Celebrity Birthday: William Castle - 63

 

 

Mr. William Castle is one of my personal favorite horror directors and, more importantly, he paved the way for many more contemporary filmmakers in the genre. Although he was often called “the poor man’s Hitchcock” in a derogatory fashion, William leaned into that phrase, eagerly taking it as a compliment even if it was given in a backhanded way.

 

Mr. Castle was born on April 24, 1914 in New York City, NY and died on May 31, 1977 in Los Angeles, CA. He was 63 years old.

William Castle Didn’t Start Out in the Horror Genre

 

As with any Hollywood filmmaker, William Castle started out with a few low-budget and little known projects. His first two films were documentary shorts. The first short, released in 1939, was entitled Coney Island and it was just 9 minutes in length. It was a marketing short that introduced audiences to the rides at the Coney Island amusement park.

In 1943, Castle released Black Marketing, which was a film he directed for the U.S. Office of War Information. The 10-minute short informed audiences about the ways in which the U.S. government detected the sale of black market items when the rationing of products was necessary for the wartime effort.

Also in 1943, William Castle’s first full-length feature film was released: The Chance of a Lifetime. The film starred Chester Morris, Erik Rolf, and Jeanne Bates. Reflecting the period, the film takes place in the WWII-era and revolves around a private detective (Morris) helping a paroled convict clear his name after having been framed for murder.

Throughout the mid to late 1940s, William directed a string of crime-dramas and mysteries in the film-noir style. Some of these movies included The Whistler (1944), The Mark of the Whistler (1944), Voice of the Whistler (1945), Mysterious Intruder (1946), and Undertow (1949).

William Castle Finally Enters the Horror Genre

Following a string of westerns throughout the early 1950s, Castle directed an episode of Science Fiction Theatre in 1956. The experience must have given him a taste of the worlds of horror, sci-fi, and fantasy because his projects changed shortly afterward. In 1958, he released his first horror film, Macabre, starring William Prince, Jim Backus, and Christine White.

 

In the film, Dr. Rodney Barrett (Prince) is notified that his daughter has been kidnapped and buried alive. Barrett is given five hours to find and rescue his daughter before she dies.

The Gimmick

If you’re familiar with the horror works of William Castle, you already know he used gimmicks to market his films. For Macabre, Castle insured each audience member to cover the risk of suffering a heart attack while watching the film. The official policy certificate, issued to each person from Lloyd’s of London, was valued at $1,000 (equal to $10,444.15 in today’s economy).

Castle’s House on Haunted Hill Makes its Theatrical Debut

The 1959 release of House on Haunted Hill was William’s next horror film and it starred Hollywood heavy-hitter Vincent Price. Alongside Price, the film featured Carol Ohmart and Richard Long. Elisha Cook Jr. shines as the nervous caretaker of the house, Watson Pritchard. This original version offered $10,000 to each guest that stayed the night in the haunted house. In today’s economy, $10,000 is equivalent to $104,441.52.

 

The Gimmick

For this film, Castle cast a plastic skeleton to perform as his in-theater gimmick. When the skeleton rises from the vat of poison at the end of the film, the plastic skeleton rises from a black box near the screen in each theater. Using a pulley system, the skeleton was “flown” over the heads of the audiences.

The skeleton in the film receives a credit as having been played “by himself”.

Castle’s String of Horror Hits Continued

Although Castle was often compared to Alfred Hitchcock when he was working, it might be said that William did much more for the horror genre than Hitch. The 1960s and 1970s saw release after release from Castle and almost all of those films were focused on horror and the macabre. The director had found his niche and he seemed to have as  much fun in making the films as his audiences had in watching them.

William Castle and Vincent Price teamed up again for another 1959 entry, The Tingler. In this film, Price plays a doctor and researcher eager to discover what causes people to feel fear. He theorizes that there’s parasite in each of us that’s kept immobile by our ability to scream during the onset of fear. When Price finds a mute woman (Judith Evelyn) who can’t scream, he sets out to test his theory.

The Gimmick

When the Tingler appeared on-screen, Castle had theaters release rolling bean bags under the seats of audience members. At the same time, the theater’s speakers would emit sounds similar to the Tingler’s screeches. To add an extra shock, electric buzzers were attached to the seats to give audience member an extra jolt.

13 Ghosts (1960) is another film that has been rebooted. Younger horror fans would say that 2001’s Thir13en Ghosts is the superior film and, while the newer film’s effects are definitely better, there’s still something to be said for the classic Castle film. The 1960 film starred Donald Woods, Margaret Hamilton (of Wizard of Oz fame), and Rosemary DeCamp.

The Gimmick

If you’re familiar with the plot of either version of the film, you’ll remember that the characters had to wear special goggles to see the ghosts. For the 1960 film, Castle provided special glasses for audience members to wear. The glasses resembled 3D glasses and the press at the time mistakenly marketed the film as a 3D experience.

 Similar to 3D glasses, there were both red and blue filters, but the wearer only looked through one color at a time. When looking through red lenses, audiences would see the images of ghosts appear. When switching to the blue lenses, the ghosts would disappear.

William Castle Continued His Exploration of Horror

 

In 1961, William added two more horror films to his portfolio: Homicidal and Mr. Sardonicus. He continued making horror films throughout the rest of his career. Some of those films include 13 Frightened Girls (1963), Strait-Jacket (1964), I Saw What You Did (1966), The Spirit is Willing (1967), and Project X (1968).

In 1974, William Castle released his last film, Shanks. This was also a horror film, starring Marcel Marceau, Tsilla Chelton, and Phillippe Clay. The plot revolved around a mute puppeteer who gets control of a dead scientist’s invention. The invention gives him the ability to animate the dead similarly to the way he controls his own puppets.

 

The Gimmick

By this time, Mr. Castle had grown weary of his gimmicks. However, it could be said that Marcel Marceau’s appearance in the film is a gimmick of sorts. The mime-turned-actor appears in the film without his customary make-up and he does speak his lines in the film.

Look for William Castle in Unexpected Places

The horror director was compared to Hitchcock for another reason. He liked to make cameo’s in his own films much like Alfred Hitchcock. While it was sometimes difficult to spot Hitchcock on screen, Castle’s cameos were more obvious to the casual move watcher. As long as you were familiar with William’s appearance, you could always spot him in his films.

 Even before he entered the horror genre, Castle was already making these brief cameos. For example, you could see him playing a reporter in When Love is Young (1937) and an angry juror in The Lady in Question (1940). Other films featuring William Castle cameos include When Strangers Marry (1944), Let’s Kill Uncle (1966), Rosemary’s Baby (1968), and Shanks (1974).

 

In addition to appearing as characters on film, Castle often started some of his films as a narrator. Look for William speaking as himself in the first few minutes of The Tingler (1959), 13 Ghosts (1960), Homicidal (1961), and Mr. Sardonicus (1961).

William Castle died at home as the result of a heart attack on May 31, 1977.