Baby Jane Hudson

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Music to Make Horror Movies By: Thelma Houston

Published December 8, 2024 by biggayhorrorfan

After it illuminated countless dance floors in the mid-70s, the magnificent Thelma Houston may have felt that there was no way to go but down for her iconic disco anthem Don’t Leave Me This Way. Flash forward forty some years, though, and this jumpy lover’s plea found its way into horror nirvana. 

Featured at a key moment in Netflix’s very popular Fear Street: Part Two – 1978, this song gained a new life while exposing Houston to many eager young viewers.

17 albums into her career, this was obviously not her first terror film connection. Her song Keep it Light was featured on the soundtrack to Into the Night, one of the films that John Landis directed, post An American Werewolf in London and Twilight Zone: The Movie. 

Even more importantly, Houston seems to be a horror fan, herself. She and Bunny Hall, a friend, pulled off a perfect Baby Jane and Blanche Hudson a few Halloween seasons ago.

Frightening up a new sonic spectacle ever year or so, you can also follow her future exploits (while exploring facets of her long ranging career) at https://www.thelmahouston.com/.

Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan

http://www.facebook.com/biggayhorrorfan

Va-Va-Villainess: Alison Arngrim

Published May 26, 2024 by biggayhorrorfan

This took me decades to realize, but it’s so crystal clear now that I am almost embarrassed about my obliviousness. Some aging, glitter flecked homosexual had to have come up with the costume design for Little House on the Prairie‘s drag queen inspiring, all time champion baddie Nellie Oleson. This 19th Century troublemaker looks exactly like the twin to Bette Davis’ iconic Jane in Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? Sealing the deal, portrayer Alison Arngrim intuitively followed the flavor trail of those tresses and dresses, creating an indelible, much beloved (or is that hated?) character.

This perfect combination gave Arngrim’s rich and spoiled Nellie a nearly 7 year-run as the self-admiring tormentor of House‘s enduring heroine Laura (Melissa Gilbert). Her professional commitment even imbued a number of follow-up credits. Variations on Nellie’s saucy naughtiness can be found in Arngrim’s lingerie clad hooker on an episode of Fantasy Island and as a champagne swilling operetta actress in I Married Wyatt Earp, a 1983 television film. 

Of course, none of those enjoyable gigs hit the delirious brilliance of a manipulative (yet helpless) Nellie bouncing down a hill in a wheelchair, another visually reverential reference to Jane, in one of House‘s most famous episodes.

So, over the past 2 decades. Arngrim has smartly embraced her bewigged past – writing a book and performing a one woman show, nationwide, about her most famous creation entitled Confessions of a Prairie Bitch. With pitch perfect humor and startling insight, she weighs in on how Nellie’s nastiness has ultimately not only enhanced viewers’ lives, but her own, as well. A recent pitstop in Chicago even included a reenactment of her most famous exchange with Gilbert:

For information on further showings of Confessions and any other project announcements, be sure to follow Arngrim at https://www.instagram.com/alisonarngrim/ and/or https://www.facebook.com/AlisonArngrimFanPage,

Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

http://www.facebook.com/biggayhorrorfan