we at some of these conventions, and they would say, okay, so can you reveal now, like, who's the actor that plays the cryptkeeper?
[00:50:44] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:50:45] Speaker F: And we would say, there is no actor. And they go, come on, you could tell us. It's a puppet. He's a puppet run by five guys. They go, yeah, come on, it's an actor.
[00:50:56] Speaker D: It was. It was always. Even as someone who. Who was part of the group that made the crypt keeper, watching the crypt keeper come to life on set was always quite.
There was a strange bit of, I'll use the word magic, for want of a better word.
And though, hey, I sat in recording studio, but John, I watched him record it. I hear the damn beep track. I see all the puppeteers. And then, you know, Kevin, you'd call action, and suddenly he'd come to life.
[00:51:31] Speaker C: You know, the funny thing is, is that that same thing happens to me whenever I do an animatronic. There's a lot less animatronics, obviously this today, but every time I put that first skin on and up the mechanism and have it and do it to recording or something like John's voice, I have the same exact feeling, even though I did it all. When you put it together, there's something about, you know, your element, you know, writing element, and then John's voice and all this stuff, and having those three things come together in front of you and you're going, well, I know I was such a big part of this, and it was magic for me too. It has the same effect every time, whether it was Chucky or anything that I did, you know, Brad Durst voice or whatever, the whole thing coming together, the writing and stuff.
[00:52:14] Speaker D: Oh, it is atheist that I am. There was something spiritual took a hold of the damn thing.
[00:52:22] Speaker C: I always tell people I don't. This may sound weird, but you feel a little bit like a creator in a sense, the creator. Something by putting together that something didn't exist before, and now it's alive and moving, even though you hear the servo motors and you know that you're playing back John's voice and all that stuff. But something about all of that together, it is a magical moment.
[00:52:42] Speaker E: And I did say so much so that that's why we had a child, a children's audience. I mean, every single one of them tells walk up by the tv and they heard, first they'd hear this voice, and they go over there and they'd see this thing moving and every like, they were like, it scared the shit out of me, but I had to watch it. Yeah, it's like the roller coaster effect where they go, we're gonna go on that. And you're like, no, I'm not gonna get on that. Oh, finally. Go on it. It's like, I want one bigger. I want one batter, I want one. You know, it's like that kind of thing.
[00:53:13] Speaker C: And the fact that the heavy crews. Go ahead, go ahead.
[00:53:16] Speaker F: I'm just thinking that, you know, what you were saying earlier, I think we all shared that, because whether we were writing the puns or writing what he said, and you were, and figuring out, is he. Is he a doctor? Is he a beetle, is he a chiropractor? When we got to the place where it all came together, yes, yes, yes. It was just so tingling.
It was so painful in the sense that it was so hard to get there. But once we got there and we said, yeah, it was like. It was, like, mesmerizing. I mean, it was like, as we were doing it, it was like, wow.
[00:53:46] Speaker D: You know, and then.
And then whether you were directing Kevin or you were directing Gil, you'd. You'd yell cut, and. And he would deflate. He would just.
And suddenly, like, all the magic just like, yeah, rain right out of him, and he's a damn puppet.
[00:54:05] Speaker F: He actually got that cue from Kevin and myself because we would deflate as well.
[00:54:12] Speaker D: You should see me at the end of cut.
But, yeah, it was. It was a.
Quite a. When I writing. The writing for the cryptkeeper was. Was far more of an. Of a profound experience than I ever thought it was going to be. And I I wanted that. To have that experience. It was.
It was transcendent. I went through a lot of years. I went through a lot of dark years. We talked about that during season one, where I really. I denied.
I denied my connection to all of this stuff. I don't know what my problem. I know what my problem was.
And yet when I finally regained my mojo, the cryptkeeper is so. Is so part of me. I think of those fucking puns every goddamn day.
