Eye On Horror
Eye On Horror
Bloody Diners, Haunted Garages, and Dukey Flyswatter
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In this episode, the boys review 4K transfer of Inland Empire, Hatching, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Strawberry Mansion and more! In the second half, they are joined by filmmaker and musician Kevin Vonesper to talk about his upcoming documentary: "The Life and Slimes of Dukey Flyswatter", the known theatrical shock rocker of Haunted Garage and B-Movie writer/actor extraordinaire!
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Welcome to Eye On Horror, the official podcast of iHorror.com. This is episode 85, Otherwise known as season five, Episode Seven. I am your host James Jay Edwards and with me as always is your other host Jacob Davidson, how you doing Jacob?
Jacob Davidson:Doing pretty good. Just had some my folks visit over the long weekend and pretty happy to be back into the swing of things
James Jay Edwards:Cool. Also with us yet again, as always, is your other other host Jon Correia How you doing? Correia?
Jonathan Correia:fucking fantastic. I mean, I'm not awake. We were recording early again. But I did. I saw Bikini Kill live for the first time over the weekend at the Greek theatre
James Jay Edwards:Sweet
Jonathan Correia:Yeah, not the venue. I thought I was gonna see the map, but it was still great. And then saw Dracula Season Four TOUR LIVE last night so, maskeded up and all that but yeah, it was great to see two acts I've been really wanting to see live.
James Jay Edwards:What's been going on you guys, what's been happening this week?
Jacob Davidson:Um, well, I I saw something interesting. Okay, so I saw the new 4k transfer of David Lynch's Inland Empire last week.
James Jay Edwards:Okay. How does that look? Because didn't he shoot Inland Empire? On like a Sony DV cam?
Jacob Davidson:Yeah, it was mini DV.
James Jay Edwards:Yeah, yeah. How does it look upscaled?
Jacob Davidson:I mean, it still looks like it was shot on MiniDV. But, but the sound quality was substantially improved.
James Jay Edwards:When I saw the 4k restoration of Texas Chainsaw that's that was kind of my takeaway from that too. It's like it still was all grainy and 16 millimeter, but the sound was insane.
Jonathan Correia:Same with Evil Dead. Yeah.
Jacob Davidson:Yeah. No, it was definitely more in the sound quality. But yeah, that was my first time seeing that one. And, you know, I just I just think of that bit from The Simpsons where Bart gets a fake ID and he and he and his friends decide to sneak into R rated movie and they sneak into Naked Lunch and then they walk out Nelson's like, I can't think of two words wrong with that title. Just
Jonathan Correia:it was neither inland nor an empire?
Jacob Davidson:mean, it's it does feel like you know, it's kind of a spiritual or whatever continuation of Mulholland Drive because it deals a lot with Hollywood but yeah, I don't know it's it. Yeah, there's a lot of movie making and, but it just goes all over the place. And there's and it's over three hours long. And there's there was a crazy ass musical sequence with the song locomotion and these women that might be ghosts or prostitutes or ghost prostitutes and Yeah Laura Dern just slowly going completely insane. I mean, it is an interesting movie, no doubt. I mean, it's, it's, uh, I was talking to a friend and we consider it it was like a Rorschach test of the movie. There's no foundation, you know, it says it's all all up to interpretation. And, and just, and it is genuinely nightmarish just between sequences of like people dressed up as rabbits and like this horrible distorted like phantom that's falling Laura Dern and people just kind of fading in and out of existence and and Harry Dean Stanton just kind of looking ominous Yeah, it's it's just pure uncut David Lynch and I've seen most of his movies so I am glad I was able to finally get around to that one though. And even though it's three hours, it just kind of float by quick seeing it theatrically.
James Jay Edwards:I guess that's what you get when you give David Lynch basically unlimited film quote film because DV cam tapes are so cheap.
Jacob Davidson:Yeah, I mean, there's definitely a lot of experimental because David Lynch just had his own camera and he was just running with it.
Jonathan Correia:Which is just a fun image to haven't had just David Lynch running around with a mini DV camera just Oh, we got to shoot this.
Jacob Davidson:Is that Hollywood and Vine?
Jonathan Correia:Well, I went out and saw the new what I said in the last episode, my most anticipated film of the year, Hatching from Finland. It was directed by Hannah Bergholm, and wow, what a weird movie. Be it's about this girl who finds like in a bit out abandoned crow egg from a crow that her mother killed. And she starts raising it and starts growing to really big size and it ends up becoming like a doppelganger bird trait, but it's like transforming throughout the movie. And those sequences are really weird very creepy, very goopy. But that's not the weirdest part of the movie. The weirdest part of the movie is the mother. And I don't want to say anything more about her because I don't want to spoil any of the fun but like, that was just such a weird atmospheric. Great movie. Like the mom is a is like a
Jacob Davidson:influencer?
Jonathan Correia:Uh, yeah, she's an influencer. She her. Her vlog is our life is perfect, or our life is always beautiful, is like the thing. And it's like an undertone for like everything where she presents this, like perfect life, but you know, her decisions, cause everybody pain and it's really, I'm really excited to see what this director does next, because there's some really interesting like, parallels between like, their perfect clean pastel life and like the bloody goopiness of what's happening with the hatching and stuff. And, man, it just stuck with me, but I was really weirded out that there was a family that brought their like five year old to this I don't know what fairy tale they thought it was gonna be like, I don't even know if if that child was old enough to be reading subtitles. But that kid definitely had a day.
Jacob Davidson:They got to learn someday.
Jonathan Correia:Exactly. And then that was kind of a double feature. Because when we got home, we've finally watch. We're All Going to the World's Fair. I love that one. I was about to say, Jacob, I think you saw that one already. Right?
Jacob Davidson:Yeah, I actually saw that last year, they did a premiere screening at Sundance, although, funnily enough, I was going to see it again in theaters tonight. So I was pretty excited about that.
Jonathan Correia:I'm so down to see it again. Because there was so much to unpack with, we're all going to the World's Fair What a creepy, it really did a great job of conveying that feeling of like, It's four o'clock in the morning and you're for some you somehow ended up in that weird part of you of the internet, where all you're doing is reading creepy pastas. You need to go to sleep, but you can't let yourself go to sleep because you're properly creeped out. And that was like the feeling of the entire movie. There's no reliable narrators and it and it just like I'm still too you know, thinking about like those those images that are in it like Jane Schoenbrun is just fantastic and exciting filmmaker, and I can't wait to see what else they bring.
