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Anthony Timpone is the luckiest guy in the world. From his perch atop the Fangoria magazine empire his tentacles reach out to all things horror. If it's dead, spooky, or bleeding, then Timpone has written about it.
Fangoria (online at Fangoria.com) is the premiere niche magazine, covering all things scary with a wit and intelligence the genre never gets in the mainstream press. But Fangoria is so much more than a mere periodical, as Timpone shares with Mr. Skin.
His Royal Highness of Horror took time from his busy schedule and spoke to Mr. Skin from his Manhattan office. The conversation went from Scream Queens past and present to the current state of filmdom horror. And Timpone was never less than chilling.
How'd you land this dream job?
I had been freelancing to Starlog Group, which is our parent company, while I was in college at NYU, interviewing a lot of the science-fiction people of the day, Star Wars, Star Trek people. But my dream was always to break into Fangoria. But back then all the articles were pretty much written in-house by the co-editors at that time, so there weren't many freelance opportunities.
I started writing for Starlog on a regular basis, and, while I was still in college, I told the editor there that I would be getting out of school soon, if any opportunities opened at Starlog to keep me in mind. Sure enough, a few weeks out of college a job did open up and it happened to be at Fangoria. One of the editors had quit. They needed someone fast and I was able to segue quickly into that job and got quickly promoted up the ladder within a year to editor-in-chief.
Directly from college to the top of the horror heap.
Yeah, it was always my dream job. I never thought it would happen so fast.
Was there a specific movie that made you ga-ga for gore?
Not really, but I had grown up reading Famous Monsters of Filmland, Marvel comic books, going to the drive-in, seeing AIP movies and Hammer films, Vincent Price movies, Godzilla movies--all that stuff, all the science-fiction, horror, and fantasy movies. But my first love was always the horror.
But as far as the defining moment, meeting [Famous Monsters publisher] Forrest Ackerman at a convention in 1973 was really cool. Just getting into the whole convention scene back then.
Did you have any aspirations to make horror movies?
More reporting on it, being an editor, not necessarily directing or starring in horror movies, but a natural progression would be to produce horror movies.
But you have spent some time in front of the camera, usually as a ghoul or a zombie, such as in Satan's Menagerie (2001) and, one of our favorites, House of the Dead (2003).
That was more as a goof for friends. It's certainly not a career aspiration.
But House of the Dead was a fine leering aspiration, with skinful scenes from Erica Durance (Picture:1 - 2 - 3 - 4), Penny Phang (Picture: 1 - 2), Sonya Salomaa (Picture: 1 - 2), and Mashiah Vaughn-Hulbert.
I did see a lot of the actresses on set and one was more beautiful than the other. But when it comes to those scenes it's usually a closed set and certainly journalists aren't welcome to watch [laughs].
OK, how about from the audience's perspective. Do you recall the first time you saw a nude scene in a mainstream movie?
Maybe Walkabout (Picture: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4), that one comes to mind. My parents took us to see it. I think it was double-billed with one of the Planet of the Apes movies. I think there might have been a little bit of nudity in Scream and Scream Again [nope--ed.]. I saw that around that same period. And Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed [strike two--ed.] that may have had a bit of nudity. One Million Years B.C. (Picture: 1 - 2), there's no nudity in that, but it sure came close. There are a lot of teasers in there! But usually the pictures my folks took us to see were PG.
Back then PG meant "Pretty Good" in terms of seeing some skin.
Yeah, that's true. But I remember the big thing was when Carrie (Picture: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5) came out in 1976. Holy cow! Is this what porno films are like? That opening in the locker room--whoa! I didn't even know what that stuff looked like [laughs].
Did you like it?
Oh, certainly, yeah.
Our two worlds meet in the realm of Scream Queens. Who are you favorites?
Definitely the A-level ones like Jamie Lee Curtis, Barbara Steele, the people that have a classier pedigree than some of the modern ones--it was fun watching that whole movement develop, Linnea Quigley, Brinke Stevens, and some of the others. Then I thought it got a little too sleazy with magazines like Scream Queens and Femme Fatales, I thought they went into the lower-rent aspects of the label.
But Linnea Quigley was always a lot of fun. She was a great personality at the Fangoria conventions. She was really able to do something with her celebrity. I always loved when she would get onstage at a convention and do this fun audience-participation thing where she'd make believe she was making a movie and audition people. She'd get fans to get onstage and act like zombies or victims. That was always a lot of fun and the audience loved that stuff.
How about modern-day Scream Queens?
Nowadays they cast these WB-types. They'll make one horror film and then move on, and they'll be embarrassed about being associated with the genre. Sarah Michelle Gellar, even though she's in one of the most successful horror films in years, she kind of looks down on the horror label. She was great in Buffy, but I think she'd rather be a serious actress than be known for that kind of stuff.
