When Saturday morning was the main event; Remembering the Hilarious House of Frightenstein
- Lisa Chester
- Oct 30
- 4 min read
Remember a time when Saturday morning programming captivated our youth, before cartoons were available at a moment's notice? Re-engage your inner child with this documentary about the cult Canadian classic, The Hilarious House of Frightenstein, which aired beginning 1972.
The film, Behind the Castle Doors: The Hilarious House of Frightenstein, will be screened Saturday morning (of course), Nov. 8 at 10 a.m., as part of the inaugural Stratford Film Festival. Reminiscent of the times, there will be a cereal bar stocked with sugary cereals.
Following the screening there will be a Q-and-A with the directors Tammy Heisel and Morgan Baker. The film was produced in 2025 and premiered at the Hamilton Film Festival earlier in October. This is also the debut film for Heisel and Baker, who have been lifelong fans of the cult classic.
“I have always been a big fan of the show. I grew up watching it. Morgan and I have a TV show that we cover nerdy culture, and one day we saw that Mitch (Markowitz), the associate producer of Hilarious House was a guest at Forest City Comic Con here in London. For me, I’ve interviewed a lot of people, and this was the one that I thought I just had to meet. I arranged an interview and we became friends. He’s led such an interesting life that I said to him I would do a documentary about him one day,” said Heisel.
Fast forward a month later and Markowitz called Heisel and asked when they would be starting so she turned around and called Baker and told him they had a documentary to make. At the beginning, they thought they had a sense of the story they wanted to tell but that evolved over time.
“The more people that we met, the concept started to change and evolve and include more people. We were able to locate a camera operator from the show as well as three of the writers. We were able to do interviews with them and get their background and perspective as well, not to mention the people that wanted to share their own experiences watching it. Next thing we knew we had a feature length documentary,” said Baker.
The project took three years to complete with early hurdles given that they were in the tail end of COVID-19 pandemic restrictions. Working with archival materials to try and present it in such a way that it still looks good, given it was filmed in standard definition at the time, was another hurdle. Searching for the perfect clip to support the storytelling was rewarding and re-energized their commitment to the project and reminded them why they were doing what they were doing.
“The original camera operator, Dave Cremasco, had 600 plus behind the scenes photographs that he took while he was working and that in itself was such luck. People haven’t seen these so that’s how we got photos of Billy Vann getting his makeup on or what the sets look like standing back. Some of his photos are floating around on the internet but they aren’t credited. A lot of people don’t realize that Dave is the one that took all of those pictures. There are stills and stills and he just gave us use of everything,” said Heisel.
This film will be nostalgic for many, but also of interest for those that are new to the show with behind-the-scenes footage and stories, “The behind-the-scenes production stories and easter eggs when watching something. It’s the TV magic that goes into a production,” said Baker.
“And Vincent Price was a part of it and people still a recognize that name. People say, ‘Vincent Price was in it? Wasn’t that a small Canadian show?’ and we get to explain that in the film. And of course, how Billy did ten different characters and the story behind that,” adds Heisel.
The film includes interviews with fans, celebrities and employees of the show. Each one was a treasured experience for the filmmakers and they feel each one helped tell the story that they wanted to tell.
It was an unbelievable experience when the film opened in Hamilton and the audience reaction was overwhelming to them. People laughed at the right parts, at parts they didn’t expect, and commenting when a character came on. They applauded throughout the credits and it was a full house.
“They didn’t want to leave. Mitch stays and signs posters afterward and people brought in things they had or t-shirts. The comments that followed on social media, we thought we could only wish for that response. One said, ‘Thank you for making it.’ One said, ‘Billy Vann would be proud. For first time film makers too,’” said Heisel.
The trailer for the film has been viewed over 311,000 times at the time of writing, even though it has only been released for a couple of weeks. To view the trailer and to buy tickets for Behind the Castle Walls: The Hilarious House of Frightenstein visit stratfordfilmfestival.ca
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