James Jay Edwards:Speaking of unreliable narrators. I don't think I told you Correia I watched the Afterparty.
Jonathan Correia:Oh, you did?
James Jay Edwards:Oh my god. Yeah. You're totally right. It is it was it was awesome. And like when it got to the musical, because, you know, if you didn't listen to our episode, where we talked about the Afterparty, basically every episode shows the same thing from a different point of view, a different characters point of view. And one of them is a musician, so his every episode is a different style as well. Like there's an artist and it's an animated episode and the musician It's a musical. And that one just killed me, you know, because they like break into song and yeah, you were you were totally right. No, it's It's so worth watching. It's so much fun. I'm
Jonathan Correia:Apple TV. Dude, it's five bucks for one month. There's enough programs on it that you can spend your month watching a lot of great stuff, especially Afterparty
James Jay Edwards:and you can watch Coda the Academy Award winning Best Picture because that I think that's the only way you can watch it Apple riding that horse. Yeah. I saw something really cool. I haven't seen much since we last talked but I saw Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of Madness mu and this one is the one people have been waiting for because it's directed by Sam Raimi. So horror fan and let me tell you it is a Sam Raimi movie. The original Dr. Strange is directed by Scott Derrickson, who did Exorcism of Emily Rose and Sinister so the character already has kind of a supernatural horror bent. But the Multiverse of Madness goes full Sam Raimi. It really does. And you can't even give a synopsis of the thing without spoiling things that I think are more fun to realize on your own but let's just say that you know, Dr. Strange basically meets a girl who can jump from universe to universe you know, they're you know, the it's there's a multiverse similar to Spider Man No Way Home. And of course, Dr. Strange because of spider man, no way home, he's hit two multiverses but he doesn't know even nearly as deep as they go like this girl does. And there's a demon pursuing this girl who wants her power to jump from multiverse the multiverse because they can't basically, if this demon gets this power, all multiverses will implode. So Dr. Strange Esther has to help her. And there's you know, they go from universe to universe and each universe is not wild. Some of them are wildly different, but some of them are just subtly different. And you don't quite know the differences. One thing that they do is they try to find the Doctor Strange in each universe they go to, and sometimes he's dead. Sometimes he's other you know, there's it's weird, like different things have happened in different universes.
Jonathan Correia:They showed in the in the trailer that there is a zombie Doctor Strange, which is the same one from Is it the same one from What If?
James Jay Edwards:I didn't watch what if but there is the third act goes full Rainey. And that's part of it. And that's a little bit of a spoiler that there's a zombie Dr. Strange.
Jonathan Correia:Well, like I said, it was shown in I know that that was like the hype moment of the trailer. So that's this is why I brought it up.
James Jay Edwards:That's one of the parts that goes full Raimi and how it gets there is crazy, though. So yeah, it oh, I don't want to talk too much about it. Because it's because also there are so many like some of its fan service, but some of it is just totally cool. There. There are a couple of moments where Marvel fans will just stand up and cheer. Because yeah, they're I mean, you kind of expect that with Marvel movies, you know that there's going to be like some surprise make sure yeah. But this one even telling you who the main antagonist is, is a spoiler. So and it's revealed very early in the movie. But it's much better if you go into the movie not knowing it. So yeah, if you're seeing it tomorrow, Jacob Don't you know, if you haven't even watched a trailer don't even watch the trailer. You know, just trying to go in as blind as possible. Yeah, yeah, do that because it'll be so much more fun. But yeah, it is. And I'll tell you one thing though, is Sam Raimi has humor is all over it and and Dr. Strange is sentient cloak just lends itself to Raimi/s humor. Let me just do that because that cloak is hysterical.
Jonathan Correia:Just a lot of Three Stooges-Stooges s gags throughout
James Jay Edwards:a little, not a lot, but there, but yeah. The cloak is the Shemp. Yeah.
Jacob Davidson:It's the cloak is voiced by Ted Raimi.
James Jay Edwards:Bruce Campbell it to answer another question. Bruce Campbell is in it. Oh, I
Jacob Davidson:knew it was all over.
James Jay Edwards:It's a Sam Raimi movie.
Jonathan Correia:Now there was one title. I know that Jacob's been plugging for years that I finally watched Jay, did you also
James Jay Edwards:Yeah, I did
Jonathan Correia:this week? Yeah. So so it looks like Jay and I both finally watched Dude Bro Party Massacre 3. What do you think Jay?
James Jay Edwards:It's rough. I didn't realize it was done but a Five Second Films, guys. Yeah. And their stick in five seconds is awesome. In 90 minutes, I think it gets a lot. I thought the whole thing was kind of silly. The the air Gore, the gore effects are awesome. The thing is, it's different from Asteron 6, silly though. Asteron 6 silly is. I think you're laughing with them. And this one, I was laughing at them. You know, I don't know. But I did enjoy the one kill where Motherface flushes the guy's intestines down the toilet while they're in. And they're just like going. That was kind of fun. I mean, it had its moments but I just thought it was kind of kind of I thought it was kind of dumb. Yeah, what did you think? What do you think Correia?
Jonathan Correia:I had fun with it. I definitely need to watch it again. Because it's definitely one of the I feel like it's one of those comedies where like, not everything landed with me the first viewing but I feel like with a second viewing it's just gonna it's gonna hit harder. I really appreciate you know, the lo-fineness of it the you know the how they like not only leaned into the the lack of money and all that but they like fully embraced it. Like there's one part where you can clearly tell like, they're supposed to be out in the woods, but like it's clearly someone's backyard with a bunch of old Christmas trees behind them. I think it was like the third act or something. But yeah, I thought I thought it was a lot of fun I mean, I there's there's a lot of comedies that I did not like the first or didn't like that much the first time and then I went back and rewatched it and was like oh shit. Yeah, no, this is actually really funny. So I definitely need to watch it again.