Other actresses, too, the one from the Scream movies, Neve Campbell, and Jennifer Love Hewitt. It's like, "We'll pay our dues here and then move on to something else." They really don't have a love for making these types of movies. I don't blame them for not wanting to be associated with, say, a Monique Gabrielle. They wanted to be taken a little more seriously. A lot of times they run from the horror label.
What about ones like that don't run from horror?
Like Debbie Rochon, say or Felissa Rose?
Yeah, or Tiffany Shepis.
I like Tiffany! She was in this movie The Hazing (Picture: 1 - 2). She was very fun in that, very spunky and had a lot of personality. And Felissa Rose, I haven't seen too many of her recent films, she's doing real cheapie-type movies, but in terms of personality she's very vivacious and fun to be around. She was one of the interviewees on the [Bravo special TV series] One Hundred Scariest Movie Moments. She was great. She gave a lot of great comments and commentary on other people's scary movies. She's a real charmer.
You talked about producing a bit earlier, so what ventures have you made beyond the print world?
In the early '90s, Fangoria produced three movies for Columbia TriStar Home Video. The first one was called Mindwarp, the second one was called Children of the Night, with Karen Black and Ami Dolenz, and the third one was called Severed Ties, with Oliver Reed and Elke Sommer. We produced those films and they were happy with them and they did well, but the returns weren't quick enough coming in so my publisher decided not to do movies anymore.
We laid low for a while. Then I put together a video label where we would put out other people's movies, Fangoria Presents. We weren't actually producing other people's films; instead we were trying to acquire the films of independent filmmakers in an effort to discover the next John Carpenter, Sam Raimi, George Romero. That label has been going strong since '98, '99.
We actually have three labels now. Midnight Classics, in which we released I Drink Your Blood (Picture: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5), which came out in November. Then we have a Fangoria International label that debuts in February. That's going to be horror films from overseas. And the first one is going to be a zombie film from the Czech Republic called Choking Hazard. It's a brand new Czech zombie-comedy.
Then we have another label called Fangoria Presents Gorezone, named after a Fangoria sister magazine that we published in the '90s. The first release on that is The Last Horror Movie, which debuted in December.
What about Sick in the Head, which you're personally producing?
That's a new film co-written and will be directed by Frank Henenlotter, who did the Basket Case movies and Frankenhooker. It's a real mind-bending, crazy, hallucinogenic horror film in the tradition of his pervious films, especially Brain Damage (Picture: 1 - 2). It's in pre-production.
Will there be any scenes that we'll be able to post on Mr. Skin?
I think there might be some warped hallucination scenes. The lead character is a young man whose parents have been arrested and locked up for being husband-and-wife serial killers. It winds up that they have this parasite that's growing on their brains that's compelling them to kill and they're trying to pass on their legacy to their son. And then the son starts having all these hallucinations. There's a scene where he's in a hardware store and a couple starts making out in the aisle and getting all hot and heavy, but he's not sure if he's actually seeing it or if it's all a figment of his disturbed mind. That's one scene that leaps out at me that might fit your criteria. And I'm sure there are others in there.
What do you think of the current state of horror?
I think it's very exciting. The horror genre is at a great place right now. More horror films are being made than ever before. Any time a new horror film opens on a Friday you can usually count on it being number one in the box office that weekend. Films like The Grudge and Saw are making record levels for films of that type. A film like Saw, which just sort of came out of the woodwork, made over $50 million, and a year ago R-rated horror films weren't making that kind of money.
What about quality?
I think Saw was definitely a horror movie. To me, it was like a mix between Se7en and The Abominable Dr. Phibes. It was really twisted, horrific, and Grand Guignol. And I liked The Grudge as well. Most of the remakes, I wasn't expecting much, but I was pleasantly surprised by the Dawn of the Dead remake, Texas Chainsaw Massacre. It seems like they're not just doing retreads, that they're actually trying to come up with something fresh and scary, and most of these remakes have been better than a lot of the original horror films we're seeing. I thought Gothika was pretty flat, same with Ghost Ship. But with remakes they have a great kernel of an idea and they're able to exploit it and come up with a really good new spin.
What do you think of Seduction Cinema and its mix of sex and horror, plus star player Misty Mundae's meteoric rise?
To be honest, I've never seen one of her films, but I appreciate the work the people are doing, and I certainly appreciate all the advertising they do in our magazine. Their films have gotten more ambitious; Screaming Dead (Picture: 1 - 2 - 3) and Bite Me! (Picture: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4), they're a little bit more than TA. They have a little more story content to them and cool, fun, kitschy special effects. So I think they're trying to grow as a company, and that definitely bodes well for the genre.
What's next for Fangoria in its world-domination plans?
We're working on a TV show, FangoriaTV (visit them at FangoriaTV.com), which will feature people like Felissa Rose and Debbie Rochon.
