How to Make a Monster (1958) on Netflix
Pete Dumond, make-up artist at American International Studios, is told he will be fired once new owners plan musicals and comedies instead of horror pictures. He vows revenge with his creations.
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- IMDb5.6/101,789 votes
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Featurette
Plot summary
Pete Dumond has spent 25 years as chief make-up artist at American International Studios, where his monster make-ups made the studio famous. When NBN Associates takes over the studio, its new owners, Jeffrey Clayton and John Nixon, arrive from the East planning musicals and comedies rather than horror pictures, and Pete learns he will be fired. They show him a rock musical number on stage featuring John Ashley. Pete vows to turn the monsters these men have rejected against them. He blends a numbing ingredient into his foundation cream, which deadens the willpower of anyone wearing it, and persuades the young actors Larry Drake and Tony Mantell that their careers are through unless they put themselves in his power.
Cast
- Heather Amesas Arlene Dow
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about How to Make a Monster (1958)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Paul Blaisdell asked AIP not to burn his Cat Girl mask in the film's fire finale, but it was destroyed anyway, and the cameraman failed to film it burning, leaving a bad taste in his mouth.
- Ed Wood's widow said in a 1992 interview that he believed AIP producer Sam Arkoff stole the idea for the film from him; Wood had written it for Lugosi, about an old horror actor taking revenge on a studio. Arkoff denied it, saying Herman Cohen originated the project.
- Herman Cohen said he cast John Ashley as a singer at the request of James H. Nicholson, who had just signed Ashley to a long-term studio contract, and Ashley was then having minor success as a recording artist.
- Paul Blaisdell built a new monster costume he called "Aunt Esmeralda" specifically to be burned in the fire scene, designed so that a grisly skull was revealed as the face melted.
- Because AIP had no studio of its own, the film was shot at Ziv Studios, where a sign went up calling the lot "American International Studios", which was totally misleading.
