Mad
Monster Party (1967)
A stop-motion –musical-comedy animated feature created by
Harvey Kurtzman who founded the great comic/magazine ‘Mad’ back in the early
1950’s.
The film features the voice of Boris Karloff (or William Henry Pratt as
he was christened in East Dulwich) and Phyllis Diller (American comedienne) in
a story that tells of a gathering of monsters (Dracula, The Invisible Man, The
Werewolf, The Mummy, The Monster, Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde etc.) called by Baron
Frankenstein (Karloff) to announce his retirement and his successor.
Phyllis Diller does the voice of the Monster’s Mate, Gale
Garnett plays Francesca but all the other voices are done by Allen Swift,
including a Peter Lorre impersonation that is spot-on. Swift was an actor but
worked mainly as a voice artist during a career that lasted from 1947 to 2002.
The creatures are designed by the legendary cartoonist Jack
Davis who, as well as working on Mad Magazine for many years, also did quite a
few movie posters (‘It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World’, ‘The Russians are Coming
The Russians are Coming’, ‘The Producers’, ‘Bananas’ etc.), comic strips, advertising
copy, book covers, Time and Life Magazine covers, record covers etc.
The poster shown above is not by Jack Davis but by famous
‘fantasy’ artist Frank Frazetta. Quite how he got involved I don’t know.
‘Mad Monster Party’ is good fun for all the family (from 8 to 80).
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