Black Actors in Old Dark House Movies

Elsewhere on this website, I've suggested that some of the elements of classic Old Dark House films grow from their predecessors in popular entertainment: horror imagery from early silent film, for example, mystery from Gothic fiction, and humour from vaudeville. A far more problematic inheritance, however, is the genre's portrayal of Black people - at best, as one-dimensional stock characters; at worst, the target of demeaning jokes made by white people.  

Just as there's no way to ignore these portrayals, there's no way to defend or excuse them. They appear in such early efforts as 1922's The Ghost Breaker, become particularly prevalent in the genre in the early 1940s, and their influence continues to be felt today. As a result, while some viewers consider the old-fashioned Old Dark House a cosy and safe space to visit, others will feel excluded or insulted. 

Only you can work out where your own line is drawn when it comes to viewing these films as entertainment. My own view is that modern-day genre fans should learn about the history and power of racist stereotypes from sources like Black Horror Movies, the Jim Crow Museum and Black-face.com. While acknowledging the extremely limited stage on which Black actors played in classic Hollywood, Looming Heirs! hopes to honour their accomplishments within an industry where they had little-to-no power. 

For a rare example of an Old Dark House film made with an all-Black cast outside of the mainstream studio system (and therefore subject to the different limitations of being classed as a race film) see 1940's Son of Ingagi. 

Willie Best (1916-1962) arrived in Hollywood as a chauffeur, a role he also played in his first Old Dark House movie, 1932's The Monster Walks, in which he was credited under the stage name Sleep n' Eat. While the film gave him the distinction of speaking the final line, this was unfortunately a racist joke about the monster ape of the title ("I had a grandpappy that looked something like him, but he wasn't as active"). Best was held in high regard by Bob Hope, his co-star in The Ghost Breakers (1940), who called him "the greatest actor I know". He went on to play similar roles in The Smiling Ghost (1941, above), The Hidden Hand (1941) and Whispering Ghosts (1942). The Mississippi Encyclopedia quotes an interview in which he reflects on his career: "I often think about these roles I have to play. Most of them are pretty broad. Sometimes I tell the director and he cuts out the real bad parts. But what’s an actor going to do? Either you do it or get out."

Mantan Moreland (1902-1973) is most famous for playing Charlie Chan's driver, Birmingham Brown, in fifteen films from from 1944 to 1949. Several of these qualify as Old Dark House movies, including Charlie Chan in the Secret Service (1944), Black Magic (1944) and The Jade Mask (1945). Much of Mantan's role in these films amounted to scaredy-cat pratfalls, a holdover from his performances in the earlier horror-comedies, King of the Zombies (1941, above) and Revenge of the Zombies (1943). Interviewed in The Afro American on 9 May 1959, however, he said: "The movies are growing up and I think my characterizations should keep pace with the times. Why shouldn't the role be written so that I solve the murder sometime? At least let me be cast as a little smarter than I have been heretofore."

Eddie "Rochester" Anderson (1905-1977) was known to millions as the character Rochester in The Jack Benny Program on radio and TV between 1937 and 1965. Not Even Past quotes a 1941 editorial from The California Eagle: "It was really a revolution, for Jack Benny’s impudent butler-valet-chauffeur, 'Rochester Van Jones' said all the things which a fifty year tradition of the stage proclaimed that American audiences will not accept from a black man." Unfortunately this wasn't quite true of his role in the same year's Topper Returns (above), which returned him firmly to the scared chauffeur stereotype - but the film did at least give him plenty to do (and the final scene). Anderson's only other Old Dark House role was a bit-part in 1933's mystery-at-sea thriller, Terror Aboard.

Ernie Morrison (1912-1989), billed as 'Sunshine' Sammy Morrison, played Scruno, one of the otherwise white East Side Kids, in two Old Dark House comedies, Spooks Run Wild (1941) and Ghosts on the Loose (1943, above). While all of the gang get similar screen time, Black Horror Movies notes: "Scruno’s fidgety, hunched over, wide-eyed/mouthed character seems, well, just a bit more over-the-top. Plus, he’s the butt of several jokes about no one being able to see him in the dark, and when a white guy gets car exhaust blown in his face, one of the 'kids' yells, 'Hey, it’s Scruno’s uncle!'" After a busy career as a young actor, Morrison quit the movie business to work in the aerospace industry. 

The Thirteenth Guest

Joseph Stefano did it in PSYCHO... Kevin Williamson did it in SCREAM... But screenwriter Frances Hyland bumped off her leading lady even earlier in the 1932 horror-mystery, THE THIRTEENTH GUEST!    

It's my custom to begin these reviews with a little look at the exterior of the Old Dark House in question but, as you can see from the still above, this is one of those annoying cases where it's never really shown. This is about as much as the film provides, glimpsed right at the start. 

