About Me
In memory of four of the biggest lady’s of the old horror world:
Vampira: Maila Syrjäniemi, The original glamour ghoul herself !!!! On Friday night, April 30, 1954, KABC-TV aired a preview, Dig Me Later, Vampira, at 11:00 p.m. The Vampira Show premiered on the following night, May 1, 1954. For the first four weeks, the show aired at midnight, and it moved to 11:00 p.m. on May 29. Ten months later, the series aired at 10:30pm, beginning March 5, 1955. As Vampira, Nurmi introduced films while wandering through a hallway of mist and cobwebs. Her horror-related comedy antics included talking to her pet spider Rollo and encouraging viewers to write for epitaphs instead of autographs. When the series was cancelled in 1955, she retained rights to the character of Vampira.
She was acquainted with Marilyn Monroe when she was still called Norma Jean, and she comforted Elvis Presley after he was booed during his performance at the Las Vegas Frontier Hotel in 1956. During the early 1950s, she was close friends with James Dean, and they hung out together at Schwab's coffee shop on the corner of Crescent Heights and Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood. Vampira's explanation for their friendship: "We have the same neuroses." Dean commented, "I have a fairly adequate knowledge of satanic forces, and I was interested to find out if this girl was obsessed with such a force."
Lily Munster: Yvonne DeCarlo, Lily is the matriarch of the Munster family. Her maiden name is Dracula. She is the wife of Herman Munster, the daughter of Sam Dracula (aka Grandpa) and the mother of Eddie Munster. She is very close with her niece Marilyn. She has a werewolf for a brother, who appeared in one episode. Lily is the voice of reason in the Munster household, often relied upon to set problems right, and she was often the mediator between Herman and Grampa's squabbling.
Lily was mainly a housekeeper and her duties included spreading garbage around the mansion and "dusting" via a vacuum cleaner operating in reverse so that it blows dirt about. During the course of the series Lily has had jobs as a welder in a shipyard, a fashion model, and a palm reader in a tea room. One time, she forced Herman to give her some money so that she and Marilyn could open a beauty parlor, but this soon went out of business as Lily assumed her clientele would want to look more like her. These part time jobs never seemed to stick and Lily would be back to being a homemaker by the next episode. Once when she thought Herman was going broke she got a job to help out, keeping this a secret lest it wound Herman's pride.
Lily is a beautiful and slender caucasian woman who appears to be in her middle-age years, although she is actually hundreds of years old. Her skin is green, which repelled some people. Later incarnations of the character, played by different actresses, would change her skin from green to pale white. A white streak in her hair recalls the monster's mate from The Bride of Frankenstein, as portrayed by Elsa Lanchester. Lily was usually dressed in an ankle-length white gown that appeared faded and old, sometimes covering up with a scarf. Her necklace featured a bat-shaped medallion. When away from the Munster house, she would sometimes wear a long silver cape with a hood.
Bride of Frankenstein: Elsa Lanchester, married actor Charles Laughton in 1929, and one of her first screen appearances was opposite him in The Private Life of Henry VIII (as a highly comical Anne of Cleves). This and other appearances in British films helped her gain the title role in Bride of Frankensteinw with Boris Karloff (1935).
She appeared again with her husband in the screen version of Agatha Christie's play Witness for the Prosecution (1957), for which both received Academy Award nominations -- she for Best Supporting Actress, and Laughton for Best Actor. Neither won. However, Lanchester did win the Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress for the film. Lanchester was previously nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, for Come to the Stable, in 1950.
Morticia: Carolyn Jones, Her acting career began to decline after the end of The Addams Family in 1966, She serves as the heart and soul of the Addams Family. She is described as a vamp. She has pale skin and long, flowing black hair, and she commonly wears long, black gothic dresses to match her hair. She is a glamorous and exotic seductress who easily allures her husband Gomez simply by speaking French (or any other foreign language for that matter). Morticia is elegant, artistic and musically inclined. She sings opera, dances the tango and plays numerous musical instruments. She frequently enjoys cutting the buds off of roses which she discards, keeping only the stems. She also has a carnivorous plant named Cleopatra which she enjoys feeding.
