Love is in the air!  Or is that the smell of something burning?  This year, the Vault’s Culinary Club had decided to host a bake sale for Valentine’s Day, which seems really sweet, but the results were questionable at best.  Those of you in management positions might think you’ve had to have some difficult conversations with your staff, but until you’ve had to explain to 27 grown adults why you can’t sell pies filled with human flesh, then please don’t talk to me.

While I would hardly consider myself the romantic type, Beaumont and I certainly tried to make Valentine’s Day a special time for the couples who live in the Vault.  We converted one of the ballrooms into a reservations-only romantic dinner spot, hosted a lonely-hearts mixer for those fiends not attending the dinner, and then fenced off a few areas of the grounds to give couples a location for a moonlight stroll without the threat of being eaten by werewolves (for the record, the werewolves were not happy, and I was not only accused of discrimination, but bitten several times).

Fortunately, everything went off without a hitch.  I’ve been told the dinner was lovely, as was the mixer.  Beaumont and I spent our evening hiding in a couple of tall trees, armed with paintball guns and watching for prowling werewolves.  Fortunately, none were able to ruin the romantic Valentine’s Day walk, and our fiends were very grateful.

Lord Blackheart left a bouquet of withered flowers on the doorstep for me, and I haven’t quite determined if the intended message was meant to be one of affection or warning.  Either way, they’ve given my desk a little color (dark brown and black are colors, right?) and as the Horror Hostess, I think it ties the room together quite nicely.

P.S. My sincere apologies for the late newsletter.  I've been struggling through some technical difficulties for over a week!  Fortunately, the staff in charge of our newsletter platform were quick to assist once I reached out.

At our last meeting we watched the Karloff/Lugosi chiller Black Friday.  For those of you who missed the meeting, let me tell you a little about the film.  After his friend nearly dies in a gang-related accident, a scientist attempts to save him by using pieces of a gangster’s brain to patch up the damage in his friend’s brain.  This of course has unexpected consequences, as the once kindly professor now shows the mannerisms and memories of the dead gangster.

We had 15 fiends joining us this month!  Special thanks to Dawn for bringing us some delicious cookies!  I hope I speak for everyone when I say that they were delicious!

The film was a good one—gangsters meet Jekyll and Hyde—and had a strong cast of characters.  Sadly, the film was originally supposed to have Karloff and Lugosi in the two starring roles, but the story goes that Karloff didn’t want to play the dual role of George Kingsley/Red Cannon, so he lobbied to play Dr. Sovac, which was Lugosi’s role.  And instead of swapping the two around, Lugosi got relegated to the minor role of Eric Marnay and Kingsley/Cannon went to character actor Stanley Ridges (who one has to admit did an exceptional job!)

Since we’re on the topic of actors, let’s look at our familiar faces for the month.  Of course, Karloff and Lugosi really need no introduction.  These horror powerhouses have appeared in quite a few of our films, and people with a passing knowledge of 1940s horror are sure to recognize them both.

Up next, we have Anne Nagel (Sunny).  Anne has also appeared in our April 2021 horror/comedy, The Invisible Woman, as Jean.  Dr. Sovac’s gentle daughter (also named Jean) is Anne Gwynne.  Anne has made several appearances in our films, but let’s limit it to two: Rita Hussman in House of Frankenstein (May 2023) and Tess Trueheart in Dick Tracy Meets Gruesome (February 2019).  Jack Muhall (Bartender) played a lawyer in The She-Creature (November 2021) and Tim in The Invisible Ghost (July 2021).  Jessie Arnold (an uncredited nurse) was an uncredited Gypsy woman in The Wolf Man (March 2015).

Franco Corsaro (uncredited as the club maître d’) was Carabinieri in The Beast with Five Fingers (May 2016).  And Kernan Cripps (detective) was a police officer in Calling Dr. Death (March 2016) and was the postman in The Invisible Woman.  His fellow detective was Edward Earle, who we had also seen in The She-Creature as Professor Anderson.  William Ruhl (G-Man, uncredited) has one of the most amusing credits in Hold that Ghost as “Night Club Patron Who Falls” (April 2016).

The reporter at Dr. Sovac’s execution, Milburn Stone, was George Keene in The Frozen Ghost (June 2016).  And Harry Tenbrook (an uncredited cabbie) was a villager in The Ghost of Frankenstein (November 2022).  Finally, we have Russell Wade and Dave Willock, who were both credited (or rather “uncredited”) as students.  Russell was Donald Fettes in The Body Snatcher (September 2016), which is the film about grave robbers, not the one with the alien pods! And Dave was Lou Gibson in Revenge of the Creature (September 2017).