[00:55:05] Speaker C: Yeah, it was fun. You guys got to do even more in the writing, you know, more and more different things. Like, Gil just mentioned the Beatles. That was a great, you know, so that you got to. And you had to outdo yourself all the time. Like, you know, you know, the story is about something. It's about a carnival or it's about, you know, something else or, you know, whatever. Of course, murder is always there, but, you know, you. You had to come up with inventive ways to make it different each time. You know, I just remember, like, I remember the. God, there was a godfather one that I loved.
[00:55:35] Speaker D: Oh, sure, sure.
[00:55:37] Speaker C: The whole godfather scene, you know, shooting, too, and it was a whole thing. And then, of course, the Beatles and just having him in a different costume, you know, was great, especially with us.
[00:55:47] Speaker F: When we would talk about it, Alan. I would talk about it, and we would come up with these things, and, you know, we would meet in the morning or whatever, and he would say to me, well, what about? Or I would say, well, what about? And we'd look at each other and we would laugh, and we'd go, well, how are we going to do that? I mean, what.
[00:56:00] Speaker C: So.
[00:56:00] Speaker F: So if he's. If he's Marlon Brando or if he's a kyle.
Yeah, it was. It was really very.
It was mind boggling for us. Because we could do. We could go anywhere with it.
[00:56:13] Speaker C: Yes.
I really wasn't tied to anything you guys could do. I mean, obviously you're introducing a story, so it has to have something to do with that, but you can come up with whatever you wanted to. Right.
[00:56:25] Speaker D: Well, hey, we even took him into Forest Gump territory.
[00:56:28] Speaker C: Right? Right. That's right.
[00:56:32] Speaker B: Box of chocolate.
[00:56:34] Speaker D: Yeah, right, exactly.
[00:56:35] Speaker B: You never know what you're gonna get.
[00:56:37] Speaker E: Yeah.
[00:56:39] Speaker D: Yeah. You know, it was. But once we took him out of. Out of the crypt, in essence, you know, he could go anywhere and. And he could do literally anything. My. My favorite. My most favorites were the ones where the were. Bill Sadler worked against the cryptkeeper when he was the mummy once, and once as playing shocked poke, I think the Grim Reaper.
[00:57:04] Speaker E: Yeah.
[00:57:05] Speaker D: And that. That, to me, was just hilarious. The idea. Oh, the idea of the crypt keeper looking at the grim Reaper, thinking, God, you're so boring.
[00:57:15] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:57:20] Speaker E: People ask me about the one from oils. Well, that ends well all the time where the crypt keeper's watching me on camera.
[00:57:27] Speaker B: You know, the other hacked us are good, but this one, a regular gory Cooper, a Robert Deadford.
[00:57:37] Speaker E: You know, and I. And I remember I was like, I told Kevin, I'm going to. I go, I'm going to try to do the biggest, best laugh I've ever done, you know, and which. Probably the biggest, best one I ever did is the one that's in the opening when he pops out of the casket. Yeah, I don't think I've ever. I don't think I've ever, like, matched that one, but.
But that one was close, you know, because he's sitting there laughing.
[00:58:05] Speaker C: Yeah, it's huge. You had to go on a little bit longer than normal. You know that I hate that for some reason. I never liked that shot because Van was by himself, you know, in holding the grip keeper up, you know, and having had to. I always try to take the jerk out of puppets, you know, like the wobbly waggle.
So. And that was. He was just single handed. Like, one arm would be lifting that up and kind of trying to hold it steady. So that was the best of all the takes that we did, you know, but it's one of those things you just stick and you think, I wish I could go back and just. Just take the woggle out of it.
[00:58:35] Speaker E: It worked, man. That's the moment that all these grown kids tell me that they had to leave the room, really, that's the moment.
[00:58:46] Speaker F: And only you being the perfectionist that you were then, and you probably are now in what you work, you would see that the audiences, and even I don't. I don't think I even saw it. Or, or it wouldn't bother me if I did. If I did see it and I acknowledged it. It never for a moment took me out of it or made me feel like, oh, we should do that over.
