Filmmaker & Author Sam Irvin (I Was A Teenage Monster Hunter): “All I Want To Do Is Be On A Set Saying Action & Cut”

DENNIS ANYONE? with Dennis Hensley

Dennis is joined via Zoom by filmmaker Sam Irvin. Sam is the author of the memoir I Was a Teenage Monster Hunter, which is about his childhood obsession with horror movies and the interviews he conducted with horror personalities for his fanzine Bizarre. Sam talks about his Cinema Paradiso-esque childhood; working at his family-owned movie theater, having to change the marquee when he was afraid of heights, getting to take home the posters after a film’s run and cleaning up vomit after screenings of The Exorcist. He also talks about his creative and personal relationship with Cassandra Peterson AKA Elvira Mistress of the Dark. He recalls how he got the job directing Elvira’s Haunted Hills, bonding over sad Joni Mitchell music and how just this year, he and Cassandra took a tour group of 30 Elvira super fans to visit the Haunted Hills locations in Romania and Transylvania. Sam also talks about being more in demand as a director at 67 than ever before. He’s directed seven Hallmark and Lifetime films in the past 12 months, including this month’s Love In Zion National: A National Park Romance and the holiday film Check Inn to Christmas. Other topics include: cold-calling his way into becoming Brian DePalma’s assistant, Ian McKellan’s naked prank on the set of Gods and Monsters, directing three seasons of the gay vampire series Dante’s Cove and getting to visit the set of the James Bond film The Man With the Golden Gun when he was 18 and hearing sex stories from a drunk Herve Villechaize in the back of a Rolls Royce afterwards.