David F Friedman - Trash Film King

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Just about every true horror fan knows the film: Blood Feast. And most know its director: Herschell Gordon Lewis. But couple of of them are familiar with producer David F. Friedman, Lewis' partner on Blood Feast and its two follow-ups, Two Thousand Maniacs! and Color Me Blood Red. Though Lewis helmed these seminal movies, Friedman's input was equally responsible for their achievement. Given the colorful life he has led and his experiences in the globe of motion pictures, Friedman's story would be suitable at dwelling up on the silver screen.

David F. Friedman was born in Birmingham, Alabama, on December 24, 1923. His parents divorced when he was eight years old, and he lived with his father, who was an editor of the Birmingham News but also a partner in carnival in North Alabama. Friedman's mother was a expert musician and his uncle operated movie houses, exactly where he spent very much of his boyhood soaking up films. But a significant component of Friedman's youth was spent traveling the carnival circuit throughout the South. He was on the inside, a member of the show. It was here that he was initial bitten by the showbiz bug, giving him a taste for spectacle that would serve him nicely in the future.

Just after graduating high school, Friedman went to Cornell University and graduated with a degree in electrical engineering. Before becoming drafted, Friedman worked as a projectionist and film booker for Paramount Pictures. Soon after entering the service in World War II, he was assigned communication duties and served with a filmmaking unit of the US Army Signal Corps. It was for the duration of this period that Friedman learned rudimentary filmmaking. Right after leaving the service, he identified himself working as a croupier in infamous Phenix City, Alabama, nicely identified in the 1940s and '50s as a haven for organized crime and corruption. In 1946, he sold some army surplus searchlights to exploitation film and roadshow pioneer Kroger Babb, which in hindsight was a most fortuitous meeting.

Friedman went to work with Babb, traveling the country showing exploitation films and learning the basics of film distribution and exhibition. He was amazed at the capital that could be produced this way. This period also tied in to his enjoy of the carnival circuit-making a score, pulling a quickly one on the mark and leaving with a pocket full of cash. This was fundamentally how roadshows worked, and Friedman was hooked.

After his partnership with Babb ended, Friedman met the man that would be his most famous associate: Herschell Gordon Lewis. Lewis, a former English professor and advertising executive, was an odd partner for Friedman, the former carny. But together, they formed Mid-Continent Films in Chicago and had been soon to make film history.

The 1st films they made were "nudie-cuties," an exceptionally favorite exploitation genre frequently filmed in nudist camps. Movies such as The Adventures of Lucky Pierre and Goldilocks and the Three Bares had been extremely profitable for Lewis and Friedman but, as with any trend, the public eventually began to appear elsewhere for a new thrill. And so did Friedman and Lewis. Trying to hit upon some thing that had never ever before been accomplished, they stumbled upon a novel concept: gore.

Produced for $24,500 in 1963, their first gore film, Blood Feast, went on to gross an estimated $7 million and played somewhere almost nonstop over the next 15 years. Blood Feast was the goriest horror movie filmed at that point in time and the first to show brains and intestines becoming spilled and limbs getting chopped off. It was also the initially film in which people died with their eyes open. Its popularity was no doubt boosted by the lurid advertising campaign designed by Friedman. The movie poster, featuring a man holding a cleaver over the bloody body of a young woman, screamed: "Absolutely nothing So Appalling in the Annals of Horror! You will Recoil and Shudder as You Witness the Slaughter and Mutilation of Nubile Young Girls-in a Weird and Horrendous Ancient Rite! Much more Grisly Than Ever in Blood Color!" At all times the showman, in an attempt to get publicity Friedman even went so far as to request an injunction against Blood Feast to avoid it from being shown. To his surprise, the judge granted the injunction, so he then had to fight to allow his movie to be shown. Of course, the film was roundly panned by the critics, but that did absolutely nothing to hurt it. It was an specifically large hit at drive-ins all through the country.

Lewis and Friedman went back to the nicely and produced two additional gore films, Two Thousand Maniacs! and Color Me Blood Red, before ending their partnership over small business differences in 1964. Friedman headed west to Los Angeles and began a partnership with veteran exploitation producer Dan Sonney. Friedman's initially film just after breaking with Lewis, The Defilers, which he each wrote and produced, was known in the trade as a "roughie," an exploitation film dealing with sex and violence, and violent sex. The team of Sonney and Friedman eventually produced dozens of soft-core sexploitation films. It wasn't long just before they decided to expand their horizons and become theater owners.

They purchased a theater in downtown Los Angeles and named it the Pussycat. This became the flagship of the notorious Pussycat Theater chain. The Adults Only market place had grown considerably in the late '60s and early '70s, and Friedman and Sonney were on the ground floor. Friedman went on to grow to be the first president of the Adult Film Association of America and was a crusader for Very first Amendment rights.

Ironically, it was hardcore pornography that led to Friedman's disenchantment with the movie industry. His motto had at all times been "sell the sizzle, not the steak." By showing every little thing in graphic detail, he felt porn violated all the principles of wonderful showmanship. Friedman produced a few hardcore films, but his heart wasn't in it and he left the company in the mid-1980s.

In a nice touch of symmetry, Friedman and Lewis were reunited in 2002 to make a sequel to Blood Feast that was financed by Jacky Lee Morgan, a long-time fan. The resulting film, Blood Feast two: All U Can Eat, was bloodier than the original and featured a cameo by John Waters, one of Lewis and Friedman's filmmaking heirs.

Friedman now lives in Alabama and makes the rounds at horror conventions, telling tales and signing autographs. Usually the carny, he still owns and operates carnivals that tour the South. As Friedman says, "There is no such factor as retirement." Especially when you are a living legend.