Heroes of Horror

Werewolf of London 1935 starred Henry Hull
The makeup by Jack Pierce also influenced the artist's later Chaney Wolf Man along with Michael Landon's version: I Was a Teenage Werewolf 1957.

Bela Lugosi shot to stardom in the title role of the 1931 film version of Bram Stoker's Dracula and set the standard for movie vampires. A successful stage actor in his native Hungary and in Germany, he emigrated to the United States in the 1920s and played various character roles until grabbing the lead in the stage production of Dracula in 1927. Lugosi's talent for playing a villain led to a career of playing monsters and mad scientists, and it's generally accepted that he made a lot of bad choices. Some of his more memorable movies include The Black Cat (1934), Ninotchka (1939, starring Greta Garbo), The Wolfman (1941) and Abbot and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948). In 1955 Lugosi committed himself to an institution, admitting an addiction to methadone. In his last years his personal life and career were on the skids, but he still worked a little in television and low-budget films. He died while working on what has been called one of the worst movies ever made, Plan 9 From Outer Space (released in 1959).


Rondo Hatton

The Art of Lon Chaney Sr.

Lon Chaney was born on April 1, 1883 in Colorado Springs, Colorado. He was the son of deaf mute parents, Frank and Emma Chaney and he learned from childhood to communicate through pantomime, sign language and facial expression. His mother became bed ridden from rheumatism when Lon was very young, so he quit school about the age of ten to care for her and his younger siblings.





























The Unknown, 1927, Lon Chaney
Directed by Tod Browning

Lon Chaney Sr.

"Lon Chaney was someone who acted out our psyches. He somehow got into the shadows inside our bodies; he was able to nail down some of our secret fears and put them on-screen," the writer Ray Bradbury once explained. "The history of Lon Chaney is the history of unrequited loves. He brings that part of you out into the open, because you fear that you are not loved, you fear that you never will be loved, you fear there is some part of you that's grotesque, that the world will turn away from."

Lon Chaney Sr.

Lon Chaney Sr.

Lon Chaney Sr.

Known on stage and screen as "The Man of a Thousand Faces," He called his specialty 'extreme characterization.' Despite how he wretched and anguished some of his roles may appear, the reports of him enduring excruciating pain for his art are wildly exaggerated. A former dancer and avid outdoorsman, He maintained a strong, lean physique and was very flexible. Of course, he got injured occasionally; and some makeup and wardrobe effects were more uncomfortable than others. However, at no time did he ever resort to self-torture.