by Randy Palmer
Blaisdell as the title monster takes a practice stalk up the pier steps on location for The She Creature. (Courtesy of Fred Olen Ray.)
Paul Blaisdell, Monster Maker
A Biography of the B Movie Makeup and Special Effects Artist
by RANDY PALMER
with forewords by FRED OLEN RAY and BOB BURNS
McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
Jefferson, North Carolina, and London
To the memory of my father, who took me to see
my first Paul Blaisdell movie, and
to my mother, who always knew that movies
don’t make monsters out of little boys
For Jackie
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGUING DATA ARE AVAILABLE
BRITISH LIBRARY CATALOGUING DATA ARE AVAILABLE
e-ISBN: 978-1-4766-0729-0
©1997 Randy Palmer. All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying or recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
On the cover: Poster art for the 1958 film It! The Terror from Beyond Space (MGM/UA/Photofest)
McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
Box 611, Jefferson, North Carolina 28640
www.mcfarlandpub.com
Contents
Foreword by Fred Olen Ray
Foreword by Bob Burns
Preface
A Note Concerning the Text
1—Turning Hollywood into Horrorwood
2—The Eyes Have It
3—The Mutant of Topanga Canyon
4—Venusian Vegetable
5—Blaisdell in Drag
6—Voodoo and Venom
7—Here Comes Mr. Gordon
8—Cosmic Creeps
9—Bert Gordon Strikes Back
10—Missing Monsters
11—Mars Needs Hemoglobin
12—The Last Her-rah
13—Beyond the B’s
14—Black and White and Bled All Over
15—Travesties and Tributes
16—Sunset
Appendix
Filmography
List of Names and Terms
Foreword
by Fred Olen Ray
If you had never heard of Paul Blaisdell before picking up this book, you will soon see how damned lucky you are to have stumbled onto him. Like Roger Corman and Bert I. Gordon, you too will discover the rich imagination and ingenious talents of one of Hollywood’s most creative fringe dwellers.
That it took the world so long to catch on to one of filmdom’s best-kept secrets is a true shame. That, as for many others who toiled in the empty grocery stores that passed as movie studios, his contributions were only realized after such recognition could have yielded any benefit to the creator is a crime.
I think what attracted the admiring fans to his work over the years was not only the images he conjured up into physical being, but the method with which he undertook the task. Obviously, the monsters in Day the World Ended, The She-Creature, and It Conquered the World were astonishingly original in design, but it is also the fact that Blaisdell created them in his garage out of literally nothing more than carpet-laying foam and paint that instills his fans with that certain sense of awe.
What first attracted me to the creations of Paul Blaisdell, at least in the sense that I noticed who was actually creating these monsters, were the “how to” articles in Paul’s magazine, Fantastic Monsters of the Films. In these articles Paul would provide details to knowledge-hungry kids, explaining how they could recreate the Beast with a Million Eyes or construct their own alien suit just like the one in It! the Terror from Beyond Space. Wanting nothing more than to be a monster maker, I read these articles over and over again, never tiring or ceasing to be amazed at what this man could do with so little money and such common household items.
But the monsters themselves were the real treat. Regardless of how quickly or cheaply they were constructed, Blaisdell’s creations were always “way cool” looking. One need search no further than Invasion of the Star Creatures or Killers from Space to see what a low-budget movie without Paul Blaisdell was like. The guy had style—flat out. In his mind’s eye, he knew what a great-looking monster was. His designs were different and lasting and had a flair all their own that exceeded his budget and schedule.
It is often remarked that Roger Corman could take a no-budget concept and elevate it into something memorable because Roger had that special “something”—a combination of intelligence and awareness that superseded just “getting the job done.” The same could and should be said about Mr. Paul Blaisdell. He did so much more than just “getting the job done.”
That Paul insisted on playing his creatures, even though he was far too small in stature to pull it off, also contributes to his legendary position in the die-hard Monster Hall of Fame. People like Corman and Sam Arkoff still delight in recounting how Paul’s Day the World Ended suit soaked up a large quantity of water, causing its weight to increase drastically and sending both monster and starlet tumbling to the ground. Similar stories abound around his other creations—Ray Corrigan was too fat, It Conquered the World’s beastie was too short, and on and on—these are just good Hollywood yarns that beg repeating. And that’s what Paul Blaisdell’s life was—a good Hollywood yarn. It had everything the big-time moguls look for in a story—ups and downs, comedy and tragedy, creation, destruction, and ultimately a downbeat finale. Hollywood had Paul Blaisdell in its grasp, but somehow it foolishly let him slip away.
Fortunately for us he left a little something of himself behind.
Foreword
by Bob Burns
When Randy Palmer asked me to write a preface for this book, I felt very honored. Paul Blaisdell was not only my mentor, he was my very good friend. In the mid-fifties, my wife, Kathy, and I used to hang out with Paul and his wife, Jackie, at their Topanga Canyon (California) home. We had more fun than people should be allowed to have.
I don’t think that most people knew that Paul had a great sense of humor. We shot many gag photos and 16mm movies of our antics. I still have the films today. What wonderful memories they bring back.