But what a start! A taxi pulls up late one night at 'the Old Morgan Place' on Old Mill Road and out steps Marie Morgan (a young Ginger Rogers). She's been lured to the former family homestead on her 21st birthday - which also happens to be the thirteenth anniversary of a dreadful dinner party during which her father not only announced some strange changes to his will, but also dropped dead. What strange changes, you ask? Well, he provided for his wife and immediate family, naturally, but the bulk of his fortune was destined for the party's mysterious 'thirteenth guest' - someone who never actually arrived and whose identity remains unknown. The house has been shut up ever since. 

Back in the present, Marie finds, oddly, the electricity switched on and a new telephone installed in the otherwise derelict and cobweb-choked property, along with an envelope addressed to her. The note inside reads: 13 - 13 - 13. She hears a noise, goes to investigate; we hear a scream, a gunshot... and the next thing we know is Captain Ryan of the local police force is phoning his friend, private investigator Phil Winston, with the promise of a 'really good murder' to solve... 

And, wowee, yes - this one does turn out to be a pretty good case! Not so much the outcome (the final revelation is actually a bit of a let-down) but the journey there involves a roster of suspects who've grown bitchier with each year since their fateful gathering, plus secret passages, a fairly inventive murder weapon and a howling, hooded villain. On top of that, this already quite slasherific killer also likes to pose their victims' bodies around the original dinner table in a Tableau of Death™, a trope that became a slasher film standard fifty years later:

The script finds an excuse to bring Ginger Rogers back after her early exit - a wise decision because she's a lot of fun. The same goes for Lyle Talbot, on a major smarm offensive as the unapologetically sleazy detective, Winston. (This lively duo reunited the following year for another mystery, A Shriek in the Night, also written by Frances Hyland.) Winston's amorous antics, along with some clanging double entendres, make it pretty obvious this one's pre-Code, but there's some surprising shading around two male characters presented as being in a relationship. (A police officer even refers to one as the other's 'boyfriend'.) 

If there is a weakness it's that aforementioned climactic reveal but, coming off the back of some strong suspense and ingenious plotting, I say ignore the black fly and down the chardonnay... It's not always this sweet.  

RATING: 🕸🕸🕸

The Three Weird Sisters

THREE creepy dowagers cook up at least FOUR murder attempts in ONE weird film... It's the 1948 proto-psycho-biddy movie, THE THREE WEIRD SISTERS! And it's Welsh. 

I'm genuinely not sure at this point whether having Dylan Thomas co-write the script for your Old Dark House movie is a good idea. On the one hand, this is a more-than-usually clever piece, complete with lyrical turns of phrase and savage deconstructions of Welsh identity; on the other, it's peppered with scenes and conversations that feel like they belong in a different film, and begins a complex exploration of philanthropy and class responsibility that it can't possibly hope to resolve within its scant running-time. 

Let's take the basic scenario for starters: the elderly, Victorian-valued Morgan-Vaughan sisters - Gertrude, Maude and Isobel - preside over the mining town of Cwmglas, which has just suffered a disaster in the form of a pit collapse that's left an entire street in ruins. Gertrude and the gang want to take responsibility and offer financial aid - but their London-based brother, the obnoxious Owen (a step-sibling but, as a man, the one who's naturally in charge of the family fortunes), is having none of it. Intending to put his foot down once and for all, he decides to pay his sisters a visit, dragging along secretary Miss Prentiss for backup. But, before you can say 'mysterious stomach upset' and 'no more trains tonight', the city folk are trapped at the sisters' gloomy mansion until morning... 

You can probably see where this is going. It's no spoiler that the sinister spinsters are out to prune Owen from the family tree, diverting control of the finances to themselves. And, yes, they're puritanical, curmudgeonly and clearly the villains of the piece... but are they really? After all, they want the money to support the beleaguered townsfolk, while boorish Owen simply wants to keep it (and all control) to himself. 

Everyone's motives do eventually receive some further shading: Dylan Thomas apparently invests something of himself in Owen, who it turns out has had to work hard to escape the pressures of his old-fashioned, backward-looking clan, and at one point mounts a frankly astonishing condemnation of his home country ("Slag heaps and pit heads and vile black hills... How vile was my valley!"). And through those odd little diversions into local scenery, we see some of the damage wrought on 'the workers' and their lives by their land-owning masters, who've pushed the mines to literal breaking-point.

These are weighty themes and, to be honest, the film frequently drops them with a clang in favour of exploiting its more macabre possibilities, such as the string of murder attempts that make up most of its plot. The unwitting Owen comes under threat from poisoned sherry...

Plummeting clocks...

Mysteriously missing road signs...

And a build-up of lethal coke fumes...

...before eventually coming up with a counter-scheme that neatly removes him from the equation, but not without inadvertently(?) putting his secretary in the deadly trio's line of fire! It's here - in, admittedly, the more traditional woman-in-peril moments - that the film is at its most successful. Nova Pilbeam, as the capable and outspoken Miss Prentiss, genuinely shines, making it clear why Hitchcock chose to work with her on both The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934) and Young and Innocent (1937). 

