By - Steve Mezo
It's OCTOBER and that means time to buy more Horror Movies! And my good friend and Writer Director has quite and few titles out there for sale on his site CLICK HERE to buy the Flesh Eaters From Outer Space/Invasion For Flesh and Blood double feature DVD, Scarlet Moon, Haunted Hay Ride and Hate's Haunted Slay Ride.
Warren is the man that had given me my huge break in Flesh Eaters From Outer Space and Invasion For Flesh and Blood. And to get some more insight on what he had to go through in the early 90's with a crew of Metal Heads CLICK HERE to read it in his own words.
Then continue on here with my article below to see the once in a lifetime experiences I had.
Warren was
the main person responsible for the whole film so he really had all the
pressure hanging over his head and had to tow the line, while Shawn T. Reich
and I were eighteen year old kids right out of high school that were getting to
live the dream. Shawn and I were A+ students in "TV production" with
a great teacher "Mr. Geller" so we at least had a working background
with video shoots (Shawn might even have the first horror movie we made in
class still). And we had made a dump load of commercials in class. And
I had a basic F/X background from working at "The Costume Shop in Red Bank
N.J."
I can't
thank Warren enough for the huge chance and break he gave me. My uncle
"Robert Gutowsky" had acted for Warren in "The Bloody Dead"
and told him about me.
F/X Artist Ed French, My Uncle Bob and Writer Director Warren F. Disbrow
Warren had given him his card to give to me and a week
later I was at Warren's door (My dad drove me) with a plastic skull made to
look rotted (Right out of Marcia Lynn Cox "Makeup Monsters" book), a
rubber hand I made with worms coming out of it and a big (Wow I'm going to be
in movies!) grin. Warren was beyond cool and told me straight out that if I was
going to work with him I would have to be serious about it and dedicated
to seeing the project through. I was in and a week
later I brought my friend Shawn T. Reich.
I think
the main reason Warren had taken us in was he had seen his love of horror, Sci Fi and fantasy movies in us and that we had the talent and at least a
working background with F/X and video production. So he had allot to
work with and taught us how to focus our abilities and to do other projects we
never thought we could. After a few weeks we had reached a point where he could
give us projects unsupervised which freed him up to continue with the main
things that needed to be constantly done.
The first
project I was handed was the construction of the "Contractor Paper Cave"
Warren Sr., Warren, Tony, Gene, and myself had made the chicken wire frame
then began the long task of stapling the (Meat wrapping paper to it).
The cave was built right in Warren's back yard and it was huge! The
only down side was after any rain it would have to be repaired in area's which
led to Warren naming me "The Cave Dweller" every other
week I was handed the staple gun and a step ladder. Along with Warren
(Using a Tarzan type voice and pointing in the direction of the cave)
"Cave Dweller... Fix Cave..." Then I would plod down in daylight and
come out at night time while Shawn helped Warren build props in the F/X lab.
Then it was time for frozen burgers on the grill (This is the same grill
we used to make F/X gel on). Yeah life was good.
Then there
was my tour of duty in Sid "The Space Monster" Tony Annunziata and I
would trade off being in it and boy did we have some adventures...
This was Tony's turn in the Sid outfit.
Like when
I had to do a "Monster rising from the water" scene and I couldn't go
under. The head of the suit floated like a cork so Tony had to cut holes in it
(While I was wearing it!) we have pictures of it too. Or when Warren popped
JAWS into the VCR the next day before I had to go into the water again.
Did I mention that this was when the beaches were closed due to high bacteria?
It didn't help much that this place is called Shark River either...
And Tony
and I had a blast being in the "John Belushi" sceen, and
"Desiree Russo/Sendelbach" had made these really bad bangs for me
with the front half of a wig to make me look more the part of the halfwit
to drive the gag home. It's funny because when I turned my head sideways
you can see where the wig ended.
It was really cool where I was able to write scenes with Warren. And it was really amazing how he could make my crazed babbling and gag notes into a workable scene and would
shoot it later.