Paul was one of the most multitalented guys I’ve ever known. He could do it all. He was an artist (he did covers for magazines). He was a sculptor, model builder, wood worker (the flying saucer from Invasion of the Saucer Men was made of white pine). He was a master of just about any other talent or craft that you could come up with.
Paul was a pioneer. He had an art background but no formal training in making monsters. There was no “Monster Academy” or books on how to make a movie monster in those days. He did everything by the seat of his pants and from his imagination.
I used to marvel at the way he came up with ideas to make his creations. For instance, the antennae on the She-Creature’s head were carved out of candles. He painted on layers of liquid latex, let them cure, then slit them up the back and peeled off the rubber. He put a wire in the tubes and stuffed them with cotton. Next he painted them, and there you have it—She-Creature antennae!
Jackie was very talented too. She helped Paul with everything. Together they made a perfect team. I had the extreme pleasure of helping Paul on some of his movies that have since become “cult classics.” I learned a lot from my friend, and I miss him very much.
I’m so pleased that Randy took the time to write this book
because you now have the chance to learn all about this wonderful, talented man. When you’ve finished reading, you’ll know something I was lucky enough to learn years ago: Paul Blaisdell was one of a kind.
Preface
The late Paul Blaisdell can be described as neither long-lived nor especially prolific. As a self-taught makeup and effects artist working in low-budget movies made during the 1950s, Blaisdell competed with established professionals like Bud and Wally Westmore, Bill Tuttle, and Jack Kevan, the creator of The Creature from the Black Lagoon. Without the resources that were so readily available to those makeup experts, Blaisdell was by necessity forced to rely on his own ingenuity to design and build B-budget beasts for pictures like The Day the World Ended and It! the Terror from Beyond Space.
In his own lifetime Blaisdell received little fame. The fantasy film press for the most part ignored his work for producers like Roger Corman and film companies like American International. Year after year the seminal Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine published retrospectives of pictures like The She-Creature and Invasion of the Saucer Men but never mentioned the name Paul Blaisdell.*
Although Fantastic Monsters of the Films magazine (1962-63) provided occasional coverage of Blaisdell’s movie work (Blaisdell was in fact the magazine’s editorial director), it wasn’t until the late 1970s, 20 years after the “B” movie monster’s horror heyday, that the monster maker’s creations finally began to be appreciated by fantasy film fans. Fangoria magazine was the first to offer substantial coverage, running a two-part article on the makeup artist in 1979, and the short-lived Monster Times also printed a feature on his work.
Finally, in 1990, Cinéfantastique published an in-depth look at the career of this innovative effects man, with 16 color pages devoted to Blaisdell and his creations. At the same time, a series of limited-edition model kits of Blaisdell monsters began to be produced in Japan, and these were eventually distributed domestically by Billiken USA. Shortly thereafter, videocassette releases of some of Roger Corman’s earliest pictures sparked further interest in Blaisdell. RCA/Columbia issued a series of “Drive-In Classics” that included Voodoo Woman, Invasion of the Saucer Men, Day the World Ended, The Amazing Colossal Man, How to Make a Monster, The Spider, and others. There is still much that has not been released, however.
Paul Blaisdell died in 1983 after a long and arduous struggle with cancer, unaware that a legion of devoted film fans would soon emerge to applaud his contributions to film fantasy. I am grateful for the assistance of Blaisdell’s wife Jackie, who helped him on many film assignments during the 1950s. She now lives in seclusion in Topanga Canyon, California, the site of the couple’s home during their active Hollywood years. Fortunately, Paul’s close friend and fellow makeup artist, Bob Burns, continues to champion the work of the visionary Blaisdell, who for the most part remains “Hollywood’s Forgotten Monster Maker.” Thanks are due Burns for his devotion to this project and the many hours of personal time he gave up to supply facts, figures, anecdotes, and other tales of wonderment from Hollyweird concerning Paul Blaisdell’s all-too-brief film career. And thanks to Forrest J Ackerman, Dennis Druktenis, Alex Gordon, Fred Olen Ray, and Tony Timpone for their time, assistance, enlightenment, and encouragement.
—RANDY PALMER
Greensboro, N.C.
Summer 1996
*Actually, the very first issue of Famous Monsters carried a short article about Blaisdell’s work on Invasion of the Saucer Men, but a falling-out between Blaisdell, editor Forry Ackerman, and publisher James Warren led to an internal promulgation at Warren Publishing that banned Blaisdell’s name from the contents of any future company publication. The Saucer Men piece was the only article in FM #1 that was never reprinted in any subsequent issue of the magazine.
A Note Concerning the Text
Unless otherwise specified, the quotations from Paul Blaisdell that appear in this book are from personal correspondence with the author. The majority of Blaisdell’s comments are from the years 1971–1982, although a very few date back to 1966. In a few instances where Blaisdell’s remarks conflict with comments provided by others (as in discussions about the making of It Conquered the World), I have elected to give Blaisdell’s remarks precedence.
