In Detroit, it takes one Hell of a Horror Host to last 15 years on Saturday afternoons! And that doesn’t count the years it was sold to Cleveland, Washington D.C. and Canada. From 1967-1982, Sir Graves Ghastly haunted the post-cartoon airwaves of WJBK-TV2 with wacky characters, powerful spoofs, loads of songs and eye candy! Lawson J. Deming (1913-2007) was Sir Graves Ghastly.
Sir Graves Ghastly was a traditional vampire with a bit of an exaggerated sense of drama. With slicked down hair combed into dark swirls, dark makeup around his eyes under pointed eyebrows, a Salvador Dali handlebar mustache and a devilishly pointed goatee, Sir Graves was certainly a looker.
“Oh, good afternoon, dearheart…”, he would begin his intro with, to draw the viewer in and he would end with his ghastly cackle of a laugh that was genuinely creep-city to kids and laugh-out-loud funny to adults!
From there, the show followed the usual format for a Horror Host show—back-to-back films, interrupted going to commercials with brief sketch comedy bits.
Other characters on the show were his sidekick, Baruba, who dressed in a monk’s robes and hood so one couldn’t see his face; a ghostly apparition known as The Glob, whose face appeared in the moon above the set and would lip sync songs portrayed by Deeming's mouth turned upside down; Tilly Trollhouse, a castle maid with a deep Bela Lugosi accent played by Deeming in Drag; and a cemetery caretaker named Reel McCoy, who opened up each episode by digging up a movie from the graveyard.
Ghastly had a very musical show, using what music he could and loads of lip-synching…
Sir Graves’ pal, The Glob, sings…
Sir Graves Ghastly’s feminine side, Tilly Trollhouse…
Lawson J. Deming worked in radio and television all his life.
Once his show was cancelled, he continued to do speaking engagements and personal appearances as Sir Graves well into the ‘90s. He would always sign off with the words that I sign off with tonight:
“Happy Haunting!”
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