The Three Weird Sisters makes for a suspenseful and unpredictable experience, and even if, at the end of the ride, it seems content to just coast into the station, you can't say it hasn't been a bit of a wild one. The revered farce Kind Hearts and Coronets would come along a year later, turning murderous succession into an art form, but given the choice I think I'd rather spend a night with the malicious Morgan-Vaughans. 

RATING: 🕸🕸🕸

Defining the Old Dark House Genre

What is an Old Dark House movie? A kind of mystery or horror film? Or just anything set in a big old house? And what's with all the comic relief?

Let's slow down, take a sip of cocoa, and start to answer these questions with a quick think about the concepts of genre and subgenre. If we take horror as a genre, for example, it seems fairly clear what that is - and it's not too difficult to identify subgenres within it like 'zombie horror' and 'possession horror'. Most people, myself included, would probably describe Old Dark House movies as something of a subgenre too, but where it gets cloudier is deciding what they're a subgenre of.

That's because the Old Dark House film is a unique blend of horror, comedy and mystery, intersecting with - rather than slotting into - each of those genres. Its closest neighbours are perhaps the 'country house whodunit' (which focuses on the puzzle aspect of the crime) and the haunted-house film (where the supernatural is the mystery). The Old Dark House movie flits between all of the above like a mischievous moth, attracted to the candles but never settling for fear of getting its wings singed. 

I'm going to go out on a bit of a limb and suggest that horror is the key component here. Old Dark House films first took root in the silent film tradition - and many of the silent era's lasting images are those of terror. Think Nosferatu, Caligari, the violence of Battleship Potemkin and the uncanny robots of Metropolis. While the intricacies necessary for a truly satisfying murder mystery might be hard to convey within a silent movie, put a helpless victim in the foreground and a shadowy figure in the background, and you don't need sound to convey a feeling of fear.

The name 'Old Dark House' stuck to the genre for a reason. In fact, I think it acts as a neat little identifier with which to highlight some of the main themes in question, so let's break it down:

THE 'OLD': The weight of the past hangs heavily over the characters and situations of an Old Dark House movie. It may be in the form of a supposed curse or treasure or, more frequently, an inheritance of 'old money' that comes with conditions... and grudges. Age itself is also often a theme, with our heroes tending to be 'young and innocent', while older authority figures have often been rendered powerless by infirmity or, even worse, become corrupted. 

THE 'DARK': Herein lies the horror element of the Old Dark House genre, represented literally in the gloomy, stormy nights its stories inhabit and more figuratively by its common themes. These include insanity (both the villain's psyche or an affliction to ruin our heroes), the unknown (even supernaturally so) and, of course, the ultimate fear - death. 

THE 'HOUSE': More than merely the setting for an Old Dark House mystery, the house is almost a character. In fact, I'd argue that it's actually an extension of the villain's character: something that exists to endanger the heroes, often being exploited by a killer who makes use of secret passages, locked rooms and torture chambers. The 'house' may also take the form of any forbidding space, whether that be an old lighthouse (Sh! The Octopus), deserted station (The Ghost Train) or even a pirate ship (Whispering Ghosts).

Another key idea I'm floating here on Looming Heirs! is an end-date for what I'm calling the 'classic' Old Dark House movie - that year being 1960. I'm not arguing that relevant films weren't released beyond then (after all, William Castle's remake of The Old Dark House appeared in 1963) but I do think these are of a slightly different ilk, with heightened states of parody and postmodern artificiality (see Murder by Death, Clue and the like). What changed things? Well, Psycho for a start, with its grim tone and envelope-pushing... Once you've been to the Bates Motel, a visit to The Rogues Tavern or House on Haunted Hill just doesn't cut it. 

Two other influential films released in 1960 further rocked the foundations of the Old Dark House: Mario Bava's Black Sunday and Roger Corman's The Fall of the House of Usher - each echoing with themes of death and madness, and both more complex properties than the films of the classic era. 

Remember as we explore the cosier classics at Looming Heirs! that there are always going to be a few that break the mould (and no doubt I'll cover them) but, basically, if I think a film has even the slightest chance of conjuring up that warm and welcoming glow for the Old Dark House film fan, it'll get a much-deserved look-in here.

[Poster image above from Wikimedia Commons.]

Lost Old Dark House Films

With three-quarters of all silent films thought to be lost, according to the Library of Congress, it's inevitable that a number of Old Dark House movies would count among these. Future discoveries may yet be made; indeed, 1932's The Old Dark House was itself believed lost for almost forty years until a print turned up in a studio vault. But, as time ticks on, it looks like all that's left of the following films are photographs, snippets and memories. 

The Ghost Breaker (1914) was possibly the first filming of an Old Dark House story, directed by none other than Cecil B. DeMille, who also had a hand in the script (based on Paul Dickey and Charles W. Goddard's 1909 play, which was first staged in 1913). The story, concerning a spooky castle left to an unsuspecting heir, has been filmed multiple times, with the quintessential version perhaps being 1940's The Ghost Breakers.

