Rob Kelly Decor: Darby Jones

A couple of weeks ago, I got a nice email from a fan of my work who wanted a print of my Darby Jones PSA poster to go up in their TV room. Always happy to help out a fellow Val Lewton fan, I sent him a copy and now it resides next to the actual movie poster to I Walked With A Zombie, which is quite a compliment!


I love seeing my artwork like this; I take it as a real compliment that someone likes it enough to put it up in their home or office. Even I don't want to look at my stuff that much.

Oh, and I want a gumball!

 

Monster PSA: Simone Simon/James Arness

These "Monster PSA" poster ideas tend to come in groups, which resulted in these two new ones over the weekend. Simone Simon, star of Val Lewton's Cat People, seemed to me the perfect person to advocate for animals. As for James Arness, who played the original Thing, I transposed the isolation his character must have felt, trying to talk (and when I say talk, I mean kill) to that bunch of scientists who were scared to death of him.

Monster PSA: Walter White

Every so often I get inspired to do another "Monster PSA" poster, and this one just popped into my head pretty much as you see here.

Normally I would have used Bryan Cranston's name instead of his Breaking Bad character, but it seemed more appropriate like this.

Monster PSA: Alfonso Bedoya

I didn't have any intention of doing a new Monster PSA poster, but then a fan of my work (who has graciously bought prints of my stuff in the past to decorate his "Man Cave") asked if I would consider doing a PSA of Alfonso Bedoya.

Bedoya's claim to fame is his appearance in the classic The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, where he gets to utter the immortal line "Badges? We don't need no stinkin' badges!" (He actually doesn't say those exact words, but that doesn't matter anymore). I considered the request, figuring I'd get to it at some point.

Then the other night I found myself not ready to go to sleep, and simultaneously not wanting to work on other projects I had going, so I tore into this and within a few hours it was finished! It turned out being one of my favorites of the last few PSAs I've done--the portrait, the colors, and the modified tagline all seemed to hang together fairly well.

My patron felt the same, and as you read this the poster is on its way to him. Sometimes things just work out!

Monster PSA: Ornella Muti

As soon as I saw that Netflix Watch Instantly added Flash Gordon to its list of streaming movies, I added it to my queue and hit Play. As a kid, I was totally smitten with Ornella Muti as Ming's daughter, one in a long line of babes from genre movies I saw as a kid that interested me for reasons I couldn't at the time quite comprehend.

So what advice would Ms. Muti give? Well, considering how much trouble she got everyone into by falling in love Flash...

Monster PSA: Jenny Agutter

I'm not the only horror fan who completely fell in love with Jenny Agutter thanks to her performance in An American Werewolf in London; as Nurse Alex Price she was unbelievably sexy and sweet, as she takes in the troubled David Kessler (David Naughton).

Agutter has been in other genre films, like Logan's Run and Child's Play 2, but she cemented herself an enduring object of desire in AAWIL. And who among us wouldn't want to be told that she wants nothing more than to take you home and take care of you?

Monster PSA: Donald Pleasence

In many ways, this more of a de-motivational poster, since Donald Pleasence is trying to scare the bejeezus out of you--something he did quite, quite well!

Monster PSA: General Ursus

I know this isn't a motivational poster/public service announcement per se; I just love using the "naked, merciless force" tag--its one of my favorite lines, from any Apes movie.

You know, with Chris Christie not running in 2012, I think there's an opening for General Ursus...

Monster PSA: Darby Jones

This Monster PSA poster is from one of my favorite horror movies, I Walked With A Zombie. Producer Val Lewton was not big on filling his movies with typical movie monsters (in stark contrast to Universal, who was almost desperate to come up with monsters they could spin off into series), so Darby Jones as the mute zombie Carrefour is about as close as Lewton got.

And even though Carrefour was a zombie and therefore didn't worry about his health, I'm betting Darby Jones the actor saw the value in a good, brisk walk.

Monster PSA: Conrad Veidt

Every so often I get an idea for another Monster PSA poster, and they're so fun (and, admittedly, easy) to do that I never let the idea sit around in my head too long before getting it down.