Then there
were the times (which was allot) where Shawn and me survived on nothing
but "WAWA" hot dogs and iced tea for weeks. God bless
the creators of that stuff. And big old Thank You to
"June" Who pretty much lived behind the counter. And
"Anthony" the keeper of the 50,000 mile (Shawn
name) WAWA hot dogs". And who can forget the "Big Top
Frozen Hamburgers"? Add in some day old rolls and you had lunch
for the week. I felt bad for Tony because he didn't have the
goat stomach like Warren, Shawn and me because the poor guy
would be puking his guts up in the bushes moments after eating them. Maybe
it was stress from film making or maybe because we used that grill
to heat up F/X chemicals too...
And there
were more than a few times where we laughed so hard our sides hurt while
filming. "Like when Greg Scott was supposed to bring two friends from
the gym to play henchmen". They didn't show so Shawn and me found two
bouncers from "The Polo Club" to fill in last minute. They looked
great, but didn't know how to stage fight so when they were hitting Greg they
were pulling back, but you can still hear him getting the wind knocked out of
him on the DVD. And the floor they slammed him down on was cement. Even
though Warren was under crazed pressure and had to teach us allot as we went
along he always kept it enjoyable and kept you wanting to see it through. I
have to say working on "Flesh Eaters From Outer Space" and "Invasion for Flesh and Blood" were two of the best times in my life.
But there
were also times where I was like "Why am I doing this again?" Like when F/X Artist "Cory Geryak" had done a chest cast on me
with plaster and the Vaseline underneath evaporated. So Warren and Tony had to
lift up the casting while Cory cut my imbedded chest hair with
a "Exacto Knife" While Warren said "Remember you're
making film history!". Then on the ride home we were pulled over and
all the cop saw was two long hair guys (Warren was sleeping on the back seat)
with a big bag of white powder (Alganate) and four huge syringes with rubber
tubing (For spurting blood F/X) between us in a beat to hell "1969 Chevy
Caprice". He told us (Tony and me) to get out (Even though I explained
why we had the stuff) so he says "I'm going to search your vehicle."
I had nothing to hide so I said "Go ahead." I'll never forget the
look on the cop's face when Warren sat up (With a bad case of bed head) and
said "You know what you're doing is illegal right?" The cop just walked
over handed us our ID's and told us to get moving.
And
another time when we had Tim Ferrante (From the early days of "Fangoria
Magazine") in the movie. I was really excited because I
love the magazine and Tim knows almost everyone in the business. Well
Cory Geryak had made a full head cast of Tim and then made a
full foam latex head (Which Warren still has) to use in a head
crushing effect. Warren needed a live shot of Tim to match the effect
shot so Tim had to stand in front of his cement chimney while Cory (Wearing
part of the monster costume) had to slowly push his head back (It would be sped
up later). Warren said "Action" and Cory didn't realize how
close Tim was to the cement and all you could hear was *THUNK!* We
were all dead quiet, then Cory started to tell Tim he was sorry. But Tim took
it really well and started making light of it by saying "I'm never doing
horror movie's again DISBROW!" And when we were finished
shooting Tim was cool enough to give me a "Fangoria Magazine"
out of his own collection and autographed it on one of his interviews with
"Robert Englund" (Freddy Kruger) and if that
wasn't enough he gave me a "Tranzor Z" otherwise known as
"Mazinga" poster after we talked about favorite cartoons and
movies. And I still have both to this day.
Or after
writing Gary Hoffman's (Penile Displacement) scene with Warren
and re sclupting the member from Warren's "Kiss of Medusa"
then coming to Warren's house the next day. And seeing Desire'e
Russo sitting on Warren's porch painting the star of the scene muttering
"This is soooo f**king wrong..."
Did I
mention all the make out scenes I got to do? Good
times!
I can
still remember him editing the movies and me keeping his spirits up with
"Chicken-Fil-A" while he was cutting it (Me and Shawn were usualy
behind him watching some B&W drive in horror movie.) Or taking him for
trips to the mall or auction when the editing machines were in
the repair shop just to keep him a little sane. Those times really
sucked because it was such a drawn out process and any setback was rough
and it wasn't like cutting film. Any change took forever to make and you were
at the mercy of the machines so if they wanted to screw something up bad all
you could do was watch and curse. But Warren got through it and the movie made
it to your hands (You bought a copy right?)