September 8, 2024 — You might have a difficult time coming up with a reason to visit Pittsburgh, but horror movie fans like me and mine don't. It's the city where zombies first shambled their way into popular culture, thanks to a director named George Romero and his seminal (appropriate use of the word alert!) Living Dead trilogy. It's also become a horror movie mecca in general, thanks to special effects master Tom Savini, who lives there to this day.
On a personal level and speaking of seminal (icky use of the word alert!), these horror movie sites are important to the origin of this here website, so it was emotional for me to revisit this city of penguins and pirates and see the ch-ch-changes since my first visit back in 2006 (see my original visit for OTIS here) both to the sites and to my own life. Want to know more about those changes? Check out semi-sappy Episode 37 of Odd Things I've Seen: The Podcast, Chasing Zombies in Romero-Land and Savini-ville. You can also see photos from our concurrent visit to the Living Dead Museum.
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Savini was the special effect person for the original Friday the 1eth flick, and that
gets him a giant mural with the mask that didn't appear in the film. |
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| It's Fluffy! One of Savini's creatures for the 1982 Creepshow movie. |
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Savini's house is around the corner from the Fluffy mural...
and gorgeously ooky. |
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| Me in 2006, visiting Monroeville Mall for the first time. |
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| Me and my 14-year-old daughter, 18 years later. |
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| Me in 2006 again, pretending to be Ken Foree. |
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| Her turn. |
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| And then my 10-year-old |
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A prop from the original Dawn of the Dead advertising the Living Dead Museum
in the mall (photos here). |
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| This wasn't here on my first visit. |
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| All my girls and George. |
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| Nor was this. |
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| Or this. |
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Reenacting scenes from Night of the Living Dead,
65 years later. |
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| Still doing it. |