My first color choice for this one was green, but then of course it made Veidt look just like The Joker, who was inspired by the Veidt film (The Man Who Laughs) in the first place! I didn't want to make that association (it's already pretty strong without me having to do anything), so I went with some cooler colors.

I tend to get ideas for PSAs in groups, so there'll probably be another one of these sooner than later!

Monster PSA: George Zucco

I haven't done a Monster PSA in a while; simply because I haven't had a really great idea for one.

But I was looking through a book about the Universal Monsters and saw this pic of character actor George Zucco, and I remembered he was one of the few "horror regulars" from that era that I haven't yet immortalized, so I set about coming up with a tag line.

Zucco was the rare actor who could toggle between A, B, and Z-level movies; he appeared in the Monogram cheapie Voodoo Man the same year he was in The Seventh Cross with Spencer Tracy.

He managed that balancing act through (most) of his career, so my first thought was the old chestnut "putting all your eggs in one basket" but that phrase is pretty antiquated; so I decided to go with a modern modern version.

Monster PSA: Yvonne Craig

I literally couldn't wait to work on this one!

I got the idea for it while working on the previous Ingrid Pitt PSA, and it was sort of amazing to me I hadn't gotten around to doing a PSA portrait of the lovely (in more ways than one) Ms. Yvonne Craig, who of course hit a double in the Genre Fan Sweepstakes by being both Batgirl on Batman and the Orion Slave Girl on Star Trek.

I had first thought of doing the portrait of her as Batgirl (where she helped usher the young pre-teen version of me into puberty), but that quickly gave way to this more sexy look in the service of promoting libraries, which I thought tied it into the Barbara Gordon/Batgirl thing nicely.


I had the chance to meet Ms. Craig at a comic con around 2000 or so, and she was so sweet as the ten millionth overgrown fanboy told her how important she was to them growing up.

Monster PSA: Ingrid Pitt

This Monster PSA poster was kind of eerie to work on.

Yesterday, I was just finishing up the last illustration for a large advertising job, and as I am wont to do, having movies on in the background. I've been watching a lot of Hammer Films lately, catching up on the ones I've never seen. Case in point, I put on The Vampire Lovers, a sort of lesbian vampire movie starring Ingrid Pitt as the vampire who crosses all sorts of boundaries.

After I finished the last client piece, I decided to do another Monster PSA poster, this time starring the legendary Ms. Pitt--I had not yet given her her own PSA, even though she played both monster and victim in numerous Hammer films. On top of that, because of the big ad job, I hadn't posted anything new on this blog in a couple of days, and I really wanted to put something up.

So just before I started to work, I noticed a friend's Facebook page that said Ingrid Pitt had just died! I did a double take, because the timing of it was so bizarre. I followed the link, and the sad news was true--Ms. Pitt, age 77, had passed away.

Once I read that (and duly changed my FB page's avatar to a pic of Ingrid), I was determined to put this poster together to have it up for the following day.

For whatever reason, this one was a lot harder than they usually are--I tried two different portraits, that as portraits were fine, but once I plugged them into the PSA poster format, they all of a sudden didn't work--something about the lights and darks and the overall shapes. But I refused to give up, finally completing a third portrait that worked when placed onto the Monster PSA poster, which is what you see above.

This poster's message isn't really a PSA--rather, I just wanted to reflect that schism many a horror movie fan felt when they saw Ingrid Pitt in a movie. Was she a victim, or was she the victimizer? Rarely have actresses had the ability to be believable as both, yet she pulled it off.

Rest in Peace, Ingrid Pitt.

Chiller TV Spots

Some of my Monster PSA posters were chosen to appear as set decoration in two TV spots for the Chiller TV network.

And while those spots aren't yet finished, here are some stills from the ads--as you can see, there are my posters on the wall of Chiller TV's lunchroom, and they make a super-quick appearance in postcard form on the wall of a Chiller TV employee's cubicle.

I had the chance to go to NYC and watch the commercials be filmed, which was a cool, informative experience. I was thrilled Chiller TV liked my posters enough to want to use them like this, and I can't wait to see the finished spots!

Monster PSA: Lee Van Cleef

I haven't done a Monster PSA posters in ages, and this one really makes a shambles of that designation--not only did Lee Van Cleef never play a monster of any sort, he never even appeared in anything like a horror movie (even form-busting subjects like Margot Kidder was in at least one genuine horror film).

