The Vampira Show
Encyclopedia
The Vampira Show was an American variety show
hosted by Vampira
. The series aired on the Los Angeles
ABC television affiliate
KABC-TV
from April 30, 1954, through April 2, 1955. The series was produced and created by Hunt Stromberg, Jr., and featured the Vampira character created by Maila Nurmi
.
Though the show was unseen outside of the Los Angeles area, The Vampira Show has become a cult classic
, spawning fan clubs the world over.
cartoons of Charles Addams
, later adapted for the TV series The Addams Family
in 1964. As Nurmi told Boxoffice
in a 1994 interview, she had dressed as Addams' at-the-time nameless ghoul-woman to attend Lester Horton
's annual Hollywood costume ball the Bal Caribe in 1953. Nurmi's ghoul woman beat out over 2,000 attendees to win the evening's prize for best costume, and drew Stromberg's attention. When Stromberg approached Nurmi about doing the character for television, Nurmi then re-imagined the character and costume as a buxom and glamorous single vampire instead of the mother of a family, and she named her creation Vampira. Nurmi told Boxoffice that her intention was to invent a unique creation of her own that was "campier and sexier" than the mute and flat-chested Addams character, in part to avoid plagiarizing Addams' intellectual property. Vampira was known to appear in broad daylight in full costume. Her husband Dean Riesner refused to appear in public with his wife in her Vampira costume.
Vampira's personality was based on elements of several silent film actresses including Theda Bara
and Gloria Swanson
as well as the Evil Queen from Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. In Vampira: The Movie, Nurmi reveals she appropriated the long cigarette holder and extra-long fingernails from the Dragon Lady
character in the Terry and the Pirates
comic strip
. The new costume was inspired by the artwork of John Willie
featured in the fetish magazine Bizarre.
by Bela Bartok
and excerpts from Uranus from The Planets
by Gustav Holst
. Nurmi's salary for the show was $75 per week.
The show's concept of having a themed host introduce films was fresh at the time and had never been done before. In later years, stations all over the world would duplicate its format with similar hosts. The Vampira Show was seen in the Los Angeles area only but was featured in articles and photo spreads in Newsweek
, TV Guide
and Life
within weeks of its first broadcast. The show and its bizarre hostess were an instant success and led to Nurmi's appearance on numerous 1950s television shows including The Red Skelton Show
and Ed Sullivan's
Toast of the Town
.
David J. Skal's The Monster Show revealed that James Dean
, a friend of Maila's at the time before he became famous in films, appeared with his back to the camera in one Vampira episode, where she was dressed as a dominant schoolteacher and rapped his knuckles. She was later hurt when Dean became famous and started to badmouth her publicly and in press interviews.
After the series demise, Nurmi appeared in the 1959
film Plan 9 From Outer Space
, dressed as Vampira but out of character; Nurmi told Boxoffice that Wood's dialogue was so awful she sought and received permission to perform her entire role in a mute and spellbound manner she referred to as "Maila in an Alpha state." Nurmi also performed as Vampira in a Las Vegas
stage show titled Come as You Are with Liberace
.
. By 1982, Elvira's Movie Macabre was syndicated in over 80 markets across the United States. Nurmi, whose only income was Social Security
, sued but lost her case when she was unable to pay for continuing legal expenses.
In a 1987 interview with Skip Lowe, Nurmi stated there were over 150 similarities between Elvira and Vampira, including her closing remark "Unpleasant dreams, darlings". The Elvira character has since appeared in over 500 television shows, two feature films, released five music albums and numerous other merchandise including action figures, perfume, beer, videotapes, posters, clothing, costumes, pinball machines, computer games, comic books and trading cards. In a 2006 interview for Vampira: The Movie, Cassandra Peterson
, the actress who plays Elvira, said of the lawsuit, "It was a no-win situation for everybody".
for future airings. No footage of the show is known to exist, however, in the 1990s a kinescope
advertising the station's ability to draw clients to advertisers featuring Nurmi in character was found in a private collection. The clips used in the kinescope were re-shot segments using a previous episode's script. Several scripts from various episodes still exist in private collections as well.
