Play the parts
The human stars of the program included John Carradine, who would be his last stage role, as the blind beggar.
GIALANELLA Carradine has done such shit-B movies, commercials. He was an old man, but he still had that deep, rich, whiskey voice. During previews Joe rents a showroom and shows us ‘Frankenstein’ and ‘Bride of Frankenstein’ [from 1935, in which Carradine had an uncredited bit part]. Someone turns to him and says, ‘This is such an amazing movie. What is your memory of it? “He stood for a moment and said, ‘Two days’ work.’
CARRIE ROBBINS, costume designer His hands were so riddled with arthritis that he could not dress himself. I had a lovely wardrobe that could hide in the ‘fireplace’ of the old man’s hut and help him out.
Victor Frankenstein’s role went to William Converse-Roberts, a recent graduate of Yale Drama School who would make his Broadway debut. After extensive auditions of other actors, the part of the Creature goes to Keith Jochim, who landed the role in St.
GIALANELLA No one nailed it. I went to Joe and said, ‘You need to bring Keith in.’ They did not want to do that. They wanted someone with at least New York credibility.
MARTORELLA Keith’s audition was incredibly moving. We had ten minutes, and finally he read for half an hour. Then he came back in the afternoon in the makeup he had designed [for St. Louis]. I wrote in my diary: “He has completely turned himself into a heap of horrors.” I can still see the faces of Tom, Joe and Victor. They were amazed.
The show started loading on October 23, 1980 in the palace. The crew started with 15 stage personnel, which quickly swelled to three dozen. The beginning of previews was delayed by the complexity of Douglas Schmidt’s sets, which turned on a giant turntable, and by problems with effects such as the Tesla coil, the full intensity of which was increased during the course of the exercises.