James Jay Edwards:There are a few places that got a genuine laugh out of me when I liked the commercials because the thing the whole premise of it is it's taped off TV in the 90s. So that's also explained some of the lo-fineness and the guy was pausing for commercials the guy that was recording it so you get like the beginning and the end of these commercials. And one of them. It's not a commercial it's like a newscast where they're talking about they're all and we'll have News at 11 and at that point in the movie, one of the characters is looking for another one. Suzu says the newscasters are doing their thing and he walks behind them on the new set he's all sizzler that was actually pretty funny.
Jacob Davidson:As a as still highlight for me was Patton Oswald as the chief of police.
Jonathan Correia:Oh, yeah.
James Jay Edwards:I was impressed with the with the cast. I mean, they got like they had
Jacob Davidson:Larry King.
James Jay Edwards:Um, yeah, Larry King, but I'm telling myself a little bit when I say porn star Nina Hartley plays the dean. I'm familiar with her work. She was also in Boogie Nights though, so I can I can say it's because of that she was sure little Bill's wife with the sweaty wife and in Boogie Nights
Jonathan Correia:We'll accept that answer, Jay and
Jacob Davidson:of course Andrew WK
James Jay Edwards:Yeah, Andrew WK isn't it? Yeah,
Jacob Davidson:A part of me did die that day.
Jonathan Correia:And Greg
Jacob Davidson:Sestero
Jonathan Correia:Sestero Yeah.
James Jay Edwards:Nicotero didn't you
Jonathan Correia:know I just I fully blanked a stop recording this so damn early. After I go see drag shows guys. We can't record morning after drag shows.
Jacob Davidson:Yeah, I'm with you. Because that's all I want to talk
Jonathan Correia:about. Which by the way, if Dragula Season 4 Tour is coming to a town near you go it is fucking incredible. When I went they had Bitter Betty come out and she was dressed up like a like Terminator meets Dolly Parton. And that was her whole day to was like glitching elevator. Dude, it was great. And then Saint was a Leatherface dancing to Megan the Stallion's bodies. Just a fabulous show. And then of course the bullies themselves did an incredible Immortan Joe meets Bride of Frankenstein set. Yeah,
Jacob Davidson:I was gonna say back on doober party massacre three. I think it is one of the reasons why it made such a big impact on me was that I saw it with an audience like that. And that was definitely a factor. Also, I just I just really love it because as a child of the 90s I grew up on a lot of stupid and crazy direct to video sequels down the lines of horror franchises. And they even said the q&a you know the five second films guys that you know they decide to make a slasher movie from the third movie because the third movie is always when slasher movies the franchise start to go really off the rails. And you know, there's just so many silly and just insane moments for the movie like The parched town thing. The like the Drowned town and Motherface killing that one guy with like a mind control device. Yeah. Yeah. And, ya know, just, yeah, just it's a very ridiculous movie, but I feel like it's in kind of a loving homage to ridiculous s horror sequels.
James Jay Edwards:I imagine it would be better with an audience too. Because it is that kind it's that kind of stupid where like, you know, like The Room you know, if you ever if you try to watch the room without an audience it's it's not the same you know, you're just like, Oh, what is this crap but then you know when you get in a collective group, yeah, people say the same thing about Rocky Horror, but I think Rocky Horror stands up for that
Jacob Davidson:night. It's true. That was gonna say like, funny enough back on the Sizzler joke actually got to do bro party massacre three soundtrack recently. And the final track is just him yelling sizzler says and it's on a loop so if you keep it going it just keeps on at yelling sizzler for ever.
Jonathan Correia:Fantastic.
James Jay Edwards:Yeah, you could sleep and you wake up in Sizzler.
Jonathan Correia:I just love that opening montage where they're like, he's he's seeing a therapist. And he's like recounting the first two movies. Like, it's that's exactly because that's what they do. In the third movie. They usually buy that one. They kill off the original person. But then it's his twin brother. It's not Brock. It's Brett, you know? Well, weird. Yeah. You were brought? No, I'm Brent. Love that. Our just when they get into the paddleboats and the one guys in the wheelchair, he's like, is there paddleboat for me? Yeah, five miles down the road. What am I supposed to do guess the most I they just like leave them. It's so fucked. It's great.
Jacob Davidson:And I just see so many great just weird One off gags like that. And also like there's a picture or bust of Ronald Reagan in almost every scene,
Jonathan Correia:I didn't notice that see thats something to go back to
Jacob Davidson:Yeah, it's it's one of those gags especially because the build up like Brett has that vision where he thinks mother faces Ronald Reagan face it mother face you our nation's 40th president
James Jay Edwards:and he has this elaborate scheme where it's true you know, he like explains it Scooby Doo style. How it actually is true.
Jacob Davidson:Oh man, I found I really had that one. On another note, I've been watching some new movies out of panic fest. Yeah, now just they did. They did last year they were virtual. This year, they're doing hybrid virtual so they are doing some stuff in in person. But a lot of it's still online. So I'd see a few fun things like I think probably the one I had the most fun with so far has been this one called Crabs! With an exclamation mark is kind of like Tremors at a seaside town. It's like, you know horseshoe crabs, the, you know, they get mutated by nuclear waste or nuclear meltdown. And it's up to this ragtag bunch of weird characters to save the town on prom night, because they keep on growing bigger and starting people but also got like this kind of Gremlins thing going where they kind of fart around and like, start wearing hats or like messing around with, with like computers and stuff. So I dug that. Let's see also saw this kind of survival supernatural horror movie called Revealer. We did send 80s Miami and this stripper and this conservative Christian protester ended up stuck inside this peep show plays when the rapture or Apocalypse happens, and they have to try and find a way to survive together. And it was also this one The Chamber of Terror about this mob that takes people to be killed and execute at this old abandoned haunted house, right called the chamber of terror. But it turns out, it's actually haunted. And this one presents about these two entrepreneurs who go on this tech guys yachts, but there's like something haunting them. So you know, I really love that a lot of festivals kept up being virtual just because in a lots a lot of people to be able to see movies on the festival circuit, the authorized one. And, as always, there's always some gems out there.
James Jay Edwards:And some people still aren't ready to go back to full theaters, either.
Jacob Davidson:Oh, exactly. Yes.
Jonathan Correia:I mean, even me, I've gone to, you know, a couple of showings, but it's always like, middle of the day, mid week, you know, trying to avoid crowds.
