Publisher of Famous Monsters of Filmland
Jim Warren recently gave a talk about the origins of Famous Monsters of Filmland, which he launched in 1958.
His initial inspiration for Famous Monsters of Filmland was noticing that kids were staying up late to watch old Universal horror movies on TV. In his youth, kids went and saw monster movies at neighborhood theaters. But with the coming of TV, older theaters were being dismantled, leaving the movie studios with a lot of black and white movies which they sold quickly in package deals to TV stations.LinkHe described the first issue of Famous Monsters of Filmland as having been laid-out on a living room table and financed with money loaned by his father. When the first run of 200,000 issues finally hit the stands, he was left with a mere $36.00 in his pocket. This initial run sold out in a manner of days and he realized the initial hunch he had to do it was a good one. The second run sold out just as quickly and the magazine continued to be published for the next 20 plus years.
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When I first saw this I read it as "Famous Monsters in Finland". I guess that would be a separate post.
Wow...all that and not one mention of editor Forry Ackerman, without whose monstrous collection of stills, posters, etc., there would be no FMoF magazine.
So, who was the man who lost his face? Don't run a cover like that and then keep us in suspense. Unless it was Lon Chaney (in which case he had 999,999 others).
The true inspiration of this magazine is revealed in the totally ludicrous and instantly appealing title.
Only the "Famous" monsters? What about the "infamous" ones? Or the lesser-known monsters? Shouldn't they get some attention, too?
And only the ones in "Filmland"? That seems like a very provincial perspective. After all, maybe Finland DOES have some monsters that deserve coverage.
I love it. It wasn't on the racks at my local drug store when I was a kid, but I thumbed voraciously through a copy whenever we drifted near a newsstand on a visit to the county seat.
My parents would never allow me to buy one, though. Of course, that only made me want it MORE! (Milhous voice.)
"Famous Monsters of Finland". LOL.
Well, there's Olli Jokinen...
"Famous Monsters of Finland", of course, there's Lordi...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lordi
coop
I was one of those kids that bought every issue of FMoFL as soon as they hit the shelves. I was 8 years old and had never heard of "Universal Pictures" or "James Whale" or even "Lon Chaney", so each issue blew my little mind.
The funniest part was I lived in a little farm community with only a couple of TV stations available, so it was another several years before I was able to actually watch the movies described in the magazine, but by that time I already knew every scene.
I logged in to say this, but UncleMike beat me to it:
"Wow...all that and not one mention of editor Forry Ackerman, without whose monstrous collection of stills, posters, etc., there would be no FMoF magazine."
And Forry is still going strong!
Starshipsofa.com had a bit on the history of FMoF a few podcasts ago. Unfortunately, the site seems to be down right now.
And here I am thinking Forrest Ackerman was behind Famous Monsters of Filmland. I guess he was/is just its biggest fan and cheerleader(?).
Yeah, you see guys like that around in Finland. You get used to it, and then monster films just don't feel the same any more. And as Bobsyeruncle said, some of those guys even play ice hockey in the NHL. Of course monsters with hockey masks aren't totally unknown in films, either.
"Wow...all that and not one mention of editor Forry Ackerman, without whose monstrous collection of stills, posters, etc., there would be no FMoF magazine."
Amen. Forry was the driving force behind Famous Monsters, not James Warren. Warren fronted the money, but it was Forry's dream.