Come Back, Crypt-Keeper!
Not too long ago I wrote an article for Fatherly about how curious it is that in a world where intellectual property is king and we are forever recycling the triumphs of the past, Roger Rabbit and his coterie of pals and enemies have gone more or less unused for decades despite the extraordinary popularity and brilliance of Who Framed Roger Rabbit.
Roger Rabbit has been MIA for what I imagine are primarily legal and licensing reasons. Who Framed Roger Rabbit marked an unprecedented collaboration between Steven Spielberg, Disney and Warner Brothers.
When Spielberg established Dreamworks Animation in direct competition with Disney I suspect it destroyed any chance of Disney wanting to get back into bed with him for another mega-budget, high-risk live-action/animated project.
There is an even more valuable piece of intellectual property that has similarly gone unused for decades despite the public desperately wanting more. I’m talking of course about the Crypt-Keeper.
At the risk of hyperbole, The Crypt-Keeper is probably the single greatest creation in human history, including all of William Shakespeare’s characters.
The Crypt-Keeper was so beloved and so inspired that he spawned the kid-friendly spin-offs Tales From the Crypt-Keeper and Secrets of the Crypt-Keeper’s Haunted House despite Tales From the Crypt being a hard-R rated celebration of profanity, violence and gratuitous nudity.
One show wasn’t enough for our man The Crypt-Keeper. The small screen wasn’t big enough for him so he went Hollywood for the terrific sleeper Demon Knight, the lousy Bordello of Blood and the disastrous, DTV Ritual, which has such a terrible reputation that I haven’t seen it despite my super-fandom.
The Crypt-Keeper even released a pair of albums, Have Yourself a Scary Christmas and Monsters of Metal and a radio series in 2000.
Even though The Crypt-Keeper has been absent from TV and film for the past few decades, he has taken up major, permanent real estate in pop culture and the ghoulish imaginations of fans like me, who never tire of channeling his morbid essence, much to the irritation of our wives and girlfriends.
A few years back there was talk of Tales From the Crypt getting rebooted courtesy of fright-master M. Night Shyamalan, but in a twist that was all too easy to predict, that fell apart due to legal issues. Also, it would not have involved The Crypt-Keeper and I think I speak for everyone when I say that nobody wants a Crypt-Keeper-free Tales from the Crypt.
Other horror anthologies strived to fill the Tales From the Crypt-themed hole in the hearts and minds of the public, most notably Jordan Peele’s Twilight Zone reboot and Shudder’s Creepshow, which is currently in its third season.
They weren’t bad, but they were not, and are not, Tales From the Crypt.
Creepshow benefits tremendously from the demand for more Tales from the Crypt, as does a decidedly worthy figure.
I’m talking about the Crypt-Keeper himself, AKA voiceover artist John Kassir, who has been making a small fortune on Cameo resurrecting his signature role for a small fee.
I should know. I have called upon his services repeatedly over the past year or so and he never disappoints. He’s not like the Backpack Kid, who REFUSES to do the Backpack Dance even though that’s all he’s known for.
No, Kassir knows damn well that people want the Crypt-Keeper and that’s exactly what he gives them.
I would love more Tales from the Crypt, obviously, but being able to pay The Crypt-Keeper to wish my friends and collaborators a Happy Birthday or congratulate them on an engagement or a job well done is one HELL of a consolation prize.
On Cameo, Kassir’s a real scream. He’s absolutely killing it and it thankfully doesn’t cost too many bones to get him to work his morbid magic.
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