Jacob Davidson:But either way, I really hope at festivals at least keep up a hybrid format, because both for accessibility and safety for people who don't feel like going to theaters. And but mostly Yeah, I just feel like it get it gets these movies out to more people. And that's what the filmmakers would want,
James Jay Edwards:Yeah, the filmmakers, I think, would want I'd imagine. that. But the festival organizers, I think do a little bit of gatekeeping. They like it to be like, you know, exclusive, you know, come to Sundance and see this. So we'll see how that plays out. I'm with you. I hope that they do do still keep some virtual aspects, but I can see them, you know, wanting people to travel to their festival kind of a thing. All right.
Jonathan Correia:Well, I mean, like, for something like Sundance, there's always going to be that big crowd that's like they're for Sundance, you know, and that's there to buy the movies, you know, especially like, you know, the more celebrity or, you know, high profile cases are always gonna go but it is also good to like get it out there. I mean, Sundance made a killing, doing virtual, I think it was their most attended. Yeah, because worse. Yeah. So I mean, like, you're not going to deny that money. But yeah, you're also not going to deny the type of money that you can make off of vendors and concessions, and, you know, advertisement and sponsorship with live one, too. So, I mean, hybrid is probably the way to go, the smaller festivals might be a little bit more difficult because you're not getting as much money, you know, pumped in. But yeah, I always hope for hybrid, anything to get, you know, word out on projects that people work so hard on, you know,
James Jay Edwards:I think, if anything smaller festivals might swing the opposite direction and go fully hybrid, because you don't have to rent a theater out and you know, you know, there's there's less overhead which you know, that'll be kind of backfiring. Because I think that the actual experience is probably what a lot of people want, but the festivals that aren't Sundance, you know, may swing the other way. Who knows we'll see
Jonathan Correia:another or real quick, not entirely horror, but finally saw Strawberry Mansion. I don't know if you guys have heard of this. It's directed by Kentucker Aldi and Albert Burnie. It's really phenomenal. It's about in the future, your dreams are taxed. And so this dream tax auditor goes to meet with this woman and ends up you know, going on this journey it's very phenomenal Dan Deacon who's one of my favorite artists did the score for it which is absolutely phenomenal and it's a it's very you know, fantastical you know, the dream sequences are very are a bit low five, but are a lot of fun. And highly recommended. I got it on a Vudu sale the other day for like five bucks and I can't recommend it enough. It's just very nice, you know, palate cleanser, especially after getting so creeped out by a double feature of Hatching and We're All Going to the World's Fair.
James Jay Edwards:What is it called?
Jonathan Correia:Strawberry mansion. Yeah, it's sometimes you know, when you have stuff where like people are going into Dreams people go a bit too far with the weirdness or too far with the fantastical at the field like this movie, walked a very nice fine line.
James Jay Edwards:The Dream Tax concept has me intrigued.
Jonathan Correia:Yeah, it's very interesting because like, the dreams are uploaded to like a memory stick. But this woman that he's auditing had all her dreams recorded onto VHS tapes. And he's like, Well, how many tapes Do you have? Just like 2000. And he's like, Oh, each tape and you see like a hologram of him in the tape. And she has like a dream where it's like she's playing with like a caterpillar on her hand. And the next thing you know, she's in a restaurant and the waiter is a guy with a giant frog head playing saxophone and stuff so it gets into it like bounces the weirdness really well. But there's like a whole conspiracy theory going on that corporations are putting ads into people's dreams that he uncovers and stuff and it's really good. Like if you it's I don't want to make the comparison but it's a if you like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. It does it does uh, it kind of is like that kind of you
James Jay Edwards:that's that's kind of weird because you already know that like, if you are suppose like say you're talking about you know, paint you know you're discussing you know paint colors with Lindsey all the sudden, ads for paint will show up like in your in your Facebook feed. It already seems like like Big Brother is listening. Oh, it'd be scouted be scary if they could somehow find a way to program because some people say that they can program their own dreams. Yeah, it would be interesting if I mean, that would be dangerous if an advertiser could figure out how to mass program people to dream. Yeah.
Jacob Davidson:That reminds me there was actually a joke on Futurama about that where you know, Fry is from the year 2000 gets frozen and ends up near 3001 night. He has a dream where he's in classes, underwear, but it turns out it's an ad for an underwear company. And he wakes up he's like, oh, man, I had the craziest dream last night. Well, that turned into a commercial for underpants. Oh, yeah. You know, so you had just a commercial dream. And yeah, like in the future does they can program dreams into your thinking program commercials into your dreams? And they're just like, yeah, just just ignore it. You know? Everybody happens everybody. Yeah.
Jonathan Correia:And that's kind of like it is like the in the the it opens up with a guy having a dream and he's having a dream of his dream buddy industry. But he's like, Oh, don't worry, I got us this bucket of fried chicken just how you like it extra crispy with double gravy. And like he it shows him like getting up and then going to the place and then he's in the drive thru for the fried chicken place. And you know, and they just kind of like any gives into like them going. Do you want the chicken shake? And they're like, what's a chicken shake? Oh, its You know, it's a shake minute chicken. No, I'll just get this. Actually, you know, yeah, I'll get the shake too. You know, it's it plays a little fun. But that's only like part of the story. Like it's really whimsical. Lots of fun. And again, the score is. Of course, it's Dan Deacon. So it's phenomenal.
James Jay Edwards:That would totally work because you Now sometimes you're dreaming about like eating doughnuts, and then you wake up and you're like, shoot, I don't have a doughnut. That would totally work. If someone figured out how to do that. We have a special guest right now. We've got filmmaker, musician archivist. A little bit of everything. Kevin Vonesper, How you doing, Kevin?
Kevin Vonesper:Hello! This is my Eye On Horror. See?
James Jay Edwards:This is audio
Kevin Vonesper:fly swatters? I know I have to describe it for the audience. This is the cover of an ADS record with two key fly swatters. I as photographed by legendary punk photographer Edward Culver, and of course, this is a attached to it is a rat trap from the final Haunted Garage performance and this actually was on Duke ease I that's he's famous for putting rat traps on his eyelids and I thought it would be perfect for you because you guys are Eye On Horror
James Jay Edwards:It is perfect. Awesome. And okay, so the big thing that Kevin's doing right now is a documentary about Dukey Flyswatter. But before we get into that, let's talk a little bit about you. What do you do? I mean, let's let's just get into who is Kevin Vonesper?
