In the early 1950s, Finland-born actress Maila Nurmi attended a Los Angeles costume ball wearing a tight black dress with shredded sleeves and a low-cut neckline, a long black wig and vampire-like makeup. Producer Hun Stromberg Jr., upon seeing Nurmi, immediately realized she would be the perfect host for an upcoming local TV station’s Saturday night horror movie program. Although Nurmi – now better known as Vampira – only hosted the show for one year, she became a California-area celebrity nonetheless.
In 1956, meanwhile, the 1933 film King Kong was broadcast on prime time television, drawing in ninety percent of the national audience. These two separate events gave Universal Studios an idea – why not package their extensive collection of horror films from the 1930s and 40s, market them to television stations across the country and encourage each individual city to concoct their own unique host?
The resulting Shock Theater became an immediate success, sweeping the country in 1957 and creating local celebrities out of the late-night hosts who appeared dressed as monsters and mad scientists while using coffins, dungeons, and creepy laboratories as their sets. Although not part of that initial wave of monster movie mania, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, had its own version of Shock Theater, called Chiller Theater, with a host – Bill Cardille – who was just as popular in the Steel City as Vampira was in Los Angeles.
Cardille began his career in broadcasting at radio station WDAD in Indiana, Pennsylvania, before joining WICU-TV in Erie as a weatherman and then migrating to the current-day WPXI in 1957. When WPXI launched Chiller Theater in 1963, Cardille became the off-screen announcer for the Sunday afternoon program.
Bill Cardille settled upon a more “spooky” delivery for his introductory remarks rather than his normal speaking voice, and the ratings for Chiller Theater steadily increased with each installment. After only thirteen weeks, WPXI management decided to move the show to Saturday night, adding a double-feature format while continuing to use Cardille as host.
As Elena M. Watson explains in her book Television Horror Movie Hosts, published in 2000, the vast majority of late-night anchors at that time relied upon gimmicks during their on-air appearances. John Zacherle in Philadelphia, for instance, wore a long black undertaker’s coat and macabre makeup, while John Barclay in San Francisco and Chuck Zink in Miami pretended to be Jekyll-and-Hyde-type split personalities.
Cardille decided to divert from this trend, believing such gimmicks would grow tiresome over the long run, and decided to wear a dark suit and tie for his Chilly Billy persona instead. To add flavor to the proceedings, meanwhile, he constructed a series of skits and offbeat characters – including Captain Bad, Maurice the Matchmaker, and Mr. Magnificent – to keep the audience entertained.
A number of recurring acts were added as well. “The Break-In” featured a wall safe that was opened during the show to reveal some unexpected activity going on within, such as a live band performing, a couple kissing, or a man hanging upside down with an apple in his mouth. Reports from the Pittsburgh Subway System (PSS) were also popular, despite the fact that Pittsburgh did not have a subway at the time.
Bill Cardille likewise brought a number of special guests onto Chiller Theater, including poet Rod McKuen, comedians Phyllis Diller and Jerry Lewis, wrestler Bruno Sammartino, and actress Barbara Feldon, a Pittsburgh native who portrayed Agent 99 on the 1960s television series Get Smart.
Chiller Theater quickly attracted a loyal audience, including future filmmaker George Romero. It was while watching the Vincent Price flick The Last Man on Earth on Chiller Theater that the idea of making his own horror movie first struck Romero. When it was time for the eventual Night of the Living Dead to be filmed, Romero immediately cast Chiller Theater host Bill Cardille as television news reporter Bill Cardille. In addition to film, Cardille also ventured into records, releasing an album of skits from Chiller Theater in the late 1960s and a single called “Chilly Billy’s Vamp” a few years later.
As the 1960s gave way to the 1970s, Chiller Theater evolved as well. The original laboratory set, for instance, was transformed into a castle motif, and an array of supporting characters – known as the “Chiller Family” – were likewise introduced. The new cast included Terminal Stare (Donna Rae), Georgette the Fudgemaker (Bonnie Barney), Norman (Norman Elder), and Stefan the Castle Prankster (Steve Lunciski).
Bill Cardille’s original dark suit and tie, meanwhile, were eliminated in favor of a tuxedo, and additional recurring skits were incorporated into the proceedings, including Cardille reciting corny jokes while a nearby skull giggled incessantly at them.
On October 11, 1975, NBC premiered a new late night television show called Saturday Night Live which in effect marked the demise of the late night horror film host. Because of the popularity of Chiller Theater, WPXI resisted the urge to bump the show in favor of SNL for four years before finally caving in, at which point Chiller Theater was reduced from its double-feature format to a single film shown at 1 a.m. instead of 11:30 p.m.
When WPXI later decided to add the hour-long weekend edition of Entertainment Tonight immediately following Saturday Night Live, the start time for Chiller Theater was pushed back even further. Ratings quickly fell, causing WPXI to cancel the show at the end of 1983. The final installment of Chiller Theater aired on January 1, 1984, a triple feature that included The Wolf Man, Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things, and It Came from Outer Space.
Chiller Theater may have ended, but it has yet to be forgotten by the multiple generations of Pittsburghers who grew up watching and is still considered the cornerstone of the horror genre within the Steel City. Bill Cardille and other members of the Chiller Family continued to make Halloween appearances in the region for an additional two decades afterwards, including a Chiller Cruise on the Gateway Clipper.
Local horror conventions, meanwhile, still pay homage to both Chilly Billy and Chiller Theater, guaranteeing that the host and the show will remain a part of Pittsburgh’s heritage for many more years to come.
Anthony Letizia