[00:59:06] Speaker C: Yeah. And I'm not saying that this is art necessarily, but they always say art's always abandoned. Never or never finished, but always abandoned. You know, you have to give up at one point. Filmmaking is the same way. Right? Yeah, you have a cut. Go. Look, we have to walk away from this at one point, you know, so there's always those little things, but every time I see it, I go cut. One too many jerks. Just one too many jerks.
[00:59:26] Speaker E: But it was like an angry fist. He comes up.
I like this kind of thing in your face.
[00:59:32] Speaker D: You know, we all live in rewrites.
[00:59:35] Speaker C: Yeah, right, right.
[00:59:36] Speaker E: You know, they had, you know, when they had the crypt keeper at not scary farms and at, you know, Halloween horror nights in Universal, they had. They would replace the stunt show with a slasher show where blood's thrown out into the audience and the cryptkeeper would pop up in the set. And because it was one person holding him up, he moved like that. Yeah, a lot. And, you know, and I was always like, it's kind of puppety looking, but you know what? The audience loved it. It was something that fit with it. That was great. But those puppeteers were great. I miss Van and, you know.
[01:00:12] Speaker C: Yeah, we've lost three of them.
Van Snowden and Brock Winkless. And then Tony Ruprecht also was. It wasn't one of the original puppeteers, but he came on, you know, I.
[01:00:24] Speaker E: Didn'T know he lost Brock.
[01:00:25] Speaker C: Yeah, Brock. Yeah, Brock died of Ms.
He suffered from it from the time he was, like, 19. But it's amazing that he had this, you know, thing going on, and you never know it, you know, puppeteer through. I had. I mean, he told me down the line, I think, you know, you're always afraid if you have something going on to tell anybody because you'll maybe lose your job or whatever. So he kind of kept it from me. And I think I saw something like his finger twitching or something. I said, hey, what's that? And he finally told me what was going on with him. But it was way until we were already way into other projects and stuff like that. But, yeah, we lost him about. I think it was about three years ago, three or four years ago.
But and now he's with the crypt keeper.
[01:01:06] Speaker B: Right. Because you have a long life ahead of you, but an even longer death.
[01:01:13] Speaker C: Now, did you just improv that one?
[01:01:16] Speaker E: Totally.
[01:01:17] Speaker D: You are more than just a one trick pony, Kevin. You've done more than just a crypt keeper, Chucky.
[01:01:23] Speaker C: Yes.
[01:01:26] Speaker D: Now, you were there at the inception when Chucky was created.
[01:01:31] Speaker C: The very beginning. Yeah.
Met David Kirchner right after I'd done nightmare on Elm street three. And I had a big freddy snake head that had articulation to it, lips and things. And he came over and Rick Baker recommended me for the job. And he came over and saw that, and that kind of led to Chucky. And this is true. I mean, I don't know if you guys have ever heard this before, but because at the first. The first year of crypt, we didn't have a whole lot of money. So Joel just gave me what he could, you know, and I. And I had to, you know, beg and borrow and take from other things. And one of the things that Chucky and the crypt keeper share are their eyeballs. So I knew that I loved the eyeballs of what we had done for Chucky because they were. They started out kind of sky blue, and they turned these ice cold blue eyes. And I thought, you know, these would really work for the cryptkeeper and save me a lot of money. And I've got about four pair left over from Chucky that I didn't use. So I ended up putting those in the eyes. People think of the whole head was, you know, the mechanism or anything. That's all. That was all done just for the crypt keeper.
[01:02:31] Speaker D: The revelations keep dropping here.
[01:02:33] Speaker C: Yes. Yeah.
[01:02:34] Speaker E: So, yeah, you know, the kids know about it because you told me that. And I, you know, I just revealed it. Like, what? Kids were like, God, these look like chucky eyes. I go, actually, they are.
And so it got around. So I get, you know, a lot of people walk up to my table or, you know, email me or dm me and go, is it true? Is it true? And I go, yes, it is true.
[01:02:56] Speaker D: It is now completely officially confirmed.
[01:02:58] Speaker C: Is confirmed. They have the same eyes and the same window to the soul. That therefore.
[01:03:03] Speaker E: That's right.