Pirated copies of the kinescope film were widely distributed with a bootlegged DVD of the 1995 Finnish documentary about Nurmi, About Sex, Death and Taxes, most notably by Kevin Sean Michaels
, director of Vampira: The Movie, through eBay auctions. Segments of the kinescope can be seen in 2006
film Vampira: The Movie.
In 2007, the kinescope film of Nurmi in character was restored by Rerunmedia, whose restorations include The Ed Sullivan Show
and Dark Shadows
. The restoration utilized the groundbreaking LiveFeed Video Imaging process developed exclusively for the restoration of kinescopes. The restoration was funded by The Clint Hickman Collection and Coffin Case.
A reconstructed episode of The Vampira Show was released from the Vampira's Attic web site in October 2007. The release imitated a complete episode by using existing footage of the show combined with vintage commercials and a full-length feature film.
cast actress Lisa Marie as Nurmi/Vampira for the film Ed Wood
. The film also featured a short recreation of The Vampira Show.
The Vampira Show was recreated for the 1995 documentary About Sex, Death and Taxes and The Haunted World of Edward D. Wood, Jr..
Variety show
A variety show, also known as variety arts or variety entertainment, is an entertainment made up of a variety of acts, especially musical performances and sketch comedy, and normally introduced by a compère or host. Other types of acts include magic, animal and circus acts, acrobatics, juggling...
hosted by Vampira
Maila Nurmi
Maila Nurmi was a Finnish-American actress who created the campy 1950s characterVampira. She portrayed Vampira as TV's first horror host and in the Ed Wood cult film Plan 9 from Outer Space...
. The series aired on the Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
ABC television affiliate
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
KABC-TV
KABC-TV
KABC-TV, channel 7, is an owned-and-operated television station of the Walt Disney Company-owned American Broadcasting Company, licensed to Los Angeles, California. KABC-TV's studios are located in Glendale, California...
from April 30, 1954, through April 2, 1955. The series was produced and created by Hunt Stromberg, Jr., and featured the Vampira character created by Maila Nurmi
Maila Nurmi
Maila Nurmi was a Finnish-American actress who created the campy 1950s characterVampira. She portrayed Vampira as TV's first horror host and in the Ed Wood cult film Plan 9 from Outer Space...
.
Though the show was unseen outside of the Los Angeles area, The Vampira Show has become a cult classic
Cult Classic
Cult Classic is a Blue Öyster Cult studio recording released in 1994, containing remakes of many of the band's previous hits.-Track listing:# " The Reaper" - 5:05# "E.T.I...
, spawning fan clubs the world over.
Background
The costume of Nurmi's Vampira character was inspired by the spooky The New YorkerThe New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...
cartoons of Charles Addams
Charles Addams
Charles "Chas" Samuel Addams was an American cartoonist known for his particularly black humor and macabre characters...
, later adapted for the TV series The Addams Family
The Addams Family (TV series)
The Addams Family is an American television series based on the characters in Charles Addams' New Yorker cartoons. The 30-minute series was shot in black-and-white and aired for two seasons in 64 installments on ABC from September 18, 1964, to April 8, 1966...
in 1964. As Nurmi told Boxoffice
Boxoffice (magazine)
Boxoffice is a film industry magazine dedicated to the movie theatre business published by Boxoffice Media LP. It started in 1920 as The Reel Journal, taking its current name in 1931 and still publishes today, with an intended audience of theatre owners and film professionals.Boxoffice is the...
in a 1994 interview, she had dressed as Addams' at-the-time nameless ghoul-woman to attend Lester Horton
Lester Horton
Lester Horton was an American dancer, choreographer, and teacher.-Early years:Lester Iradell Horton was born in Indianapolis, Indiana on January 23, 1906. His parents were Iradell Horton and Pollyanna Horton....
's annual Hollywood costume ball the Bal Caribe in 1953. Nurmi's ghoul woman beat out over 2,000 attendees to win the evening's prize for best costume, and drew Stromberg's attention. When Stromberg approached Nurmi about doing the character for television, Nurmi then re-imagined the character and costume as a buxom and glamorous single vampire instead of the mother of a family, and she named her creation Vampira. Nurmi told Boxoffice that her intention was to invent a unique creation of her own that was "campier and sexier" than the mute and flat-chested Addams character, in part to avoid plagiarizing Addams' intellectual property. Vampira was known to appear in broad daylight in full costume. Her husband Dean Riesner refused to appear in public with his wife in her Vampira costume.