The Circular Staircase (1915) adapted the popular 1908 novel by Mary Roberts Rinehart. A full synopsis and contemporary review quotes are given in the book American Silent Horror, Science Fiction and Fantasy Feature Films, 1913-1929 by John T. Soister, Henry Nicolella and Steve Joyce. Print ads from the time read: "There was a shot in the night and two dead bodies lay huddled in the shadows at the foot of 'The Circular Staircase' before threads of fate were finally unravelled." 

Seven Keys to Baldpate (1916) was an Australian silent movie, closer to a filmed version of George M. Cohan's stage play of the same name, recorded against canvas sets at the Theatre Royal, Melbourne. Three of its four reels survive.   

The Ghost Breaker (1922) again used Paul Dickey and Charles W. Goddard's play as its basis. Lots of lobby cards are still in existence and can be seen as part of a thorough overview of the film at the Lost Media Wiki. 

London After Midnight (1927), starring Lon Chaney, is one of the most famous lost films of all time and, as such, there's tons of information available about it on Wikipedia. Director Tod Browning remade it in 1935 as Mark of the Vampire, and TCM created a reconstruction using stills in 2002. 

The Terror (1928) was the first of three English-language adaptations of an Edgar Wallace play, later filmed as The Return of the Terror in 1934 and again as simply The Terror in 1938. (A German version entitled Der Unheimliche Mönch/The Sinister Monk turned up in 1965.) It had the distinction of being the first horror film with a soundtrack - in this case a Vitaphone record, which you can read all about at Vitaphone Varieties.

The House of Horror (1929) came from Danish director Benjamin Christensen, and was another Old Dark House film with a soundtrack in the form of an accompanying Vitaphone record of music and sound effects. Michael R. Pitts' book, Thrills Untapped: Neglected Horror, Science Fiction and Fantasy Films, 1928-1936, provides a full synopsis and quotes from critics, and there's more at Vitaphone Varieties.

The Cat Creeps (1930) was a sound remake of 1927's The Cat and the Canary, from which the only remaining footage is incorporated into a 10-minute short film from Universal Pictures called Boo! (1932). As with Universal's 1931 film of Dracula, a Spanish version called La Voluntad del Muerto (The Will of the Dead Man) was filmed using the same sets but this is also lost. Both are thankfully discussed in some detail over at Movies and Mania.

The Gorilla (1930) was based on Ralph Spence's play and, like the same year's The Cat Creeps, came with a Vitaphone soundtrack record. The Lost Media Wiki again has a lovely write-up, including a 28-second clip that turned up in 2003. 

Castle Sinister (1932) was a British horror film that just preceded the Boris Karloff-starring The Ghoul. Thanks to the research of Mark Fryers at The Spooky Isles, we have a full description. 

Sources: As well as from the articles sited, this information draws on the various films' Wikipedia articles, and uses images from Wikimedia Commons. 

The House of Secrets

Who are the secretive strangers holding secret meetings at Hawks Nest Manor? What secret treasure is secreted within its walls? Welcome to THE HOUSE OF SECRETS, where everything is a BIG, FAT SECRET!

Being kept in the dark is part and parcel of enjoying a good mystery story, but it's usually carried off with just a little more finesse than in this 1936 effort, where characters flat-out refuse to explain anything, while repeatedly explaining that they can't explain anything. Ever. 

No sooner has ferry passenger Barry Wilding (played by a slightly smarmy but still likeable Leslie Fenton) made the acquaintance of a mystery woman (Muriel Evans) than she's coming out with mysterious things like, "I can't explain, but you're an American and I'm an American and that's all we can ever know about each other!" A bit dramatic, perhaps - as is tossing her own handbag into the English Channel in case he grabs it and reads the name on her Boots loyalty card - but it's that kind of movie... 

The kind of movie where Barry finds out, as soon as he arrives in London, that he's inherited the Trevelyan family estate, Hawks Nest, left to him by a 'barmy' uncle and requiring him to sign the deeds - in blood! - beneath a clause that reads, "By ye blood that cometh from my heart, I swear to keep Hawks Nest till death do us part."

And that could be sooner than Barry might like, since, when he gets to the manor (a spiffy fifteen miles from London) he discovers a ragtag bunch of ne'er-do-wells who'd like nothing better than to see the back of him... preferably with several bullets in it. There's shady scientists, Chicago gangsters, the mystery woman from the boat, unsympathetic police officers, and even the Home Secretary himself. What the bliddy heck is going on?

Well, it's a while before you really find out - and, to be honest, you'll probably have cooked up some more interesting theories of your own in the meantime - but it's mostly good fun, with things picking up considerably following the introduction of the secret-treasure subplot (which arrives, like most things, out of thin air). The gangsters have somehow obtained a torn piece of parchment containing clues to the loot's whereabouts and, oh, Barry has the other half. If everyone could manage to stop wandering the estate bumping into each other in the dark for five minutes, they might even be able to piece things together and discover a secret passage!