Well then the fans at Mr. Skin will be tuning in.
Fangoria (online at Fangoria.com) is the premiere niche magazine, covering all things scary with a wit and intelligence the genre never gets in the mainstream press. But Fangoria is so much more than a mere periodical, as Timpone shares with Mr. Skin.
His Royal Highness of Horror took time from his busy schedule and spoke to Mr. Skin from his Manhattan office. The conversation went from Scream Queens past and present to the current state of filmdom horror. And Timpone was never less than chilling.
How'd you land this dream job?
I had been freelancing to Starlog Group, which is our parent company, while I was in college at NYU, interviewing a lot of the science-fiction people of the day, Star Wars, Star Trek people. But my dream was always to break into Fangoria. But back then all the articles were pretty much written in-house by the co-editors at that time, so there weren't many freelance opportunities.
I started writing for Starlog on a regular basis, and, while I was still in college, I told the editor there that I would be getting out of school soon, if any opportunities opened at Starlog to keep me in mind. Sure enough, a few weeks out of college a job did open up and it happened to be at Fangoria. One of the editors had quit. They needed someone fast and I was able to segue quickly into that job and got quickly promoted up the ladder within a year to editor-in-chief.
Directly from college to the top of the horror heap.
Yeah, it was always my dream job. I never thought it would happen so fast.
Was there a specific movie that made you ga-ga for gore?
Not really, but I had grown up reading Famous Monsters of Filmland, Marvel comic books, going to the drive-in, seeing AIP movies and Hammer films, Vincent Price movies, Godzilla movies--all that stuff, all the science-fiction, horror, and fantasy movies. But my first love was always the horror.
But as far as the defining moment, meeting [Famous Monsters publisher] Forrest Ackerman at a convention in 1973 was really cool. Just getting into the whole convention scene back then.
Did you have any aspirations to make horror movies?
More reporting on it, being an editor, not necessarily directing or starring in horror movies, but a natural progression would be to produce horror movies.
But you have spent some time in front of the camera, usually as a ghoul or a zombie, such as in Satan's Menagerie (2001) and, one of our favorites, House of the Dead (2003).
That was more as a goof for friends. It's certainly not a career aspiration.
But House of the Dead was a fine leering aspiration, with skinful scenes from Erica Durance (Picture:1 - 2 - 3 - 4), Penny Phang (Picture: 1 - 2), Sonya Salomaa (Picture: 1 - 2), and Mashiah Vaughn-Hulbert.
I did see a lot of the actresses on set and one was more beautiful than the other. But when it comes to those scenes it's usually a closed set and certainly journalists aren't welcome to watch [laughs].
OK, how about from the audience's perspective. Do you recall the first time you saw a nude scene in a mainstream movie?
Maybe Walkabout (Picture: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4), that one comes to mind. My parents took us to see it. I think it was double-billed with one of the Planet of the Apes movies. I think there might have been a little bit of nudity in Scream and Scream Again [nope--ed.]. I saw that around that same period. And Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed [strike two--ed.] that may have had a bit of nudity. One Million Years B.C. (Picture: 1 - 2), there's no nudity in that, but it sure came close. There are a lot of teasers in there! But usually the pictures my folks took us to see were PG.
Back then PG meant "Pretty Good" in terms of seeing some skin.
Yeah, that's true. But I remember the big thing was when Carrie (Picture: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5) came out in 1976. Holy cow! Is this what porno films are like? That opening in the locker room--whoa! I didn't even know what that stuff looked like [laughs].
Did you like it?
Oh, certainly, yeah.
Our two worlds meet in the realm of Scream Queens. Who are you favorites?
Definitely the A-level ones like Jamie Lee Curtis, Barbara Steele, the people that have a classier pedigree than some of the modern ones--it was fun watching that whole movement develop, Linnea Quigley, Brinke Stevens, and some of the others. Then I thought it got a little too sleazy with magazines like Scream Queens and Femme Fatales, I thought they went into the lower-rent aspects of the label.
But Linnea Quigley was always a lot of fun. She was a great personality at the Fangoria conventions. She was really able to do something with her celebrity. I always loved when she would get onstage at a convention and do this fun audience-participation thing where she'd make believe she was making a movie and audition people. She'd get fans to get onstage and act like zombies or victims. That was always a lot of fun and the audience loved that stuff.
How about modern-day Scream Queens?
Nowadays they cast these WB-types. They'll make one horror film and then move on, and they'll be embarrassed about being associated with the genre. Sarah Michelle Gellar, even though she's in one of the most successful horror films in years, she kind of looks down on the horror label. She was great in Buffy, but I think she'd rather be a serious actress than be known for that kind of stuff.