But when I was working on the portrait of Mr. Van Cleef for my "Tough Guy" series, I realized it'd be cool to draw him doing what he's most associated with--brandishing a gun. So I figured what the hell, a sentiment I think he'd get behind.

This was one of those instances where I let the image decide what the tag line would be, a sound piece of advice in any situation, I think.

Monster PSA: Darren McGavin

The idea for this one came out of nowhere, and I had a few moments free to put it together almost immediately.

The original tagline was something to the effect of Darren McGavin being the coolest uncle you never had, but that didn't seem quite right. Sure, I wanted to reflect McGavin's iconic role in The Night Stalker, but he's also equally famous as the Dad in A Christmas Story, and I thought it was necessary to reference that too, somehow.

So, riffing off the first idea, I combined the two approaches and had McGavin as a crusty, avuncular uncle/dad-type who takes you monster-hunting as a day out--ending with ice cream, comics, and a ball game, surely. What kid wouldn't want a day out like that?

Monster PSA: Evelyn Ankers

This Monster PSA was done as a request from one of my "fans" (feels weird, typing that), who specifically I asked I give The First Lady of Universal Horror, Evelyn Ankers, a turn.

Besides starring in The Wolf Man, Ms. Ankers appeared in literally dozens of other Universal horror/suspense movies of the 40s. From what I've read of Ms. Ankers, she really wasn't that into acting--it was mostly work, a way to make money, and when she got a little older (and horror films were mostly on the outs) she packed it in and never looked back. (Later, when he was living in Hawaii with her husband, she was asked to appear in Hawaii 5-0, which was just starting up production. She turned them down)

Whatever her feelings about being in movies, it didn't really show: she was always a welcome presence to this horror/monster fan. But I'm betting her advice would have been close to what you see on the poster.

Monster PSA: Lon Chaney Jr.

This Monster PSA is a bit more serious than the others; since fans of the late, great Mr. Chaney know that he suffered from alcoholism; and Lon's inability to get a handle on led to the dimunition of his career, and eventually early death.

I remember seeing the 1972 cheapie Dracula Vs. Frankenstein, which featured an aged, bloated Lon in a few scenes as a mute hulking brute. The movie itself is glorious, Z-grade fun, but seeing someone who I loved as a child used this way made me sad--Bela Lugosi's scenes in Ed Wood movies looked like acting triumphs by comparison. Lon died shortly thereafter.

So I thought, out from under all the various make-ups Lon endured, this is the kind of advice he would dispense if he was sitting down with someone, one on one.

Monster PSA: Dick Durock

Not too long after completing my Adrienne Barbeau PSA, I thought why not complete the mini-Swamp Thing run and feature the man himself, Dick Durock?

Mr. Durock has many, many credits to his name, but to people my age he's really known for his work in various levels of make-up and rubber: as Swamp Thing of course, but also as Battlestar Galactica's Imperious Leader, and as "Frye's Creature" on The Incredible Hulk.

That must have been marinating in my head for a couple of days, because suddenly the tagline popped into my head, fully formed. I couldn't wait to put this together once I had it!

Of course its a bastardization of the classic "three chords and the truth" line, and at first I was content with this just being a silly goof on that. But then it dawned on me that maybe, just maybe, there's an actual point here: considering how many god-awful CGI fests Hollywood keeps pumping out, substituting charm and characterization with spectacle, maybe all you really need is a rubber mask and the truth.

Monster PSA: Adrienne Barbeau

Unlike the last Monster PSA poster I did, which was inspired by the tagline first, this one was driven entirely by the fact I love Adrienne Barbeau, and desperately wanted her to be part of this series.

From Escape From New York to The Fog to Swamp Thing, Ms. Barbeau was a recurring...er, face in the movies I saw and loved as a kid. But not only was she a sex bomb, but she was tough--equally adept at firing a gun or kicking your head in as she was at seducing you. So for the tagline I wanted to reference that part of her on-screen persona.

As I write this, it occurs to me my last two Monster PSA posters both featured cast members from Swamp Thing. Surely, that's simply a coincidence...?