Cassandra Peterson understands the power of a movie night — or more specifically, the kind of movie night that wobbles between horror and hilarity, where the fake blood maybe gleams brighter than the budget.
Long before “so bad it’s good” became a genre unto itself, Peterson was perfecting the art as her alter ego, Elvira, Mistress of the Dark. Beginning in the early 1980s with her weekly series “Elvira’s Movie Macabre,” she invited late-night viewers into her crypt of cult cinema: “The Boy Who Cried Werewolf,” “Frankenstein’s Castle of Freaks,” “The Bat People,” “The Thing with Two Heads.” Each screening was laced with her signature cocktail of camp, innuendo and gothic glamour; that plunging neckline and sky-high beehive as much a part of the show as the B movies themselves.
Her 1988 film, “Elvira: Mistress of the Dark,” endures as a Halloween-season essential precisely because it understands the delicious overlap between fright and farce. Set in the buttoned-up town of Fallwell, Massachusetts, it’s a fizzy send-up of small-town sanctimony and monster-movie melodrama. (At one point, Elvira hosts a midnight screening of “Attack of the Killer Tomatoes” at the local theater — conveniently owned by her square-jawed, endearingly dull love interest, Bob.)
So it feels only right that Peterson has now turned her gift for spectacle toward real-life entertaining in her new book, “Elvira’s Cookbook from Hell: Sexy, Spooky Soirées and Celebrations for Every Occasion.”
When we spoke over video earlier this month, she emphasized that while the book might debut in the long shadow of Halloween, it’s meant to be an all-seasons guide, an invitation to anyone with a gothic streak (“You know, in my line of work, I come across people who are living the goth lifestyle every day, all year,” she told me) or simply a taste for the macabre. Its pages are organized not just around holidays, but around moods: “A Beastly, Bloody Brunch,” “A Romantic Graveside Picnic” and — naturally — a chapter on how to host your own scary movie night.
It’s a concept that works just as well in October as it does on a sticky July evening, with the curtains drawn, the popcorn buttered and a camp classic flickering on the screen.
When I asked her what she’d put on the reel — and what she’d serve alongside — she didn’t hesitate.
What to Watch
Anything by director Roger Corman
Peterson’s first instinct, when I asked what she’d screen for her own movie night, was immediate: “If I was having movie night, for me — I like the old B movies, like Roger Corman.”
It’s an apt choice. Corman, affectionately known as the “Pope of Pop Cinema,” was a god of low-budget horror, a maestro who could turn a shoestring budget into something glittering, gothic, and gloriously unhinged. From the 1950s through the ’70s, he elevated schlock to an art form with films like “The Little Shop of Horrors” and his vividly stylized Edgar Allan Poe adaptations starring Vincent Price.
If you’re programming your own lineup, start with “The Masque of the Red Death” (his undisputed masterpiece), “The Terror” (a foggy fever dream co-starring a baby-faced Jack Nicholson) or “Creature from the Haunted Sea,” which is exactly as unhinged and delightful as it sounds.
“Plan 9 from Outer Space”
For the truly devoted — those who prefer their horror so bad it becomes sublime — Peterson recommends one particular classic.” “If I wanted to really have a bad movie night, I’d have to go with ‘Plan 9 from Outer Space,’” she told me.
Written, directed and produced by Ed Wood, the 1957 sci-fi horror hybrid has achieved a kind of divine infamy. Aliens in hubcap saucers! Zombies in polyester suits! Graveyards that wobble if you look too hard! Though it barely flickered through cinemas before vanishing into late-night TV purgatory, it was later immortalized in “The Golden Turkey Awards,” written by film critic Michael Medved and his brother Harry, as “The Worst Film of All Time.”
And yet, in the grand B-movie tradition, its flaws have become its crown jewels. “Plan 9” endures not in spite of its cheapness, but because of it. Also in the cast: Maila Nurmi, the original Vampira, whose spooky-glam TV persona on “The Vampira Show” paved the way for Peterson’s Elvira.
“Sinners” and “Weapons”
Then, for those who want their horror picks to come with some more critical acclaim, Peterson recommended two more recent films: “Sinners” and “Weapons. Both released this year and, according to her, “both fantastic movies.”
“Sinners,” written, directed, and produced by Ryan Coogler, is a gothic Southern fever dream set in 1932 Mississippi. It follows twin brothers Smoke and Stack (each played by Michael B. Jordan, in an uncanny dual performance) who return home after a stint in Chicago to open a juke joint. What begins as a story of reinvention turns darkly operatic when their music awakens something hungry in the Delta night.
Meanwhile, “Weapons” is a supernatural horror film featuring Julia Garner, Amy Madigan and Josh Brolin about a small town where 17 children from the same class mysteriously vanish one night at 2:17 a.m. It’s a story of dread and disappearance that lingers long after the credits roll.
What to Serve
“To go with bad movies, you need bad food,” Peterson told me. “I would probably use my ‘Trick or Trash’ or something.”
Her Trick or Trash — a salty-sweet mix of Chex, mini pretzels, peanuts, candy and Halloween sprinkles — appears in her new cookbook, and comes with a truly immortal anecdote: Peterson once brought it to a party at a billionaire’s house, where, she recalls, “it disappeared faster than Dracula’s ass in a tanning booth.”
“It really is the worst stuff,” she said, “and it’s so darn good.”
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From there, she suggests keeping things easy, kitschy and irresistibly snackable—“trash chic,” if you will. Her so-called Finger Sandwiches (really, cocktail franks with almond slivers for nails and a drizzle of ketchup for blood) are a crowd-pleaser that lands squarely between haunted house and haute cuisine.
But the pièce de résistance of her spooky spread? “One of the things I like best in the book is my little Shock-cuterie,” Peterson said. “It’s a hand-made out of various cheeses and then wrapped in prosciutto — it looks so incredibly gross. But then, of course, surround it with cheeses and crackers and fruit and all of those items, so people can kind of nibble all night.”
Because in the end, she says, the golden rule of a proper movie night is simple: “You want to be able to have people watch the movie, but still be able to snack while watching the movie.”
It’s a philosophy worthy of Elvira herself — equal parts camp and comfort, with a generous pour of showmanship. To watch bad movies and eat “bad” food is, in her world, not a lapse in taste but an elevation of it: a reminder that delight and decadence often come disguised in plastic bowls and paper napkins. So draw the curtains, dim the lights, cue the Corman and pass the Chex mix.
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