Kevin Vonesper:Well, professionally for the past 15 or so years, I've been a videographer, video editor, music producer, photographer doing all that kind of stuff under my company Vonesper Studios. And then of course, during the pandemic, is when kind of all my jobs stopped happening because all my jobs happened around people and gatherings and, and so it kind of got derailed and I had to refocus my energies and start some internal projects. So I decided the best marriage of my professional and my, my personal passions would be this documentary about Dukey Flyswatter
James Jay Edwards:that kind of leads into my next question. Why Dukey Flyswatter what I mean, I know the big thing with documentaries. You're always trying to find the story. What about Dukey You think will make a good documentary.
Kevin Vonesper:Have you guys heard of Dukey Flyswatter Before?
James Jay Edwards:Yes, yeah,
Jonathan Correia:yeah. Okay. A bit. Yeah. If you want to give us a brief overall.
Kevin Vonesper:Yeah, I was gonna say because if one of you hadn't heard of him before, I would say that's why because you all need to hear about Dukey Flyswatter.
James Jay Edwards:Well, he was in I was just telling Correia. He was in two of my favorite movies from '88 and Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers and Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama. We have visual aids props VHSs to movies I just named there they
Kevin Vonesper:Yes, you'll see him in Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers, Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama, Nightmare Sisters.
James Jay Edwards:Yeah, he had the Linnea Quigley triple feature of '88 with Nightmare Sisters. Yeah,
Kevin Vonesper:and actually, Sorority Babes and Nightmare Sisters. Were the only two movies in the 80s that starred the Big Three Scream Queens, and they both included Dukey flyswatter. One of them has a soundtrack by Haunted Garage themselves. And they were filmed literally days apart from each other. So those are like, I would say those two movies and Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers like you just mentioned, are like the three holy trinity of like, 80's scream queen horror
James Jay Edwards:Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama was filmed at the mall that I grew up in.
Kevin Vonesper:Really, that's awesome. Which mall was that?
James Jay Edwards:It's called Plaza Camino rial. It's in this tri city area of Carlsbad Oceanside Vista. It's it's actually kind of funny because I didn't know it until I was watching the movie. And I'm like, Wait, that's that's our mall.
Kevin Vonesper:That is awesome. That's a personal touch for sure.
James Jay Edwards:Well, right after they shot it they remodeled the entire mall and it looked completely different. So it's only people who knew it back then but you know, you could see it you can see the stores you can Oh, there's orange. Julius there's chess king. You know that's that's how old it was because Orange Julius and chess King were still things.
Kevin Vonesper:Malls, were still a thing.
Jonathan Correia:Yeah. Is that where a Chopping Mall was filmed to?
James Jay Edwards:No,
Kevin Vonesper:no, I believe that was at the Galleria, because I know that because I just got in the mail this week. My blu ray Collector's Pack. This is a little sideline from Dukey Flyswatter. Sort of I'll connect it but as Phantom of the
Mall:Eric's Revenge.
Jonathan Correia:Yes.
Kevin Vonesper:Which just came out on Arrow, Blu ray. And that was filmed at the same Mall. And you know they did Chopping Mall there, Commando. Like all sorts of movies were filmed there. I'm waiting for somebody. Maybe somebody did, and I just haven't found it yet. I'm I'm waiting for somebody to edit together a movie just about like all the crazy stuff. As if all these things are happening one day at this mall, because they are all film there. There was a whole movie waiting to be edited together. And the connection there is in the showers? No, it's uh, they're watching girls in a changing room on like a security camera and that movie and one of the girls is bringing Stevens so Oh, there you go. That you can connect Dukey to any kind of B movie from the 80s
Jonathan Correia:there's there's got to be an edit. Or, you know, there's definitely a project there because Jacob in a previous episode was just talking about a film where they edited all the Airport movies into one movie.
Kevin Vonesper:Yeah, this is literally the same mall and so like it's right there. I mean,
Jonathan Correia:there's there's got to be something where it's like and meanwhile on the other side of the mall,
Kevin Vonesper:or a documentary Maybe that's my next documentary. Yeah. The Galleria shopping mall. Oh my god who want who wouldn't want to See that?
Jonathan Correia:The world's most cinematic Mall?
Kevin Vonesper:I know. And in, in a Phantom of the Mall. There's actually the most interesting man in the world is in that movie. So, you know from the DOS AQIS keurmerk commercials, yeah. Oh, yeah.
James Jay Edwards:So how did this project come about? You said it was kind of born of necessity from COVID. So, I mean,
Kevin Vonesper:right, so Well, let me take you all the way back to 1990. Let's say to write I'm, I'm about eight years old. And, you know, the grunge era is just ending because Kurt Cobain just passed away. Right. So my first love of music was kind of I needed something else. And I discovered Green Jello. Right? And so I was very, because because that was a very popular song at the time. It's strange to think about that now because of how weird that was. But it was actually very popular, but three little pigs and little did I know, there's a video on here called Can I curse on this? Of course, okay, the misadventures of shit man, which Dukey Flyswatter turning into this character, shit man alongside other people, such as Danny Carey, who was in green jello at the time, and was forming his own band in their studio called Tool. I don't know what happened to them. I heard they used to open for Haunted Garage. I guess? I guess they're still around. And yeah, that that led me to discover and who Gwar, you know, because that's the next band, you find once once you discover one band that's put stupid stuff on their head, then you kind of like open a whole world of trouble. So I discovered Gwar. And then the next band I discovered, was a little bit more obscure and a little bit more mysterious. And that was Haunted Garage. And this was, let's say, let's skip to like 1994. I'm, like 10 years old. And I'm starting the internet's first Haunted Garage fan site, because there was no new and I was on a quest for information, even back then.
James Jay Edwards:And the internet was pretty new back then to 14 new. Okay, you were doing this at 10? Yeah.