Vampira's personality was based on elements of several silent film actresses including Theda Bara
Theda Bara
Theda Bara , born Theodosia Burr Goodman, was an American silent film actress – one of the most popular of her era, and one of cinema's earliest sex symbols. Her femme fatale roles earned her the nickname "The Vamp" . The term "vamp" soon became a popular slang term for a sexually predatory woman...
and Gloria Swanson
Gloria Swanson
Gloria Swanson was an American actress, singer and producer. She was one of the most prominent stars during the silent film era as both an actress and a fashion icon, especially under the direction of Cecil B. DeMille, made dozens of silents and was nominated for the first Academy Award in the...
as well as the Evil Queen from Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. In Vampira: The Movie, Nurmi reveals she appropriated the long cigarette holder and extra-long fingernails from the Dragon Lady
Dragon Lady
Dragon Lady is a phrase referring to a seductive, treacherous, domineering, and/or tyrannical woman, especially an Asian one. Women famously referred to as "Dragon Lady" include:*Madame Ngo Dinh Nhu, First Lady of South Vietnam...
character in the Terry and the Pirates
Terry and the Pirates (comic strip)
Terry and the Pirates was an action-adventure comic strip created by cartoonist Milton Caniff. Captain Joseph Patterson, editor for the Chicago Tribune New York News Syndicate, had admired Caniff’s work on the children's adventure strip Dickie Dare and hired him to create the new adventure strip,...
comic strip
Comic strip
A comic strip is a sequence of drawings arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions....
. The new costume was inspired by the artwork of John Willie
John Willie
John Alexander Scott Coutts , better known as John Willie, was a pioneering fetish photographer, illustrator, and bondage artist.- Life and work :...
featured in the fetish magazine Bizarre.
Synopsis
Each show began with the spectral image of the wasp-waisted Vampira gliding through knee-deep fog down a dark corridor toward the viewer. At the end of her trance-like walk she would suddenly let out a long, piercing scream as the camera zoomed in on her face. She would then smile and coyly remark, "Screaming relaxes me so." After that Nurmi would sit on a Victorian double-ended sofa decorated with skulls and introduce the movie of the night, sometimes pausing to play with her pet spider Rolo, talk with off-camera ghosts, torment her advertiser, Fletcher Jones, in amusing commercials, or drink a Vampira Cocktail at her poison bar. The show's theme music was from the Adagio movement in Music for Strings, Percussion and CelestaMusic for Strings, Percussion and Celesta
Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta, Sz. 106, BB 114 is one of the best-known compositions by the Hungarian composer Béla Bartók. Commissioned by Paul Sacher to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the Basel Chamber Orchestra, the score is dated September 7, 1936...
by Bela Bartok
Béla Bartók
Béla Viktor János Bartók was a Hungarian composer and pianist. He is considered one of the most important composers of the 20th century and is regarded, along with Liszt, as Hungary's greatest composer...
and excerpts from Uranus from The Planets
The Planets
The Planets, Op. 32, is a seven-movement orchestral suite by the English composer Gustav Holst, written between 1914 and 1916. Each movement of the suite is named after a planet of the Solar System and its corresponding astrological character as defined by Holst...
by Gustav Holst
Gustav Holst
Gustav Theodore Holst was an English composer. He is most famous for his orchestral suite The Planets....
. Nurmi's salary for the show was $75 per week.
The show's concept of having a themed host introduce films was fresh at the time and had never been done before. In later years, stations all over the world would duplicate its format with similar hosts. The Vampira Show was seen in the Los Angeles area only but was featured in articles and photo spreads in Newsweek
Newsweek
Newsweek is an American weekly news magazine published in New York City. It is distributed throughout the United States and internationally. It is the second-largest news weekly magazine in the U.S., having trailed Time in circulation and advertising revenue for most of its existence...
