Night of the Living Dead Cast and Crew Reunited at AMC Waterfront Tonight AMCs Waterfront Theater in Homestead had a special showing of the iconic horror film Night of the Living Dead tonight. AMC chose tonight because, on this date in 1968, Night of the Living Dead had its world premiere at the Fulton Theater on Sixth Street downtown Pittsburgh (now the Byham). The event was the brainchild of AMCs Chad Nichols, a friend of Haunted Pittsburgh and co-owner of Demon House: demonhouse/ Before they showed the film, several key players in the production had a panel discussion. Producer Russell Streiner, who played Johnny, repeated his classic line, Theyre coming to get you, Barbara, and that, alone, was worth the price of admission. Russ talked about the sizzle of the world premiere (partly manufactured by the film crew), and recounted that when his character, Johnny, tussled with zombie Bill Hinzman in the opening scene, his grandmother shouted out from the middle of the darkened theater, Russell, he broke your glasses! Sound engineer Gary Streiner talked about driving downtown for the premiere from the North Hills, and about what a special moment it was to see those klieg lights from outside the Fulton while he was still five miles from town. Screenwriter John Russo recalled the shoestring production that produced the classic: in the memorable opening cemetery scene, the entire cast and crew present totaled five or six people. In the remake of 1990, they had 110 people to film the cemetery scene. Kyra Schon, who played Karen, the little girl in the basement who eventually turned into a zombie and ate her father and stabbed her mother, revealed she was actually not eating Karl Hardman, her screen and real-life father -- she was eating a meatball sandwich. Kyra repeated her lone line in the film for the crowd: Im hurt. George Kosana, who played Sheriff McClelland, had one of the best lines of the entire night: Night of the Living Dead is a prerequisite for living in the Pittsburgh area. Amen, Sheriff. Amen. All sorts of interesting things were revealed, too many to chronicle: screenwriter John Russo explained that he originally wrote the role of the little girl Karen as a little boy named Timmy (an excellent name). I spoke with Mr. Russo, and hes a good guy. Most importantly, the panel dispelled the notion that the film was an overt political statement or that the sheriff was intended to be a redneck. Those notions were inventions of critics. The people who made the film were looking to do just one thing: scare people. When the panel discussion ended and they ran the film, it was clear they succeeded. JOIN US FOR A GHOST TOUR THIS WEEKEND: hauntedpittsburghtours/
Posted on: Thu, 02 Oct 2014 03:07:16 +0000