Podcasts
Exploiting an Heiress in the ‘House of Wax’ Marketing Campaign [Horror Queers Podcast]
See Paris Cry.
After kicking off 2023 with a re-do of one of our earliest episodes (The Perfection), we moved on to Todd Haynes’ AIDS allegory Safe before tackling Guillermo del Toro’s Gothic romance Crimson Peak. Now, we’re venturing back into the world of Dark Castle Entertainment with a fun discussion of Jaume Collet-Serra‘s 2005 remake House of Wax.
In the film, a gang of college friends, including Wade (Jared Padalecki), his girlfriend Carly (Elisha Cuthbert) and her twin brother Nick (Chad Michael Murray), are en route to a school football game when their car mysteriously loses its fan belt. They are forced to seek help in the nearby town of Ambrose, which boasts a literal house of wax. Once inside the spooky and seemingly abandoned building, they find the works on display are not quite what they seem, and the friends soon discover that they are being hunted by the insane twin brothers (Brian Van Holt) who run the museum.
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, Acast, Google Podcasts, and RSS.
Episode 214: House of Wax (2005)
We are not here to see Paris die but we are here to discuss Jaume Collet-Serra’s mean and stylish 2005 remake House of Wax (and yes, we know it has more in common with Tourist Trap)! Wanna see what happens when a really dumb slasher script gets a $40 million budget thrown at it? This is it!
Join us as we discuss the film’s controversial “See Paris Die!” marketing campaign (and the emotional toll it may have taken on Paris Hilton) that preceded the film’s release before going all in on this 2005 time capsule that fell in that awkward period for horror between post-Scream slashers and torture porn.
Plus: twincest, Penny Can, sexy super glue blowing, a fiery finale and an unexpected(?) queer reading of Chad Michael Murray’s Nick.
Oh, and here’s the link to the 5-part documentary series Movie Life: House of Wax that aired on MTV the month before the film was released. It’s…something.
Cross out House of Wax!
Coming up on Wednesday: Long live the new flesh because we’re heading back to Cronenberg Land to discuss 1983 nightmare Videodrome.
P.S. Subscribe to our Patreon for more than 222 hours of additional content! We’re wrapping up the year with episodes on Netflix’s Edgar Allan Poe-focused murder mystery The Pale Blue Eye, Shudder’s anthology sequel Scare Package II: Rad Chad’s Revenge, the creepy found footage film Skinamarink, Blumhouse’s killer robot movie M3GAN, and an audio commentary on Cloverfield, just in time for its 15th anniversary!
Maybe you haven’t thought about your good friend Sweeney Todd in a while, or maybe you have. The 2007 movie is a bit of a memory, though a fond one – it has a healthy 86% on Rotten Tomatoes, for what it’s worth. But 2023’s Broadway revival starring Josh Groban, who your mom thinks is “so talented” (she’s right!), was enough of a hit that its run was extended.
It appears we’re in a bit of a Sweeneyssaince.
For the uninitiated, Sweeney Todd is the story of a barber who kills his customers and disposes of the bodies by passing them off to pie shop owner Mrs. Lovett, who uses them as a special ingredient. But there’s more below the trap door.
Sweeney Todd isn’t just a late 70s musical that turned into a movie; it started as a penny dreadful called The String of Pearls: A Domestic Romance (author unknown), told week-to-week in the 1840s. Penny dreadfuls were essentially fiction zines featuring serialized stories that were usually horror-based and cost a penny, leading to the very literal nickname.
The String of Pearls differs from the more well-known Sweeney Todd plot in that it follows the investigation of a missing persons case that leads to the reveal of Sweeney and Mrs. Lovett’s arrangement, as opposed to the more modern iteration which treats audiences to the duo hatching their homicidal plan and then giving the worst haircuts ever. What a delightfully wild reveal that must have been if you were a reader in Victorian London after weeks of wondering what had become of the missing sailor carrying a string of pearls to deliver to a lovely girl.
Kristen and Will discuss the history and future of Sweeney Todd and works inspired by it this week on Guide to the Unknown. Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts to get a new episode every Friday.
Looking for New Episodes of “Chucky” on Peacock? Here’s What Changed
‘Mountain Man’ – Joe Manganiello Will Battle Zombies in Upcoming Horror Movie
‘The Blair Witch Project’ – Original Stars Release a Statement Asking Lionsgate for Residuals & Recognition
‘Trap’ – Official Trailer Previews a Wild New Horror Experience from M. Night Shyamalan
‘Halloween: Illustrated’ Review: Original Novelization of John Carpenter’s Classic Gets an Upgrade