, TV Guide
TV Guide
TV Guide is a weekly American magazine with listings of TV shows.In addition to TV listings, the publication features television-related news, celebrity interviews, gossip and film reviews and crossword puzzles...
and Life
Life (magazine)
Life generally refers to three American magazines:*A humor and general interest magazine published from 1883 to 1936. Time founder Henry Luce bought the magazine in 1936 solely so that he could acquire the rights to its name....
within weeks of its first broadcast. The show and its bizarre hostess were an instant success and led to Nurmi's appearance on numerous 1950s television shows including The Red Skelton Show
The Red Skelton Show
The Red Skelton Show is an American variety show that was a television staple for two decades, from 1951 to 1971. It was second to Gunsmoke and third to The Ed Sullivan Show in the ratings during that time. Skelton, who had previously been a radio star, had appeared in several motion pictures as...
and Ed Sullivan's
Ed Sullivan
Edward Vincent "Ed" Sullivan was an American entertainment writer and television host, best known as the presenter of the TV variety show The Ed Sullivan Show. The show was broadcast from 1948 to 1971 , which made it one of the longest-running variety shows in U.S...
Toast of the Town
The Ed Sullivan Show
The Ed Sullivan Show is an American TV variety show that originally ran on CBS from Sunday June 20, 1948 to Sunday June 6, 1971, and was hosted by New York entertainment columnist Ed Sullivan....
.
David J. Skal's The Monster Show revealed that James Dean
James Dean
James Byron Dean was an American film actor. He is a cultural icon, best embodied in the title of his most celebrated film, Rebel Without a Cause , in which he starred as troubled Los Angeles teenager Jim Stark...
, a friend of Maila's at the time before he became famous in films, appeared with his back to the camera in one Vampira episode, where she was dressed as a dominant schoolteacher and rapped his knuckles. She was later hurt when Dean became famous and started to badmouth her publicly and in press interviews.
Cancellation
Despite its popularity, the series was canceled in 1955 when Nurmi refused to sell her rights to the character to ABC. Nurmi revived the series for a short time in 1956 on KHJ-TV with a different set and production crew.After the series demise, Nurmi appeared in the 1959
1959 in film
The year 1959 in film involved some significant events, with Ben-Hur winning a record 11 Academy Awards.-Events:* The Three Stooges make their 190th and last short film, Sappy Bull Fighters....
film Plan 9 From Outer Space
Plan 9 from Outer Space
Plan 9 from Outer Space is a 1959 science fiction film written and directed by Edward D. Wood, Jr. The film features Gregory Walcott, Mona McKinnon, Tor Johnson and Maila "Vampira" Nurmi...
, dressed as Vampira but out of character; Nurmi told Boxoffice that Wood's dialogue was so awful she sought and received permission to perform her entire role in a mute and spellbound manner she referred to as "Maila in an Alpha state." Nurmi also performed as Vampira in a Las Vegas
Las Vegas Strip
The Las Vegas Strip is an approximately stretch of Las Vegas Boulevard in Clark County, Nevada; adjacent to, but outside the city limits of Las Vegas proper. The Strip lies within the unincorporated townships of Paradise and Winchester...
stage show titled Come as You Are with Liberace
Liberace
Wladziu Valentino Liberace , best known simply as Liberace, was a famous American pianist and vocalist.In a career that spanned four decades of concerts, recordings, motion pictures, television and endorsements, Liberace became world-renowned...
.
Revival and changes
In 1981, KHJ-TV hired Nurmi to recreate The Vampira Show. When Nurmi quit, the character's name was changed to ElviraCassandra Peterson
Cassandra Peterson is an American actress best known for her on-screen horror hostess character Elvira, Mistress of the Dark. She gained fame on Los Angeles television station KHJ wearing a black, gothic, cleavage-enhancing gown as host of Movie Macabre, a weekly horror movie presentation...
. By 1982, Elvira's Movie Macabre was syndicated in over 80 markets across the United States. Nurmi, whose only income was Social Security
Social Security (United States)
In the United States, Social Security refers to the federal Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance program.The original Social Security Act and the current version of the Act, as amended encompass several social welfare and social insurance programs...
, sued but lost her case when she was unable to pay for continuing legal expenses.