Kevin Vonesper:Well, I was using the all music.com algorithms to discover bands. And that's how I discovered and I'm pretty sure that's still the algorithm that Spotify uses, because I still see the same suggested artists for my favorite bands. So I think they stole it just just putting it out there. And then, yeah, that Haunted Garage broke up originally in 1992. All these other bands are like guar still continuing till today. So there was always a little bit more mystery and a little bit more to discover from them. And it was a little bit harder to find Haunted Garage things because they only had one album. And then I discovered Dukey Flyswatter was a B movie actor and writer, and he wrote Blood Diner and stuff like that, so that I started getting into B movies, and it was just a whole nother world of of interest for me. And then skip to the pandemic, you know, the how many years, late 25 or so years later, I'm looking for something to do, I'm digitizing my VHS tapes, you know, as a hobby. Like, because I used to do like tape trading back in like, the 90s I would trade bootleg VHS and cassette tapes, you know. And I figured, you know what, there's not a better time to start this project, you know, most of the most of the people involved are still alive and accessible. And you never know, like, in especially in the early days of the pandemic, like who's going to just die overnight, you know, so I just started messaging people and seeing if they would be into it I started it. And now I have 40 Something interviews and I've I've archived Dukey's archive, you know of tapes and, and just it just it just started rolling and and I'm on a quest to complete it now.
Jonathan Correia:Yeah. So a lot of this. concert footage is shot by various sources, various people all over. It wasn't just one singular source for it.
Kevin Vonesper:i Well, the source of the material came from mostly several main sources like Dukey and other band members but who shot them. Some some of them I know some of them I don't you know, I have I have pictures of people with video cameras at Haunted Garage shows that I'm trying to identify. You know, I know there's more out there because I had pictures that are like who is this guy with a video camera? We got to find him and I've actually found some by doing just that, like somebody identified themselves on a photograph and found sound like their last show from the 90s in a storage unit, you know, Bin and and now we have stuff that nobody would have ever seen before and before. And that's part of my goal for this project is to dig all this stuff out of the closets and the and the garages as you will to preserve it, because otherwise, nobody's looking for it. And it might be last time, you know, in a few years.
Jonathan Correia:Yeah. And that's really important, because this is a very specific time. This is a very specific thing. And like you said, there might, the bands might only put out one album, but they did shows for like, 10 years. And that's right. And unless people you know, it's preserved and all that, it's not going to be seen. Are you after the documentary? What's going to happen with this archive?
Kevin Vonesper:That's a good question. If there's a demand for it, maybe we can start releasing it. Well, I can tell you one thing that we're doing is I found tons of old demo tapes and stuff that they've recorded that have never been heard unless you are either in the band or in their very close circles. Songs that they wrote for movies that Dookie was in that weren't used such as songs for like Surf Nazis Must Die and Star Slammer you know that movie? I found the Nightmare Sisters soundtrack I found songs they submitted to the Hellraiser three soundtrack that were never used all this stuff it's gold it's it's nuggets of gold straight from the cassette tapes that are available on their on my fundraiser on Indiegogo available for the first time ever because I took the time to dig them up and archive them and and transfer them from from cassette so don't sleep on it if you're a B movie you know horror punk fan of any kind nuggets of gold I'm telling you
James Jay Edwards:now is this just with all the video footage and you know, all the different sources from the video and audio? Is this a rights nightmare? Or are people just signing the rights over to you
Kevin Vonesper:so far I've been pretty too lucky. Like anything that the band owns. I don't have you know, I have a right you know, rights to use so far there's been no trouble for that kind of stuff. I haven't dug too far into the movie rights I think some of the directors are going to be pretty willing to share some footage with me. And then other stuff like say the Montel Williams Show with that he was on or like the Name That Tune he was on from the 80s or like maybe his is in finding him as an extra and say The Bodyguard you know, which which is a thing. Those maybe might be a little bit more difficult but we will see I haven't gotten quite that far yet. But that's why I need the support because I know licensing and and like just getting lawyers to make contracts for you. That's like been the most expensive thing so far in this whole project.
James Jay Edwards:Was he just like like Alice Cooper of the 90s Was he just like everywhere you say he's on like Alice Cooper would pop up in Bob Hope golf tournaments. center square of Hollywood Square.
Kevin Vonesper:Yeah, him and, and other members of the band when they were not on stage would do extra work for for like their day job and stuff like that. So members of the band Dukey and other people, some of the girls, you'd find them in Terminator 2, Kindergarten Cop, The Mask, The Bodyguard, Tales From the Crypt, the original Flash TV series, you know, the Marvel I mean, the DC property, just like all sorts of places. I always say like everybody out there, including your mother has seen Dukey Flyswatter somewhere we just don't know where yet. Yeah, and I have to point this out to everybody because it's it's hilarious. It's like kind of like a subliminal thing like you've seen Dukey flyswatter but you just didn't know his name or his story.
Jonathan Correia:Yeah, well it's always interesting because you know you know of like the the famous examples of musicians popping up in movies like Anthony kitas in Point Break or you know, X popped up a bunch like and Road House and right all those things some
Kevin Vonesper:members of 45 Grave and people like that are in Blade Blade Runner and stuff
James Jay Edwards:like that. John Doe was in Boogie Nights my favorite movie of all time. Oh, wow. He was Amber Waves ex husband.
Kevin Vonesper:That's awesome. They're playing New York soon I gotta get a ticket. Ex Yeah. Yeah. I was just talking about that yesterday. They are going to keep going forever. X is amazing. Like they actually have a full like original lineup still and everything. Yeah,
James Jay Edwards:they because they didn't for a while they they had a different color but Billy's you was back. Yeah.
Kevin Vonesper:Incredible.
Jonathan Correia:I hope they come to LA sometime soon again. They have to,
Kevin Vonesper:you know, because they're from LA,
James Jay Edwards:right. Yeah, they'll come home eventually. Yeah. Los Angeles,
Kevin Vonesper:you know, Haunted Garage covered in X song once, and I have a recording of it. It was the night that the restrictions were lifted from the oh my god, I'm blanking on the name Sorry. It's still it's so early for me. Big riots in the 90s. Police and the LA riots. Yeah. Who was
James Jay Edwards:the Rodney King?
Kevin Vonesper:Yeah, right. Right. Yeah, we're just the restrictions were lifted that night. And they played like the first show on the strip, like since they were lifted, and everyone was just going nuts. And they opened their set with Los Angeles by X and then followed it up with All Hell Breaks Loose by The Misfits.