[01:03:04] Speaker D: Wikipedia can now cite that.
[01:03:06] Speaker C: Yeah. You know, one of the fun. The funnest things that we did was the crypt jam. John, do you remember that? The crypt?
[01:03:12] Speaker E: I do. I do have a cameo with that. Somebody started singing. Singing it to me the other day, you know, and I was like, well, you know, Chucky Booker wrote that, who used to write Janet Jackson. But there is a thing with him, Chucky and I doing this thing in the background.
[01:03:26] Speaker C: Yes.
[01:03:26] Speaker E: You know, and I tell them that you directed it, and I love the tapping foot. And as you back up, it's just like a foot. There's no leg. I mean, just part of a leg connected to it.
[01:03:35] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:03:36] Speaker E: And it's really a great tune. I don't know if you guys ever knew this, but they had me promote it on Howard Stern.
[01:03:45] Speaker C: Yes, I think I did. I think I heard that, actually. Yeah.
[01:03:48] Speaker E: And so I go on, Howard Stern. And, you know, Howard at the time was like, if he doesn't know you, he's just gonna like. You know, he's gonna eat you for lunch. So I go on, and I get, hello, Howard. And he's like. He goes, I hate the cryptkeeper.
[01:04:02] Speaker B: I go, what do you mean you hate me? I'm just like you, Howard. I love to be hated.
[01:04:09] Speaker E: He's like, my God, he's laughing. He can't help laughing. He's like, okay, I love you, John. He's the puppet I can't stand. And he starts going off on it. He goes, and what is this song? He goes, is this, like, a shatner album? I go, no, it's a crypt jam. It's awesome. I could play some of it. He plays. He goes, oh, this is pretty good. But at the end, he's trying to break the dvd, and he can't break the dvd and stuff, because that's what.
[01:04:32] Speaker C: I hate about these dvd's.
[01:04:33] Speaker E: You can't break them. You know, I got a call back from Gary Della Bate, you know, works with him. He's like, oh, my God, howard just loved you. It was so great. He goes, they never had me back on, but it was.
[01:04:43] Speaker C: He never had you back on? You didn't go back on?
[01:04:46] Speaker E: No. You know, I mean, at that point, they were, like, negotiating into going into, you know, then he wound up with, you know, syndicated and all that stuff. I think he was still mainly in New York and in some syndication, but, God, I have that on. On a cassette tape somewhere.
[01:05:03] Speaker D: The early, early days, long before satellite.
[01:05:06] Speaker C: Radio, I just liked it because it was. It gave us something. It was a longer piece, obviously. I think it was a three or four minute, you know, song. But I love the fact that you.
[01:05:15] Speaker E: Had, you know, when we tried to.
[01:05:17] Speaker C: Do around rap and all that.
[01:05:19] Speaker E: Oh, my God.
[01:05:20] Speaker C: Whole nother thing, and I got to do fun things like the crypt keeper right next to this girl who was, you know, twerking, you know, well, I.
[01:05:27] Speaker E: Love you, did the flashdance thing where he throws his hair back and.
[01:05:32] Speaker C: He went his hair down. It was fantastic.
[01:05:35] Speaker E: It's funny because I remember they tried to do one with heavy d and it was not, it just didn't have the same kind of crypt keeper ish thing. This one had more of a thriller thing to it.
[01:05:44] Speaker D: Yeah, he appeared in an episode he appeared in on a dead man's chest.
[01:05:50] Speaker E: That's right.
[01:05:50] Speaker D: Billy Friedkin's episode.
[01:05:52] Speaker E: Yeah, it's a good one.
[01:05:53] Speaker C: That's right.
[01:05:54] Speaker B: The crypt keepers in the house with a groove that's nasty and mean like the effects of a guillotine. A permanent headache's the end of the mission. Cause you have entered the keeper's terravision.
[01:06:10] Speaker D: It's still so fresh.
[01:06:11] Speaker C: You remember all that? Yeah. How are you doing it? So fresh.
[01:06:15] Speaker E: Oh my God.