If as much care and attention had gone into the plot as the set designers put into this secret chamber, we might have been onto something. As it is, The House of Secrets is a bit of a mixture, to put it kindly, of plot elements, tone and British and American influences. The humour is thankfully on the subtle side, with wisecracks in the style of The Cat and the Canary bringing warmth to most of the characters (except poor Muriel Evans, who gets nothing even remotely fun to do). 

The designers do seem to be having fun with the sets and overall look of the film - not only the aforementioned hidden dungeon but some exaggerated window views outside the offices in the London scenes, and some great vintage stock footage of Piccadilly Circus. There's also a lovely camera glide between two rooms of Scotland Yard, sneaking 'impossibly' through a wall in a delightful throwaway moment very much in the movie's style. 

Is it a genuine Old Dark House film? There's perhaps not quite enough time spent in the house itself, despite vivid themes around inheritance, mysterious guests and, of course, secret-passage peril. But the sense of intrigue is strong, if a tad frustrating at times, and it's a fairly brisk and inoffensive affair, which should appeal to Old Dark House fans and wider mystery buffs equally. 

RATING: 🕸🕸

The Screaming Skull

Death by lily pond, a cranium in the geraniums, and soggy footsteps in the night... Someone’s getting Gaslighted (or are they?!) in the 1958 spook-fest, THE SCREAMING SKULL! 

A missing link between the Rebecca-style melodramas of the 1940s and the post-Psycho mind-warpers of the early 60s, this quirky quickie actually beat the similar (but more famous) output of director William Castle to the screen. Within its first few minutes, we’ve been assured our funeral costs will be covered by the film’s producers should we die of fright, heard an ominous extract from Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique decades before it was used in The Shining, and seen an actual screaming skull doing its thing. And, if that doesn’t impress you, well... the good news is there’s only sixty minutes remaining, so you might as well put the kettle on and make yourself a cup of cocoa. It’ll probably still be warm by the time this thing’s over. 

“It hardly seems fair using the living to bring back the dead, does it?” asks Mrs Snow, the reverend’s wife - not a leftover character from Clue, but the slightly nosy neighbour of newlyweds Eric and Jenni Whitlock. Eric is (still) mourning the death of his first wife, it transpires, and may have rushed into remarriage, while Jenni is fresh out of the sanatorium after witnessing the drowning of both parents in a boating accident. Jeez, let’s hope they’ve both finally managed to put the past behind them, find love and settle down for a quiet life in the country. 

NOPE, SORRY! Not today, true happiness. You see, this is the house where the first Mrs Whitlock met her slapstick demise, by slipping on a garden path, smacking her head on a wall, and falling face-first into a nearby pond - where it seems her (screaming) supernatural skull still resides, bobbing to the surface every once in a while for jump scares and vengeance. 

Jenni’s already slightly scanty sanity is soon put to the test as she finds herself beset by further horrible happenings at the old estate, not to mention reminders of dead wife #1 everywhere she turns, from a creepy painting to a monolithic gravestone that stands tastefully in the grounds. Even worse, long-serving gardener Micky is constantly prowling around the place in sinister fashion... and that treacherous pond-side path isn’t looking any drier. 

While it’s unlikely anyone will ever die of Screaming Skull-induced shock, the fact that the film does work is undeniable. Unlike the rest of its drive-in ilk, which were busy cashing in on dwindling crazes or resurrecting faded stars, this one seems to have its finger on the pulse of something. Appearing right at the top of the trend for gimmicky psycho-thrillers, it feels breezy and modern. Just a tad more style or thematic complexity might have nudged it into the realm of classics like 1962’s Carnival of Souls or even Night of the Living Dead. That said, I actually prefer it to Francis Ford Coppola’s Dementia 13. It may lack that film’s moodiness and gore but it’s certainly more entertaining. There are frights among the fripperies, too: in a borderline brilliant moment, the camera assumes the viewpoint of the skull itself, tossed out onto the lawn to look crookedly back at the house... only for this supposedly inanimate POV shot to right itself and crawl eerily back towards the front door. 

At the heart of the film is actress Peggy Webber, pregnant during production and paid just $1000 for bringing the terrified bride to life. In a slightly underwritten role she’s nevertheless genuinely likeable, which is one of the main reasons the whole thing is so watchable. When things really kick off in the final act, her response to a key revelation (a simple but confused “I... don’t... know!”) is really heartrending. If some of the horrors around her have grown goofy with age, they can’t detract from her performance. 

In the hands of William Castle, then, this probably would have become better remembered - but we would have lost something too: a slightly subtler shade of psychodrama with a hint of emotion and a truly giddy sense of the grotesque.

RATING: 🕸🕸🕸

Books, Plays and Silents: The Development of the Old Dark House Genre

We can trace the Old Dark House genre back at least as far as 1764 and the publication of the first Gothic novel, Horace Walpole's The Castle of Otranto, with its cursed family line, mysterious deaths and secret passages. The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794) by Ann Radcliffe brought a credible female protagonist to the fore, while another influential classic of the genre was J. Sheridan Le Fanu's The Wyvern Mystery (1869). But the movies we love find their closest ancestor in The Circular Staircase, a 1908 novel that crystallized almost everything that would characterize the genre over the next half-century... 