James Jay Edwards:I remember I was at in LA, not the criminal trial where they were all found not guilty. But the civil trial were, I think two of them were found live into that know, the day that the day that that verdict was handed down. I went to a Rage Against the Machine show in LA that night. And I'm like, is this gonna be safe? And it was it was completely safe. But I'm sure
Kevin Vonesper:everyone was going was having a really good time. Right? Yeah. Well, it also another band that started in Green Jelly studios.
James Jay Edwards:Yeah, they were pals with them, too. All the only thing that happened is before they played Killing in the Name Zack said he's all earlier today. Someone asked if I thought Justice had been served. And then they were you know, they launched into it. So that's the only thing that happened. But we were a little nervous. We're like, is there going to be like, you know, because only two of the four got found liable. Were like, is there? Is this going to be safe, but it was fine.
Kevin Vonesper:Just a lot of pent up energy. No, no, like, criminal violence, I'm sure. Yeah, it's exciting times. And it's they Oh, that's all part of the story now.
James Jay Edwards:Yeah, it is. Okay, so the documentary itself? Can you walk us through what I mean? It's obviously going to be about Dukey Flyswatter. But is it going to just kind of beginning to end or I mean, what's the arc there?
Kevin Vonesper:Yeah, see, the arc is sort of the anti arc. You know, I call this like, sort of the anti documentary because usually there's like a success story. And the whole story of Haunted Garage is like a comedy of errors that ended up with them not being successful, even though they should be, in my opinion, one of the biggest bands in the world because they you know, they broke up in late 1992. And they were playing with Tool they were playing with White Zombie. They were playing with Soundgarden. They were scheduled to play with Nirvana, they were playing with L7. Like all these bands that just kind of like went straight up into the spotlight in 1993, let's say and I swear if Haunted Garage had one extra year, they would be there with them playing stadiums, you know, arenas now like Rob Zombie does with his horror show. And you know, they would have been the ultimate music video band like it was the perfect time for MTV. They had the perfect company with Dukey and his B movie career it is in his director friends and an actor friends and actually did film one music video for their album Position Park, but have never even got printed from the film. As far as I know. Like, it's it's a last project it was never completed. And it's just a comedy of errors. Like, they tried to do all these cool things. And it just for some reason didn't work out. And that's kind of the story is that if you don't know about this band, like it's gonna blow your mind that this existed and and you missed it.
James Jay Edwards:Is the documentary gonna be more about Haunted Garage? Or is it gonna be more about Dukey's film career?
Kevin Vonesper:Sure. I think it's gonna be a perfect marriage of both because actually, their careers were very intertwined. Like, Hauned Garage actually started in 1985. And that's about the same time Dukey started doing his movie career. And like I said, I found demos of them. They wrote songs for some of the movies. In the case of Nightmare Sisters, they actually did get that into the movie. Not the other ones. They didn't and they those songs were lost to time. And then, you know, the Haunted Garage themselves were actually in a movie called Cyclone. So they were kind of and also in a movie called Breakfast of Aliens. That was originally called see What's Happening to Walter and that was filmed in like 1988 but didn't get released until the mid 90s. So they were already broken up before they had like, this big scene in this movie. So it's it's very, like closely knit story to begin with. So I think it's going to be the perfect algum ation of both. Yeah, that makes sense to you. Are you?
Jonathan Correia:Are you seeing more people getting more interested in not just because of the project because a lot of these titles that were mentioning from Dukey are being released by labels like Vinegar Syndrome and Arrow and whatnot. Are you seeing an increase in like, people's interest in Dukey? Or?
Kevin Vonesper:Well yeah, I think I think it took it takes a project like this to, to use a word expose the world to Dukey Flyswatter people know these movies and they're popular within the genre and the retro VHS culture and everything. Especially those movies like those are like the top of the list for the collectors, right? Like some Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers, Surf Nazis Must Die. Those are the ones you remember the most. And they just might not know that this guy Michael sunny in these movies is Dookie. flyswatter from haunted garage. And once they put all the pieces together, they're gonna they're gonna be like, Oh my God, of course. I know that guy is the crazy bartender and Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers are the guy who gets his head ripped off and the beginning of Nightmare Sisters like it all makes sense. Now,
James Jay Edwards:that's actually true because he because he used his real name for his movie career mostly.
Kevin Vonesper:Well, at certain point. It kind of changed. Yeah, you can kind of see the change. I think Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers might be the first movie where he uses the moniker Dukey Flyswatter. And that it's just Dukey from there on in. But yeah, there's a lot of movies. There's like, he wrote a movie that Sharon Stone started in early in late 80s. Like one of her first movies, stuff like that, that you just would never think that Dukey Flyswatter was associated with. And people need to know.
Jonathan Correia:Now you Of course, I've been talking about how great the band is. music wise, but what what happens typically? Or what would happen at a typical like Haunted Mansion show, you know, like wars got there? Or my apologies hot.
Kevin Vonesper:Launching is the big budget version.
Jonathan Correia:Yeah, but what would happen at a Haunted Garage show? I mean, like, we talked about Gwar, you know, they got their space, monster costumes and stuff. But Haunted Garage was a bit more brutal, in some ways, in a
Kevin Vonesper:way. Yeah. So the difference between Haunted Garage and Gwar. And they do get a lot of comparisons a because they were on the same record label. And then of course, like there wasn't many bands doing anything like that at the time. So it was easy to compare one theatrical horror band to another theatrical horror band. The difference is guar did their show in character these these larger than life characters that tell like this comic book story, whereas Haunted Garage, we're just being versions of themselves. And that's the element that made it a little bit more scary, because you're like, Hey, I know that guy. Wait, he's piercing himself right now. Or, you know, you might see him pierced himself and see some real blood, or you might get some Hudson sprayer in your face and some fake blood, you might see him do some fire tricks. He's set his arms on fire, or like flash paper from the rear end. To simulate you boy, you can just imagine, you know, the dancing girls. You might see, depending on the age that was led into the show at the time, you know, some fleshiness, you know, you might see some mash traps on his eyelids or other parts of his body, depending on the show. Just it was kind of like, oh, you know what some of the one of the guitar players was was in drag, which was, I would say not very popular at the time as it is now. It was a little bit more underground and risky. So yeah, you never really knew what you were going to see. You'd probably see a rev up a chainsaw and chain saw somebody on stage and then throw their guts into the audience. And let me tell you like that chainsaw in a small club that makes a really loud, loud sound, you know? So it's, it's shocking. So yeah, those are the things you would see it at econo garage show it's it's a little bit scary, but a whole lot of fun and definitely always with a sense of humor.
