===================================================================== THE GRATEFUL UNDEAD TALK BACK ===================================================================== a one-act play by Craig J. Clark (cjclark@earthlink.net) ===================================================================== based on the movie "The Undead" ===================================================================== [Lights up on a chat show set. As much should be done as possible to give the impression that this is a rerun of a show originally broadcast in the late 50s. For this reason, the set should be all in blacks, whites and grays, with two gray chairs placed at center stage. Hanging on the backdrop is a sign which reads "TALK BACK". A brief opening theme plays.] ANNOUNCER: And now, from Philadelphia, it's time for "Talk Back," with your host Dick Clark! [The one concession to pigmentation, a 27-year-old, flesh-toned DICK CLARK enters, wearing a gray suit.] DICK: Hello, and welcome to "Talk Back," the weekly show where we talk to people and they talk back to us. And this week we are talking to none other than Vlad the Impaler himself. Let's have a warm welcome for Dracula! [DRACULA enters, dressed to the nines in a black tie and tuxedo. He dwarfs DICK CLARK, which is only to be expected since DICK is a mere 5'9" and DRACULA is well over six feet. DRACULA bows, and he and DICK take their seats.] DICK: Good evening, Dracula. I know it's only late September, so I hope you don't think we're rushing the Halloween season by having you on now. DRACULA: Oh, not at all. It's my pleasure. Of course, I don't just crawl out of the crypt once a year. For one thing, there are my regular feeding times that keep me young and fit. And for another, I am so enjoying this new medium of television. Incidentally, I wish you the best of luck with the launch of your "American Bandstand" program next week. I predict that it will be very successful, much like the rock and roll music that you will be playing on it. DICK: Thank you. Of course, it could all just be a passing fad, but we'll see. Now, Dracula, the reason we asked you to be on the program tonight is because we will be discussing modern horror films, particularly how they appeal to the youth of today. DRACULA: Ah, yes. The youth of today. I have noticed how the studios have moved away from the classic monster archetypes that used to populate its horror films in order to appeal to the youth of today. They think that just because it's 1957, young people don't find the traditional monsters scary anymore. Now it's all atomic mutations, mad scientists, creatures from outer space. Where are the vampires, the zombies, the mummies, the werewolves? DICK: Now that you mention it, I can't remember the last time I saw a vampire in a motion picture. DRACULA: That's because there hasn't been one since John Carradine's "House of Dracula" in nineteen hundred and forty-five. Nineteen forty-five. How does that coincide with your post-war atomic conspiracy, huh? It's incredibly obvious, isn't it? A foreign substance is introduced-- DICK: I hate to cut you off there, Dracula, but did you say atomic conspiracy? DRACULA: Yes, ever since Hiroshima and Nagasaki it's been an industry-wide problem. Even Bela Lugosi -- arguably one of the best Draculas who ever lived (apart from me, of course) -- was reduced to acting in utter garbage like "Bride of the Monster" to pay the bills. And since he passed away last year, that atomic monstrosity will have to stand as his final film. That is an outrage. And that is why I am on this program, to promote my new "Take Back the Fright" initiative among the monster community. The studios are already beginning to roll out their Halloween offerings and we must be ready to take full advantage of the publicity they will generate. DICK: Now, Dracula, you shouldn't speak too soon. Not all modern horror films are devoid of traditional monsters. I'm looking at a list of new and recent theatrical releases here and I see "I Was a Teenage Werewolf," starring Michael Landon, was just released back in June. What do you say to that? DRACULA: Bah! A blatant attempt to appeal to the youth market. The Michael Landon character isn't even a proper werewolf! The producers show an utter lack of respect for traditional werewolf lore by having him become one through some past-life regression nonsense. And the worst part is they probably stole the idea from last year's "The Werewolf," in which a car accident victim becomes a werewolf when some scientists inject him with a serum. This is not kosher lycanthropy and I won't stand for it. DICK: What about mummies? We had last year's "Pharoah's Curse." DRACULA: Yes, and you can keep it. DICK: I take it you didn't like it. [DRACULA just stares at him.] DICK: Okay. This is a couple years old, but what about "Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy"? DRACULA: Don't make me laugh. DICK: But the film did feature a-- DRACULA: Yes, yes. But what I'm saying is they don't make me laugh. DICK: Mummies? DRACULA: No, Abbott and Costello. DICK: Oh, I see. DRACULA: And before you say it, don't even get me started on the current zombie craze. These cheapie studios have no idea what they're doing. Bring back Val Lewton and Jacques Tourneur -- at least they knew what to do with their small budgets. DICK: So, when you get right down to it, what you object to is not the absence of the undead in motion pictures, but rather the way that their iconography has been subverted and exploited for the burgeoning teen market. DRACULA: Precisely. DICK: Then what would you say if I told you that Samuel Z. Arkhoff and James H. Nicholson's American International Pictures is releasing a motion picture called "The Undead"? DRACULA: Ah, "The Undead." DICK: You know it? DRACULA: Directed and produced by Roger Corman? Written by Charles B. Griffith and Mark Hanna? Starring Pamela Duncan, Richard Garland and Allison Hayes? Oh, yes. I know it well. DICK: How? Were you somehow involved in the making of it? DRACULA: No, and thank God for that. DICK: But how can you say-- DRACULA: Have you seen the film? DICK: Er, no. DRACULA: Well, I have and believe you me, it is not a pretty sight. The funny thing is, when I first heard that AIP was putting out a film called "The Undead," I had such high hopes. I called all my friends -- the mummy, the wolf man, various assorted zombies -- to let them know it was coming. It seemed like the tide was turning in our favor once again. Then I saw an advance screening of the film and I was mortified -- literally. The title notwithstanding, "The Undead" has nothing to do with actual undead creatures at all. Of course, if it had then that might be worse still. DICK: Why do you say that? DRACULA: Because it's such an awful film. And it's just one of eight that Roger Corman has made this year alone. [to audience] Roger, I offer this one piece of advice to you: Slow down! Quantity is not necessarily better than quality. [back to DICK] I tell you, I'm grateful. DICK: Grateful for what? DRACULA: Grateful that no vampires or zombies or other creatures of the night appear in "The Undead," because if they did, it would be such a setback for our cause. Sure, the witches and Satanists take quite a beating from it, but that I can live with. DICK: So this film "The Undead"-- DRACULA: Is not the answer to my prayers at all. No, right now our only hope lies in the fledgling Hammer Studios of Great Britain. In fact, I plan to fly over there after this interview and act as an advisor for them. It could prove quite fruitful. DICK: Well, I wish you the best of luck with that. DRACULA: Thank you. [rises] Now, if you'll excuse me, I must be off. DICK: What? DRACULA: I've said what I wanted to say. And if I don't leave now I will be disintegrated by the sunrise over the Atlantic. [He starts to leave.] DICK: No, wait. DRACULA: I'm afraid I can't. [DICK rises dramatically.] DICK: STAY! [DRACULA stops and slowly turns to face him.] DICK: ...At least until the end of the program. There's something I have to know. DRACULA: In that case, the end of the program will have to be now because otherwise I have to go. Self-preservation and all that. [DICK thinks and then suddenly turns to the audience.] DICK: Well, I'm afraid that's all the time we have for "Talk Back" tonight. Thanks for watching. And look for me on October 7 on the premiere of "American Bandstand." Good night. [Music starts. DRACULA crosses to DICK.] DRACULA: Are we off the air? DICK: Yes. DRACULA: Now what's so important? [The lights start to fade...] DICK: I have to know. How do you manage to stay so young? DRACULA: Ah, that. [leaning over to whisper in DICK's ear] Let me tell you a secret... [As he bears his fangs, there is a blackout.] T H E E N D ===================================================================== THE MST3K ONE-ACT PLAYS BY CRAIG J. CLARK ===================================================================== [801] Return of the Creature [802] Boy, Am I Gland to See You [803] How to Irritate Mole People [804] Kiss Me Deadly Mantis [805] The Trouble With Things That Can't Die [811] clonus: the lowercase horror [814] Riding with Death on Long Island [815] Re-Animation Agent for H.A.R.M. [816/906] The Prince of Space Children [817] The Mild Apprehension of Party Beach [818] Touched by a Devil Doll [819] Evasion of the Neptune Men [820] Pigs in Space Mutiny [821] Vodka with a Time Chaser [901] The Alan Parsons Projected Man [902] Phantom Planet, Schmanet or: The Next-to-the-Last of the Dogmen [903] Strong Enough for a Puma Man... [904] Where Wolf? There Wolf! [905] The Deadly B-Sides [907] Hobgoblins 2: The Grue Batch [908] Analyze What? or: The Bad Touch of Satan COMING QUITE SOON: [822] Overfed at the Memory Banquet [810] They Might Be Giant Spiders COMING EVENTUALLY: [807] Mystery from the Year 3000 [808] She Features She Creatures Down by the Seashore [809] I Was a Teenage Marketing Ploy [812] The Incredibly Strange Creatures Stop to Conquer [813] Yet Another Movie Called Jack Frost You can read these one-act plays and more at http://home.earthlink.net/~cjclark/mstplays.htm