1908

Mary Roberts Rinehart's The Circular Staircase is published (following its magazine serialization), kicking off a trend for modern mystery stories set around old and creepy houses. The opening line of the novel is: "This is the story of how a middle-aged spinster lost her mind, deserted her domestic gods in the city, took a furnished house for the summer out of town, and found herself involved in one of those mysterious crimes that keep our newspapers and detective agencies happy and prosperous..."

1913

Paul Dickey and Charles W. Goddard's 1909 play The Ghost Breaker runs for 72 performances between March and May at New York's Lyceum Theatre. The story, about a woman who inherits a supposedly haunted Spanish castle, goes on to be filmed in 1914 by Cecil B. DeMille (now lost), 1922 (again, lost), 1940 (as The Ghost Breakers plural!) and 1953 (as Scared Stiff). 

The book Seven Keys to Baldpate by Earl Derr Biggers is published, swiftly followed by a Broadway stage adaptation by George M. Cohan, which runs for 320 performances from 22 September at the Astor Theatre. Film versions follow in 1916, 1917, 1925, 1929, 1935, 1946, 1947 and 1983 (as The House of the Long Shadows). All share the same plot, in which a novelist bets he can write a book in 24 hours while holed up at a deserted resort, only to be drawn into mystery by a succession of visitors.

1914

The first Old Dark House film - Cecil B. DeMille's The Ghost Breaker, based on Paul Dickey and Charles W. Goddard's play - is released (but sadly it's now lost). The story is filmed again in 1922, 1940 and, as Scared Stiff, in 1953. 

1915

A film adaptation of The Circular Staircase, directed by Edward LeSaint and starring Guy Oliver, Eugenie Besserer and Stella Razeto, is released. (Now considered lost.)

1916

Australian film adaptation of Seven Keys to Baldpate released, directed by Monte Luke. (Now lost.)  

1917

Director Hugh Ford's film adaptation of Seven Keys to Baldpate is released, starring the playwright himself, George M. Cohan, in the lead role.

1920

The classic German Expressionist film The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari is released on 26 February. Although not an Old Dark House movie itself, its style and structure will have a profound influence on many horror films made over the following years, including those of Universal Pictures such as The Cat and the Canary (1927) and The Old Dark House (1932).    

Mary Roberts Rinehart and Avery Hopwood's The Bat opens at the Morosco Theatre on 23 August. A smash hit (based partly on Rinehart's own The Circular Staircase) it becomes, at the time, the second-longest running play on Broadway, running for 867 performances and spawning local spin-off productions and many imitators. Film adaptations follow in 1926, 1930 (as The Bat Whispers) and 1959.

1922

An original Old Dark House stage play starts a highly successful run: John Willard's The Cat and the Canary tells the story of a group of heirs coming together for the reading of a will in a spooky old mansion. The production opens at New York's National Theatre on 7 February, clocking up 349 performances, plus 40 more the year after. Official film adaptations are produced in 1927, 1930 (The Cat Creeps), 1939 and 1979.  

On 9 August, Crane Wilbur's play The Monster opens at the 39th Street Theatre, New York, and runs until November. The story may be the first to introduce a 'mad scientist' character to the formula. One print ad reads: "Two travelers - a man and his girl bride - have a tire puncture near a big country mansion, on a dark, dreary night. They seek shelter in the nearby mansion - a weird abode. There they meet 'THE MONSTER' and have a series of hair-raising adventures." A film adaptation follows in 1925, while Wilbur himself would go on to direct the 1959 film of The Bat.

10 September sees the cinema release of a new version of The Ghost Breaker (previously filmed in 1914), this time as a vehicle for popular star Wallace Reid. The film is now considered lost.

Inspired by the The Bat and The Cat and the Canary, filmmaker D.W. Griffith creates the silent film One Exciting Night, exploring similar themes and borrowing one of the latter play's stars, Henry Hull. The film premieres on 2 October. 

The Last Warning by Thomas F. Fallon (based on the book The House of Fear by Wadsworth Camp) runs at Broadway's Klaw Theatre from 24 October 1922 to May 1923, achieving 238 performances. In this Old Dark House story, the 'house' is a theatre house, with the cast of a play reunited inside five years after an unsolved murder that took place onstage. 

1925

Roland West's film adaptation of the 1922 play The Monster is released on 16 March, starring Lon Chaney. (West later directs The Bat in 1926 and The Bat Whispers in 1930.)

The first genre spoof opens at Broadway's Selwyn Theatre on 28 April. The Gorilla: A Mystery Comedy, by Ralph Spence, achieves 257 performances and inspires a successful production in London's West End the same year. The poster promises it "outbats The Bat, outcats The Cat and Canary [and] outwarns The Last Warning".