In a 1987 interview with Skip Lowe, Nurmi stated there were over 150 similarities between Elvira and Vampira, including her closing remark "Unpleasant dreams, darlings". The Elvira character has since appeared in over 500 television shows, two feature films, released five music albums and numerous other merchandise including action figures, perfume, beer, videotapes, posters, clothing, costumes, pinball machines, computer games, comic books and trading cards. In a 2006 interview for Vampira: The Movie, Cassandra Peterson
Cassandra Peterson
Cassandra Peterson is an American actress best known for her on-screen horror hostess character Elvira, Mistress of the Dark. She gained fame on Los Angeles television station KHJ wearing a black, gothic, cleavage-enhancing gown as host of Movie Macabre, a weekly horror movie presentation...
, the actress who plays Elvira, said of the lawsuit, "It was a no-win situation for everybody".
Episode status
The original Vampira Show has never aired in syndication due to it being originally broadcast live and never filmed as a kinescopeKinescope
Kinescope , shortened to kine , also known as telerecording in Britain, is a recording of a television program made by filming the picture from a video monitor...
for future airings. No footage of the show is known to exist, however, in the 1990s a kinescope
Kinescope
Kinescope , shortened to kine , also known as telerecording in Britain, is a recording of a television program made by filming the picture from a video monitor...
advertising the station's ability to draw clients to advertisers featuring Nurmi in character was found in a private collection. The clips used in the kinescope were re-shot segments using a previous episode's script. Several scripts from various episodes still exist in private collections as well.
Pirated copies of the kinescope film were widely distributed with a bootlegged DVD of the 1995 Finnish documentary about Nurmi, About Sex, Death and Taxes, most notably by Kevin Sean Michaels
Kevin Sean Michaels
- Biography and Career :Michaels is best known as Art Director for Troma Entertainment in 2002 and worked closely with filmmaker Lloyd Kaufman on Troma's Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead and for the 2007 documentary"Vampira: The Movie."- Movie Work :...
, director of Vampira: The Movie, through eBay auctions. Segments of the kinescope can be seen in 2006
2006 in film
- Highest-grossing films :Please note that following the tradition of the English-language film industry, these are the top-grossing films that were first released in the United States in 2006...
film Vampira: The Movie.
In 2007, the kinescope film of Nurmi in character was restored by Rerunmedia, whose restorations include The Ed Sullivan Show
The Ed Sullivan Show
The Ed Sullivan Show is an American TV variety show that originally ran on CBS from Sunday June 20, 1948 to Sunday June 6, 1971, and was hosted by New York entertainment columnist Ed Sullivan....
and Dark Shadows
Dark Shadows
Dark Shadows is a gothic soap opera that originally aired weekdays on the ABC television network, from June 27, 1966 to April 2, 1971. The show was created by Dan Curtis. The story bible, which was written by Art Wallace, does not mention any supernatural elements...
. The restoration utilized the groundbreaking LiveFeed Video Imaging process developed exclusively for the restoration of kinescopes. The restoration was funded by The Clint Hickman Collection and Coffin Case.
A reconstructed episode of The Vampira Show was released from the Vampira's Attic web site in October 2007. The release imitated a complete episode by using existing footage of the show combined with vintage commercials and a full-length feature film.
In popular culture
In 1994, director Tim BurtonTim Burton
Timothy William "Tim" Burton is an American film director, film producer, writer and artist. He is famous for dark, quirky-themed movies such as Beetlejuice, Edward Scissorhands, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Ed Wood, Sleepy Hollow, Corpse Bride and Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet...
cast actress Lisa Marie as Nurmi/Vampira for the film Ed Wood
Ed Wood (film)
Ed Wood is a 1994 American comedy-drama biopic directed and produced by Tim Burton, and starring Johnny Depp as cult filmmaker Edward D. Wood, Jr. The film concerns the period in Wood's life when he made his best-known films as well as his relationship with actor Bela Lugosi, played by Martin Landau...
. The film also featured a short recreation of The Vampira Show.
The Vampira Show was recreated for the 1995 documentary About Sex, Death and Taxes and The Haunted World of Edward D. Wood, Jr..