[01:06:17] Speaker D: What are you working on now, Kevin?
[01:06:19] Speaker C: I'm doing a tv series called Misses Davis. Just doing some, you know, I'm still in television, you know, and there's a couple other projects going on, but doing some secret stuff with I can't talk to you. I have to, of course kill us.
But yeah. And so I shouldn't even mention it, but yeah, I mean, and just keep him busy, you know, still. Still doing it, you know, not directing anymore really much, but how about you guys?
[01:06:55] Speaker D: Well, we'll get to us. Okay, John? Hey, you know, because the audience going to get sick of us. We're here to talk about you guys, but. But we'll answer the question.
John, you working all the time, man? You're like the hardest working man in show business, aren't you?
[01:07:12] Speaker E: I, you know, I feel really lucky, you know, first of all, there's, there's another thing that I can credit, you know, doing the crypt keeper with, and that was launching my voiceover career.
[01:07:21] Speaker C: Oh, wow.
[01:07:22] Speaker E: Because although people knew that I, you know, had a talent for this, especially because I did all these voices and characters in my stand up, which is why HBO even thought to bring me in on this.
You know, it seated me as one of the top voiceover people in the business. And, you know, as you get older, there are just less roles written for your age group. And of course it's more competitive because the guys who are still around are all great. You know, you like to think you're good, but there's also a lot of other really good people, you know, and I still get my share of auditions for some on camera stuff here and there and I still get offered things here and there.
[01:07:58] Speaker D: But your reel is very good by the way.
[01:08:00] Speaker E: Oh, thank you. I appreciate that.
[01:08:01] Speaker D: No, it really is. I don't know why people should hire you more.
If Gil and I can finish putting the show together. You got a job, my friend.
[01:08:11] Speaker E: I'm on it, baby.
I would love it. But, you know, I literally.
You're not counted out by anything that, you know, as a voice actor. You know, during the pandemic, I have my own little, you know, sound studio. This is not actual it, although it looks like it. I do have the microphone here. Here we go. We can push that right in there. But, you know, I was able to do some major, you know, Disney pictures, and I worked for illumination, and I worked on the new Ghostbusters and, you know, doing the little marshmallow guys and some other stuff, along with another group of crazy voiceover guys and that kind of thing. And so, you know, I mean, you could play anything, you know, any age group, any, you know, gender or any, you know, anything that even that's not alive or. Or human. So, you know, I did Flora and Ulysses, which was the. The big Disney kids movie last year.
[01:09:16] Speaker D: Right, right.
[01:09:17] Speaker E: As you know, they go, oh, he did Miko the raccoon. He must be able to do a squirrel. Okay.
[01:09:23] Speaker D: This girl must be within his range.
[01:09:25] Speaker E: Exactly.
[01:09:26] Speaker D: So rodents are your range.
[01:09:27] Speaker E: To know that. Yes. To know that's in your wheelhouse is. It's a turning wheel. But, you know, so do you do other mammals? Yes.
[01:09:38] Speaker D: What size mammal do you go up to?
So what happened then was, it's so ironic. It's to be expected. John Kassir, the guy with the studio in his house, his sound system breaks down and begins projecting through zoom.
It's like a noise in a horror movie that they're trying to kill you with. We only scratch the surface of all those stories that we have from back then.
[01:10:08] Speaker F: Yeah, there was much more pain than we were let on.
[01:10:13] Speaker D: We've gone easy on ourselves. Hey, see you next time, everybody.
The how not to make a movie.
[01:10:21] Speaker A: Podcast is executive produced by me, Alan.
[01:10:24] Speaker D: Katz, by Gil Adam, and by Jason Stein.
[01:10:27] Speaker A: Our artwork was done by the amazing.
[01:10:29] Speaker D: Jody Webster and Jason.
[01:10:30] Speaker A: Jody, along with Mando, are all the hosts of the fun and informative dads.
[01:10:35] Speaker D: From the Crip podcast.
[01:10:36] Speaker A: Follow them for what my old pal the crypt keeper would have called terrific crip content.