A now-lost film adaptation of Seven Keys to Baldpate (directed by Fred C. Newmeyer) is released on 19 October. 

1926

Famous British mystery author Edgar Wallace publishes The Black Abbot, about sinister happenings and lost treasure at an old abbey, which he turns into the play The Terror the following year. 

A novelization of The Bat also appears, under the names of Mary Roberts Rinehart and Avery Hopwood. (The actual ghostwriter was Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Stephen Vincent Benét.)  

1927

Edgar Wallace's aforementioned play The Terror, an Old Dark House production of British origin, opens at New Brighton's Winter Gardens on 21 February, before transferring to the West End for a run of 246 performances at the Lyceum Theatre. It's also filmed the following year.

The first film adaptation of The Cat and the Canary is released on 9 September. Director Paul Leni was one of the top German Expressionist filmmakers, making his Hollywood debut.  

J.B. Priestley's novel Benighted, the basis for the 1932 film The Old Dark House, is published in October.

13 November sees the release of a film adaptation of The Gorilla: A Mystery Comedy (with the title shortened to The Gorilla) directed by Alfred Santell. Walter Pidgeon, in one of his early roles, plays 'Stevens'. 

1928

Sh, the Octopus, written by Ralph Murphy and Donald Gallaher, runs for 47 performances at the Royale Theatre, Broadway, from 21 February. Little seems to have been written about its plot (at least online) but Bruce G. Hallenbeck's book Comedy-Horror Films: A Chronological History, 1914-2008 quotes a few theatre reviews that suggest it was set in a lighthouse and mixed elements of humour and horror. The 1937 film Sh! The Octopus uses the lighthouse setting but its story draws more on The Gorilla. 

On 6 September, the first Old Dark House movie with a soundtrack is released: Edgar Wallace's The Terror (about a killer who infiltrates a manor called Monkhall) is now lost but its accompanying Vitaphone record survives, and is described at Vitaphone Varieties. 

1929

Another Old Dark House movie with a soundtrack is released on 18 April: Benjamin Christensen's The House of Horror comes with a Vitaphone record featuring voices, sounds and music. Unfortunately, the film and its soundtrack are now lost. Read more about the plot, in which a brother and sister investigate a creepy mansion full of antiques, at Vitaphone Varieties. 

Armitage Trail (author of Scarface) publishes the novel The Thirteenth Guest, about the reading of a will in which the family fortune is left to a mysterious guest who never arrives. The book is filmed with Ginger Rogers in 1932, and again in 1943 as The Mystery of the 13th Guest. 

Another film adaptation of Seven Keys to Baldpate - the first fully 'talking' Old Dark House picture, in fact - is released on Christmas Day. Richard Dix takes the lead role, with Reginald Barker directing. 

Sources: Information for this list was gathered from Wikipedia and the Internet Broadway Database. Images are from Wikimedia Commons, except for the book cover of The Bat, which is from Amazon.

Reviews A-Z

Bulldog Drummond's Secret Police (1939) 🕸🕸

Cat and the Canary, The (1939) 🕸🕸🕸🕸🕸

Gorilla, The (1939) 🕸🕸🕸

House of Secrets, The (1936) 🕸🕸

Living Ghost, The (1942) 🕸🕸

Monster Walks, The (1932) 🕸🕸🕸
Murder by Invitation (1941) 🕸

Rogues Tavern, The (1936) 🕸🕸🕸

Screaming Skull, The (1958) 🕸🕸🕸
Shadows on the Stairs (1941) 🕸 
Son of Ingagi (1940) 🕸🕸🕸

Thirteenth Guest, The (1932) 🕸🕸🕸
Three Weird Sisters, The (1948) 🕸🕸🕸
Topper Returns (1941) 🕸🕸🕸🕸

Chronology of Old Dark House Movies

Stage Frights: Pre-1930

Most of the earliest Old Dark House movies were silent adaptations of popular Broadway comedy-thriller plays like Seven Keys to Baldpate, The Bat and The Cat and the Canary. (You can read more about these plays in Books, Plays and Silents: The Development of the Old Dark House Genre.) 

Ghost Breaker, The (1914, lost film)

Circular Staircase, The (1915, lost film)

Seven Keys to Baldpate, The (1916, lost film)

Seven Keys to Baldpate, The (1917)

Ghost Breaker, The (1922, lost film)

One Exciting Night (1922)
Monster, The (1925)
Bat, The (1926) 

Midnight Faces (1926)
Cat and the Canary, The (1927) 

London After Midnight (1927, lost film)
Terror, The (1928, lost film)

House of Horror, The (1929, lost film)

Last Warning, The (1929)
Seven Keys to Baldpate (1929)

Chuckles and Chills: 1930-1938

As the ‘talkies’ took off, Old Dark House movies grew in complexity and wit, producing shrewd and spooky spoofs, as opposed to the more serious horror popularised by 1931’s Dracula (itself a stage adaptation). But, by the time James Whale’s unusually sophisticated The Old Dark House was released in 1932, it was hard to tell where the fear ended and the fun began, and the genre’s unique blend of humour, mystery and atmosphere flourished. 

