Nostalgia, Pizza and a VHS Puppet Run Wild on Luther’s Mid-Fright Snack (New Web Series!)
If I took my childhood memories of horror movie marathons, weekend pizza parties, and episodes of “Aaahh!!! Real Monsters“ and “Pee-wee’s Playhouse,” and mixed them all together the result would certainly be a wild, wacky, psychedelic casserole capable of feeding a family of five hundred. But could such a combination of things actually exist? Is it actually possible to incorporate the (sometimes) disparate elements that many of us kids from the 80s and 90s grew up loving: monsters, pizza, horror movies, Nickelodeon-style slime, gore, puppets? As it turns out, yes, such a thing could and does exist. Ladies and gentlemen, “Luther’s Mid-Fright Snack.”
The brainchild of Hayden Hall of Sick Slice Cinema and Josh Schafer of Lunchmeat VHS, “Luther’s Mid-Fright Snack” is a brand new web series/variety show that’s part live-action, puppetry, and claymation, and features the Dracula lookalike, Luther VanGross, and groovy pizza delivery guy, The Delivery Dude. Episode One (link below) aired this past Halloween and, unlike many shows, avoided the slow burn approach employed by a lot of creators with series premieres and pilots. Instead, “Luther’s Mid-Fright Snack” comes out swinging with a talking pizza, hilarious faux-infomercials, temperamental VCRs, a chain smoking VHS puppet, and some good ol’ fashioned finger slicin’ hilarity.
The episode opens with Luther VanGross struggling to get his VCR to work properly (we all know what that feels like). Amidst his efforts to revive the fidgety beast, The Delivery Dude shows up—with what ends up being—a mouthy pizza pie with a penchant for cheesy puns (see what I did there?) What happens next? You’ll have to check it out for yourself, but I’m confident that based on this first installment viewers are in for loads of creativity and original (sometimes goofy) writing—oh, yeah, and pizza. Lots of pizza. And probably some blood.
“This project is really the brainchild of Hayden,” Josh Schafer explained to me in a recent exchange on Facebook. “We shot all of the live-action stuff in two sessions, one 12-hour shoot and another 6-7 hour shoot. It was all shot in [Hayden’s] apartment, with zero budget, really.” As a viewer coming into “Luther’s Mid-Fright Snack” blind, as I did, the lack of budget almost feels like an irrelevant fact, because this type of variety show isn’t about boasting budgets or wowing with special effects. For me, the most enjoyable element in the first episode was the mixture of media—claymation, live-action, puppetry. It felt refreshing and enjoyable and the quick-paced editing made the episode move and never really feel stale. Whether or not this sort of thing is your cup of tea, you’ve gotta tip your hat to the creativity and good-natured aesthetics of the cats behind “Luther’s Mid-Fright Snack.”
So, what would inspire these guys to create this kind of a series? As Schafer writes, “The look of the show is really a collection of influences: Pee-Wee’s Playhouse and all the groovy horror hosts out there like Elvira and Zacherley—especially their kind of humor and vibe. We wanted to celebrate that whole aesthetic with this show, for sure.”
At the end of the day it’s evident that these guys are truly passionate about the things they love: films, horror, and the almost religious experience of sharing those things with likeminded people. And, as Schafer also explains, sharing that passion for film and wacky storytelling is what lies at the heart of “Luther’s Mid-Fright Snack.” “I think the show is really just a lot of fun and we want people to have fun when they watch it.”
To stay up-to-date on the latest on “Luther’s Mid-Fright Snack” keep your eye on the websites and Facebook pages for both Sick Slice Cinema and Lunchmeat VHS. And, in the meantime, let’s hope these guys are able to take their efforts in madness to the next level: public access television. “We also made the show with intention of airing it on public access television here in Philly (PhillyCAM). We’re waiting on approval.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSkP8N6x2xc
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