Podcasts
[Horror Queers Podcast] It’s Cop vs Gays in Queer Positive Slasher ‘Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker’
Vagina Boxes.
Trace and I are still making our way through Pride Month! After kicking things off with the evolution of the gay slasher with Hellbent/Killer Unicorn and a tribute to trailblazer Clive Barker and his final directorial effort Lord of Illusions, things take a timely turn this week. We’re tackling little-seen Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker (aka Night Warning), a rare queer positive slasher that also has a lot to say about the relationship between the police and the queer community.
In director William Asher‘s 1981 video nasty, Aunt Cheryl (Susan Tyrell) has a possessive obsession with her nephew Billy (Jimmy McNichol). Their unhealthy relationship becomes even more problematic when Cheryl murders a man and Billy becomes the prime suspect in the eyes of homophobic Detective Carlson (Bo Svenson), who fixates on the teenager. Will Billy and his indestructible “girlfriend” Julie (Julia Duffy) survive both the relentless cop and his serial killer Aunt Cheryl?
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Episode 78 – Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker aka Night Warning (1981)
Pride month continues with the most queer positive slasher film most people have never seen!
We’re joined by fellow queer podcasters Andrew and Matty, aka FriGay the 13th, to unpack the delirious madness of Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker (aka Night Warning). This exploitation/video nasty tends to make waves for Susan Tyell’s incestuous relationship with her twinky son, but the real topic here is the film’s true villain: the homophobic cop who hates gays.
In addition to its bombastic Final Destination 2-like opening car crash and William Asher’s workmanlike direction, the group debates Tyrell’s artistic choices, sports in slashers, and twinks vs daddies. Plus: Andrew is obsessed with Julie the indestructible girlfriend, and Trace wonders who has a machete lying around the house? Also: do vaginas have flaps like boxes?
Finally, and most significantly, a serious talk about how Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker reflects real life tensions between the queer community and the police and how the film’s odd double release pattern put it on opposite sides of the AIDS epidemic.
Cross out Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker!
Coming up on Wednesday: We’re closing out Pride Month by calling the corners with quintessential teen girl/outsider film, The Craft!
– Joe & Trace
P.S. Check out last month’s article on 1986’s extremely upsetting In a Glass Cage. You can find all of the old articles here.
P.P.S. Subscribe to our Patreon to access bonus episodes! June is Creature Features month, so we have new episodes on Deep Rising and Arachnophobia, as well as an audio commentary on Snakes on a Plane!
Podcasts
Shakespearean Education in the Vincent Price-Starring ‘Theater of Blood’ [Horror Queers Podcast]
Butch knows best…
After concluding May with discussions of the disaster “slasher” The Poseidon Adventure (listen) and Michael Biehn’s demon twink in the messy-but-watchable The Fan (listen), we’re heading back to the ’70s to discuss our very first Vincent Price film in Douglas Hickox‘s horror comedy Theater of Blood (1973).
In Theater of Blood, Vincent Price stars as Edward Lionheart, a disgraced Shakespearean actor who begins targeting the critics who shamed him. The gimmick? He’s taking inspiration from the death scenes in William Shakespeare’s plays! Aiding him is his daughter Edwina (Diana Rigg), who acts as the honeypot for her father’s macabre scheme.
Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get a new episode every Wednesday. You can subscribe on iTunes/Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, iHeartRadio, SoundCloud, TuneIn, Amazon Music, and RSS.
Episode 388: Theater of Blood (1973)
Brush up on your Shakespeare and protect those poodles because we’re covering our very first Vincent Price film in Douglas Hickox’s horror comedy Theater of Blood (1973), a personal favorite of both Price and Diana Rigg.
Join us as we go all in on this somewhat episodic (but also educational!) proto-slasher, wondering if we’re supposed to know that’s Diana Rigg in hippie drag, and cackling at some of these murder set pieces.
Plus, “Handsy Dickman,” narcissistic gravestones, antisemitic stage makeup, and the ultimate debate: is it theatER or theatRE?
C/W: Attempted suicide, off-screen dog murder.
Cross out Theater of Blood!
Coming Up Next: We’re celebrating the premiere of AMC’s The Vampire Lestat with a look at the much-maligned 2002 adaptation Queen of the Damned!
P.S. Subscribe to our Patreon for over 492 hours of Patreon content including this month’s new episodes on Hannibal Season 3 Episodes 5 & 6, Backrooms, Passenger, Leviticus, an audio commentary on the original Scary Movie (2000), and the return of our Requel Tier as we begin our episode coverage of AMC’s The Vampire Lestat.