Bat Whispers, The (1930)
Cat Creeps, The (1930, lost film)

Gorilla, The (1930, lost film)

Laurel-Hardy Murder Case, The (1930)

La Voluntad del Muerto (1930, lost film)

Murder by the Clock (1931)
Phantom, The (1931)

Castle Sinister (1932, lost film)

Crooked Circle, The (1932)
Haunted Gold (1932)
Monster Walks, The (1932)
Old Dark House, The (1932)
Phantom of Crestwood, The (1932)
Tangled Destinies (1932)
Thirteenth Guest, The (1932)
 
Ghoul, The (1933)

Night of Terror (1933) 

Secret of the Blue Room, The (1933) 

Shriek in the Night, A (1933) 
Terror Aboard (1933)

Tomorrow at Seven (1933)
 
Black Cat, The (1934)

Double Door (1934)
Ghost Walks, The (1934)
Green Eyes (1934)
House of Mystery (1934)
Moonstone, The (1934)

Ninth Guest, The (1934)

Mark of the Vampire (1935) 

One Frightened Night (1935)
Raven, The (1935)
Seven Keys to Baldpate (1935)
While the Patient Slept (1935)
White Cockatoo, The (1935)

Charlie Chan’s Secret (1936)
House of Secrets, The (1936) 
Phantom of the Range, The (1936) 

Rogues Tavern, The (1936)
Someone at the Door (1936)

Sh! The Octopus (1937)

Mystery House (1938)
Terror, The (1938)

A New (Bob) Hope: 1939-1944

The genre was starting to burn out by the end of the decade, but a lavish 1939 remake of The Cat and the Canary, featuring a talented cast and fine production, ushered in a second golden age, which saw it reach new heights of popularity and style. 

Bulldog Drummond’s Secret Police (1939)

Cat and the Canary, The (1939)
Gorilla, The (1939)
Man They Could Not Hang, The (1939) 

Door with Seven Locks, The (1940)
Ghost Breakers, The (1940)
Ghost Train, The (1940)
Rebecca (1940)

Son of Ingagi (1940)

You’ll Find Out (1940)

Black Cat, The (1941)

Hold That Ghost (1941)
Horror Island (1941)
Invisible Ghost, The (1941)

Iron Claw, The (1941)
King of the Zombies (1941)
Murder by Invitation (1941)
Shadows on the Stairs (1941)
Smiling Ghost, The (1941)
Spooks Run Wild (1941)
Topper Returns (1941)
Whistling in the Dark (1941)
 
Boogie Man Will Get You, The (1942)
Corpse Vanishes, The (1942)
Hidden Hand, The (1942)
Living Ghost, The (1942)

Night Has Eyes, The (1942) 

Night Monster (1942)
Whispering Ghosts (1942)
Undying Monster, The (1942)
 
Black Raven, The (1943)
Ghost and the Guest, The (1943)
Ghosts on the Loose (1943)

Mystery of the 13th Guest, The (1943)
Revenge of the Zombies (1943)
Sherlock Holmes Faces Death (1943)

Black Magic (1944)
Charlie Chan and the Secret Service (1944) 
Girl Who Dared, The (1944)
One Body Too Many (1944)

Darker Houses: 1945-1960

Following WWII and the rise of film noir, thriller films began to deal more deeply in serious subjects like espionage, relationships and psychology. The Old Dark House genre morphed into a gothic exploration of the latter, before gradually giving way to experimentation and cartoonish parodies. The release of Hitchcock’s game-changing Psycho in 1960 effectively brought the cycle to an end, and horror cinema itself to a new level of maturity and explicitness. 

And Then There Were None (1945)
Fog Island (1945)
Frozen Ghost, The (1945)

House of Fear, The (1945)
If a Body Meets a Body (1945, short)

Jade Mask, The (1945)
Pillow of Death (1945)

Cat Creeps, The (1946)

Dangerous Millions (1946)

Spiral Staircase, The (1946)

Cry Wolf (1947)
Dragonwyck (1947)
Moss Rose (1947)

Scared to Death (1947)
Seven Keys to Baldpate (1947)

Strangler of the Swamp (1947)

Castle Sinister (1948)

Creeper, The (1948)

Three Weird Sisters, The (1948) 
Who Killed Doc Robbin? (1948)

Abbott and Costello Meet the Killer, Boris Karloff (1949) 

Who Done It? (1949, short)

Ghost Chasers (1951) 
Mystery Junction (1951)
Third Visitor, The (1951)

Crow Hollow (1952) 

Maze, The (1953)

Scared Stiff (1953)

It! The Terror from Beyond Space (1958)
Screaming Skull, The (1958)
Terror in the Haunted House (1958)

Bat, The (1959)

Headless Ghost, The (1959)
House on Haunted Hill (1959) 

Black Sunday (1960)

City of the Dead, The (1960)

Fall of the House of Usher, The (1960)
Psycho (1960)