Conversations between Paul Blaisdell and other individuals have been recreated from descriptions of events provided by Blaisdell in personal correspondence with the author. In all such cases, quoted conversations are condensed recitations of remarks from involved parties as recalled by Blaisdell. In those few instances in which Blaisdell was unable to recall specifics, reconstruction of conversations or events was not possible. In these instances, in the interest of accuracy I have elected to sum up Blaisdell’s personal feelings, rather than to rely on faulty memories or guesswork.
Quotations from Jackie Blaisdell and Bob Burns are from personal correspondence with the author conducted during the periods 1982–1989 (Blaisdell) and 1989–1995 (Burns).
1
Turning Hollywood into Horrorwood
Old monsters never die, no matter how long ago they were shot.
—Paul Blaisdell
Hollywood has always had its own peculiar way of doing things. During the 1930s and 1940s, actors were signed to long-term, studio-exclusive contracts, and producers were the ones who called the shots—unless you were a Hitchcock or a Welles. Even then you were lucky to escape interference from the “suits” if they thought your picture was a bit too pretentious, too arty, or—horror of horrors—“uncommercial.” Back then, a “B” film wasn’t synonymous with the term exploitation. But as the 1940s drew to a close and the dawn of the nuclear decade approached, Hollywood was about to undergo some tumultuous changes, perhaps not all of them for the better.
More than anything else, television became the catalyst for a whole new approach to moviemaking. The “idiot box” had the effect of keeping scores of potential ticket-buyers at home, where, except for the periodic intrusion of commercial messages and station identification breaks, Mom and Pop and the kids were enjoying entertainment that was essentially free and, for all intents and purposes, very, very movielike.
To woo patrons back to the cinemas, Hollywood embarked on a systematic search for something television couldn’t duplicate. CinemaScope, Panavision, VistaVision, Todd A-O, Cinerama, 3-D Stereo-Vision, and other specialized photographic processes were conceptualized, refined, and released amid reams of promotional fanfare and kaleidoscopic hoopla. The strategy worked. Ticket sales perked up, and all of Hollywood breathed a collective sigh of relief.
Along with 3-D and CinemaScope came something else: a new film genre, born out of the fear of Armageddon and America’s new preoccupation with nuclear superweapons, the atomic bomb and, later, the hydrogen bomb. In previous decades the term horror film had meant Frankenstein, Dracula, haunted houses, and, as often as not, Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi. The horror films of the 1950s, however, featured new types of terrors—radioactive mutations, prehistoric monsters reborn in an atomic haze, overgrown ogres split from the atom. Horror experienced a kind of metamorphosis, eventually becoming “science-fiction-horror.” For a while there were no more Frankenstein monsters, at least not until Britain’s Hammer Films revitalized the gothic horror genre with their color remakes of Universal’s chillers from the 1930s and 1940s. There were only giant bugs, blobs, brains, fiends, and monsters, monsters, monsters—from outer space, from beneath the sea, from green hell, from Yucca Flats, from the ocean floor, from the year 5000. So many newfangled freaks that Life turned to death for a special issue on the monster craze, and Forrest J Ackerman and James Warren were prompted to unleash the world’s first pulse-pounding periodical, Famous Monsters of Filmland, which cataloged the new creature-features almost as quickly as Hollywood created them.
But it wasn’t the old guard that created the monster movie craze of the 1950s; it was the new boys on the block—independents like American International Pictures, which came into existence just as Hollywood was cat
ching its breath from the blow of public television. As AIP’s top brass well knew, it wasn’t the easiest time to establish a new independent production company, but company president James H. Nicholson and vice president Samuel Z. Arkoff saw the turmoil of the times as a way to “buy in.” Whether they were dilettantes or not (and they weren’t) didn’t matter. Arkoff was a lawyer and figured he would make a decent, hard-line movie mogul. Nicholson, who actually had some previous film business experience working with Realart Pictures, liked good movies but didn’t care if he made any or not. What he cared about was making money. Motion pictures, Nicholson knew, didn’t necessarily have to be made well to make money; they just needed to be sold well.
And AIP did make money. In time, they made lots of it. The way they did that was by hiring young people, many new to the industry, who had little or no professional motion picture experience but possessed a seemingly inexhaustible supply of energy and dedication to making the most entertaining and respectable products possible under trying, sometimes difficult, and occasionally nearly impossible circumstances.
Like many persons who went to work for Nicholson and Arkoff, Paul Blaisdell could not boast any previous professional motion picture experience. Born on July 21, 1927, in Newport, Rhode Island, Blaisdell grew up in Quincy, Massachusetts—a long way from the glamour, glitter, and schmooze of Hollywood. As a child he was bright and imaginative and possessed a superb sense of visualization that helped him design homemade kites, puppets, marionettes, and similar playthings. He often spent Saturday afternoons at the local cinema, enjoying the latest “spooky movies” at special matinee showings. His father, an aviation buff, took Paul to see just about every aviation picture that came along. As Paul explained it, “I couldn’t lose. I liked both kinds of movies, especially if they had square heads and more than one wing. Whoopee!”