Ron Sweed, AKA The Ghoul, noted TV horror movie host from the seventies has passed away.
He was big in Cleveland but his show also aired in Detroit. When I was in college we’d watch him every Saturday on the TV in the dorm lounge.
He once hosted the “classic” Vincent Price movie “Last Man on Earth”, one of three movies based on the Matheson classic “I am Legend”. The movie had zombie vampire creatures that would bang on Price’s door at night yelling “Morgan, come out, Morgan.” For months later people would bang on your dorm room door late at night and repeat that line.
you know they don’t make shows like that anymore …… well they do but its all dad jokes and wannabe mst3k stuff….
MY fave as a kid was channel4’s Sammy terry in which it had a real horror motif and had to air at 11 at night …. and another was a svengoolie type on Chicago’s other indie station that wasn’t WGN on Saturdays …. I remember when xmas was on Saturday and he just ran with it singing :Rudolph the undead reindeer … I saw mommy axing Santa Claus (where mom was drunk and dad decided to slide down the chimney and well…)and I thought it was funny because my stepmom hated horror movies and to be making fun of Christmas … oh the true horrors ……
Just as Harry Houdini took his stage name to honor Jean-Eugène Robert-Houdin, the Ghoul named himself to honor his Cleveland horror TV predecessor, Ghoulardi. Ghoulardi in turn must have made his name a portmanteau of “ghoul” with a famous Italian immigrant to Cleveland chef, Ettore Boiardi (whose creations were marketed under the name Chef Boy-Ar-Dee).
The original Svenghooli was played by DJ Jerry G Bishop after he moved from Cleveland to Chicago the same summer I did. I’d ask why Cleveland is the home of so many horror hosts, but I’ve lived in Cleveland. :eek:
Some of the mst3k guys grew up in the suburbs of Chicago and picked up much of their schtick from Svengoolie and Son of Svengoolie, not the other way around.
Dude, that WAS Sven (Jerry G Bishop) or Son of Sven (Rich Koz) on Channel 32. Some years back Koz got Bishop’s permission to drop the “Son of.” Watch him on MeTV on your local cable system. No dad jokes, just terrible puns and a bit of ‘Who dat?’ trivia.