Former Marvel editor-in-chief and co-creator of “Werewolf by Night” Roy Thomas recently released “Les Ghouls,” a film he made as a teen in 1958. Long before he was bringing Werewolves to comics, let alone Disney+, he was making low-budget horror flicks with his buddies.
“Les Ghouls” was shot in Thomas’ hometown of Jackson, Missouri. Like most aspiring filmmakers, he used his friend group as performers, including Gary Friedrich. The duo would go on to co-create the character Ghost Rider while they were both working at Marvel.
The film pays homage to the 1948 classic “Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein,” a favorite among he and his pals. John Short, who owned the camera, naturally became the primary director. While Thomas, of course, plays the Werewolf.
Thomas’ love of comics was already shining through with characters’ names being peppered with references to them. Slim (Friedrich) and Slat (Ronnie Lowes) are named as a tribute to the DC Comics humor strip, “Fat and Slat.” The characters of the mad doctor and his assistant are called Dr. Sturdley and Melvin. Paying homage to MAD Magazine cartoonist and editor Harvey Kurtzman, who sometimes used the moniker Melvin Sturdley.
Roughly 15 years ago, Thomas got in touch with Short to see if the footage still existed. Luckily it did, and they transferred the twelve-and-a-half-minute film onto DVD. In honor of Marvel Studios debuting a colorized version of 2022’s black and white “Werewolf by Night,” Thomas has released “Les Ghouls!”
“I hadn’t watched it in years, but two or three weeks ago I was sitting at my desk, and I accidentally kicked something under the desk, off to the side,” Thomas wrote in an email. “Turned out it was a pile of DVDs and VHS tapes of old interviews, etc., and there atop the mix was a DVD that included Les Ghouls.”
Currently, POPXP! Network on YouTube is hosting “Les Ghouls.” You can check it out for yourself below. You can also catch both the black and white and colorized versions of Michael Giacchino‘s “Werewolf By Night” on Disney+.