Jonathan Correia:Yeah, and watching the trailer you put together and a lot of that footage definitely gave me reminisce and thoughts of Herschel Gordon Lewis, you know,
Kevin Vonesper:funny. Funny. You say that because we're Yeah, actually we haven't yet but we're supposed to interview, Jimmy Maslin, who actually owns the Herschel Gordon Lewis catalogue. Because of that, he produced a movie that Dukey wrote called Blood Diner that you might know it Yeah, it was originally supposed to be a sequel to blood feast social Gordon Lewis's Blood Feast. So it's all connected. Even Herschel Gordon Lewis.
Jonathan Correia:Oh, that makes I just watched a Blood Diner earlier this week to familiarize myself a bit more and yeah, I haven't watched that since I was, you know, young in the VHS store so that yeah, it's, I can see the connection.
Kevin Vonesper:And there's a brain in a jar and and everything.
Jonathan Correia:Oh, yeah. i My favorite part of Blood Diner is just definitely the the insistence. Something like this hasn't been done in 5 million years, you know, has just been done before nine, 5 million years, just like the constant of bringing that up was great.
Kevin Vonesper:Yeah, Dukey was gonna play the guy in the movie with the dummy. But once once Jackie Kang was the director, she had no, no writers on set rule. So he got recast. Yeah, and the original casting for the leads in his scripts, you know, I don't think they changed much of the words in the script. But um, the tone changed a little bit because the two leads were supposed to be kind of like these ugly guys. And they were supposed to be George The Animal Steele and he was gonna be the wrestler. And, and Michael Berryman. From from the Hills Have Eyes and stuff like that. And so they stay. I don't think they could afford them. That's probably the real reason that it changed. But now they became like these two very attractive young men doing all these crazy killings. And that changed the tone of the movie a lot. And Carl Crew who plays Oh, boy, what's his character's name? I can't remember right now, but Georgie. He is in the documentary. And he owns a club in LA called California Institute of Abnormal Arts.
Jonathan Correia:That's right down the street from me. I go there a lot. That's so good. Well,
Kevin Vonesper:we actually than that we actually shot most of the documentary down the street from you because we were a stone's throw away from CIAA the whole time.
Jonathan Correia:That's Awesome. It's
Kevin Vonesper:Hollywood. Yeah. See, it's
Jonathan Correia:all connected to Dukey Flyswatter. Even me.
James Jay Edwards:Cool. Well, we're run out of time. But there's one more thing that I do want to ask you about. I looked on your Twitter account, and you just listed Green Jello. Well, Green Jelly, but it's always green jello to us. And then there's no connection there. What is the Green Jello connection?
Kevin Vonesper:Okay. Well, I was a member of Green Jelly, actually. So I mean, they were my favorite bands, you know, when I when I discovered them in like 1992. When that's they kind of were the reason. As I was saying, before that I kind of got led into this whole wacky world. And then back in 2008. I, they went on their first tour since the 90s. If you can believe that. They only went on one tour to support Three Little Pigs and that record. And then they kind of like,
James Jay Edwards:became Tool
Kevin Vonesper:Yeah, game Tool and a bunch of other bands, I'm sure. And they were just they were kind of an LA staple. But they finally went back on tour in 2008. And I met them on their first leg of it. And I told one of them, hey, if you ever need a bass player for the next leg, or whatever, hit me up, and so happens that they did so I flew out to LA and I joined Green Jello and The Radioactive Chicken Heads and Rosemary's Billy Goat, and we all shared a bus and we all shared band members and and so the direct connection is that I am member number 237 of Green Jello, nice and Dukey Flyswatter and honey garage. They used to play together all the time with green jello and being in each other's videos and actually on their second album if you hear the anthem song, if you listen closely, you can hear Dukey Flyswatters, background vocals in in the audience, alongside Weird Al Yankovic.
James Jay Edwards:It's funny, your Twitter actually does say Green Jelly number 237. So that's what that means. Okay, so you're
Kevin Vonesper:okay, yeah, I'm 37 now they have over 1000 members, so I'm considered old school already.
James Jay Edwards:Awesome. Well, thanks for for joining us. Where can the where can people find you?
Kevin Vonesper:Yeah. Dukeydoc.com is the easiest way to find everything. DUKEYdoc.com I gotta spell it out. So people don't look like like that Green Day album cover. D U K E Y D O C.com There's an Indiegogo. They're calling it the Indiegogo campaign emphasis on the pain. There's lots of great perks please support an independent grassroots DIY documentary project about underground culture. Like even if you're not totally into it, you know get a sticker for five bucks or just share it with your friends. Someone's gonna love this stuff. I'm easy to find Kevin Vonesper, you know just Dukey doc on on Twitter. I don't use that much, but I Instagram is where I hang out most of the time.
James Jay Edwards:We'll post all the links in the show notes. And yeah, Dukey Dukey Flyswatter. Like like Kevin said, if you if you don't know him, you probably do know him. You just don't know that you know him. You've seen it like in
Kevin Vonesper:the underground culture punk rock horror movies, be horror movies, anything like that. Like there's something in here for everybody.
James Jay Edwards:Or if you've seen The Bodyguard apparently
Kevin Vonesper:it's like subliminal messaging. green hair just.
Jonathan Correia:And you never know you might also be connected to do he. I mean, that was eye opening for me. within a half hour we were able to seven degrees me to do
Kevin Vonesper:what we do here on Eye On Horror.
James Jay Edwards:Awesome. Well, thanks again, Kevin for joining us. Our theme song is by Restless Spirits. So go and give them a listen or artwork is by Chris Fisher. So go give him a look. You can find us at any of the socials Eye On Horror or@ihorror.com. So give us a shout out. And we will see you in a couple of weeks. So for me James Jay Edwards.
Jacob Davidson:I'm Jacob Davison.
Jonathan Correia:I'm Jonathan Correia.
Kevin Vonesper:I'm Kevin Vonesper your Eye On Horror
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