Other actresses, too, the one from the Scream movies, Neve Campbell, and Jennifer Love Hewitt. It's like, "We'll pay our dues here and then move on to something else." They really don't have a love for making these types of movies. I don't blame them for not wanting to be associated with, say, a Monique Gabrielle. They wanted to be taken a little more seriously. A lot of times they run from the horror label.
What about ones like that don't run from horror?
Like Debbie Rochon, say or Felissa Rose?
Yeah, or Tiffany Shepis.
I like Tiffany! She was in this movie The Hazing (Picture: 1 - 2). She was very fun in that, very spunky and had a lot of personality. And Felissa Rose, I haven't seen too many of her recent films, she's doing real cheapie-type movies, but in terms of personality she's very vivacious and fun to be around. She was one of the interviewees on the [Bravo special TV series] One Hundred Scariest Movie Moments. She was great. She gave a lot of great comments and commentary on other people's scary movies. She's a real charmer.
You talked about producing a bit earlier, so what ventures have you made beyond the print world?
In the early '90s, Fangoria produced three movies for Columbia TriStar Home Video. The first one was called Mindwarp, the second one was called Children of the Night, with Karen Black and Ami Dolenz, and the third one was called Severed Ties, with Oliver Reed and Elke Sommer. We produced those films and they were happy with them and they did well, but the returns weren't quick enough coming in so my publisher decided not to do movies anymore.
We laid low for a while. Then I put together a video label where we would put out other people's movies, Fangoria Presents. We weren't actually producing other people's films; instead we were trying to acquire the films of independent filmmakers in an effort to discover the next John Carpenter, Sam Raimi, George Romero. That label has been going strong since '98, '99.
We actually have three labels now. Midnight Classics, in which we released I Drink Your Blood (Picture: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5), which came out in November. Then we have a Fangoria International label that debuts in February. That's going to be horror films from overseas. And the first one is going to be a zombie film from the Czech Republic called Choking Hazard. It's a brand new Czech zombie-comedy.
Then we have another label called Fangoria Presents Gorezone, named after a Fangoria sister magazine that we published in the '90s. The first release on that is The Last Horror Movie, which debuted in December.
What about Sick in the Head, which you're personally producing?
That's a new film co-written and will be directed by Frank Henenlotter, who did the Basket Case movies and Frankenhooker. It's a real mind-bending, crazy, hallucinogenic horror film in the tradition of his pervious films, especially Brain Damage (Picture: 1 - 2). It's in pre-production.
Will there be any scenes that we'll be able to post on Mr. Skin?
I think there might be some warped hallucination scenes. The lead character is a young man whose parents have been arrested and locked up for being husband-and-wife serial killers. It winds up that they have this parasite that's growing on their brains that's compelling them to kill and they're trying to pass on their legacy to their son. And then the son starts having all these hallucinations. There's a scene where he's in a hardware store and a couple starts making out in the aisle and getting all hot and heavy, but he's not sure if he's actually seeing it or if it's all a figment of his disturbed mind. That's one scene that leaps out at me that might fit your criteria. And I'm sure there are others in there.
What do you think of the current state of horror?
I think it's very exciting. The horror genre is at a great place right now. More horror films are being made than ever before. Any time a new horror film opens on a Friday you can usually count on it being number one in the box office that weekend. Films like The Grudge and Saw are making record levels for films of that type. A film like Saw, which just sort of came out of the woodwork, made over $50 million, and a year ago R-rated horror films weren't making that kind of money.
What about quality?
I think Saw was definitely a horror movie. To me, it was like a mix between Se7en and The Abominable Dr. Phibes. It was really twisted, horrific, and Grand Guignol. And I liked The Grudge as well. Most of the remakes, I wasn't expecting much, but I was pleasantly surprised by the Dawn of the Dead remake, Texas Chainsaw Massacre. It seems like they're not just doing retreads, that they're actually trying to come up with something fresh and scary, and most of these remakes have been better than a lot of the original horror films we're seeing. I thought Gothika was pretty flat, same with Ghost Ship. But with remakes they have a great kernel of an idea and they're able to exploit it and come up with a really good new spin.
What do you think of Seduction Cinema and its mix of sex and horror, plus star player Misty Mundae's meteoric rise?
To be honest, I've never seen one of her films, but I appreciate the work the people are doing, and I certainly appreciate all the advertising they do in our magazine. Their films have gotten more ambitious; Screaming Dead (Picture: 1 - 2 - 3) and Bite Me! (Picture: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4), they're a little bit more than TA. They have a little more story content to them and cool, fun, kitschy special effects. So I think they're trying to grow as a company, and that definitely bodes well for the genre.
What's next for Fangoria in its world-domination plans?
We're working on a TV show, FangoriaTV (visit them at FangoriaTV.com), which will feature people like Felissa Rose and Debbie Rochon.
Well then the fans at Mr. Skin will be tuning in.
