shot by Don Kincl
When was peak car culture? I nominate the early-mid ’60s, with Ed “Big Daddy” Roth and George Barris being the ringmasters, at least of one of the most popular elements. One perfect representation of that is Dragula, a little something Grandpa in the tv show “The Munsters” cooked up in the garage.
Yes, kids back then ate this stuff up. The true hot rod era was now well gone and dead, and it all became comic book drawings come to life. Here’s a video of the Dragula in action:
Turns out the Dragula was only used in one episode, but apparently it appeared in the credits of every Season 2 episode. It was a product of George Barris’ shop, but the car was constructed by Richard “Korky” Korkes and others who worked under Korky’s direction there.
Here’s a vintage shot which includes the legendary Munster Koach in the back. Wonderful stuff. And for what it’s worth, I was not a fan of the Munsters. Addams Family was a bit more my speed.
That final promo shot seems off. It almost looks like the characters are Photoshopped in, or whatever was done in the 60s. And why didn’t anyone sweep up the detritus before the shot was taken?
Evan, I think you’re right. In the 60s, it was cut and paste—Xacto knives being the tool of choice. The giveaway to me is the shadow of the pipes on the driveway. Given Herman (Fred Gwynne)’s height, we should see his shadow too.
Grandpa (Al Lewis) Munster may have been the only one in the shot. His hand is on the bubble top and that would have been tricky to get just right.
Odd. I see no evidence that this is anything but a posed professional studio photo shoot. Click on the image and take a closer look; it’s very much the real thing.
The giveaway to me is the shadow of the pipes on the driveway.
What shadow of the pipes on the driveway? You don’t mean that drain grate, do you?
The sun was high and to the front, hence the shadows under the car. The shot is clearly also lit from the front, which is why everyone is in the light and they’re all squinting. Obviously a professional shoot with reflectors to make sure everyone is well lit.
I don’t know, it looks like a color picture of grandpa and the daughter, and B&W of the other 3.
This might be the peak of this variety of car culture, but I’m not that into it. The literally undrivable cartoonish hot rod isn’t where it’s at to me.
OMG. That’s how they were made up! They’re monsters; ghouls. No blood, no color. But can’t you see mom’s red lips? And a bit of pink in the boy’s mouth?
Jeez, If you guys can’t see, I can’t help you. That’s only a problem an ophthalmologist can fix. But don’t try to blame it on a doctored picture. Which this very much is not.
I agree this is an authentic picture
I see evidence that I should never try to judge these things on my cellphone. That was dumb.
Those lines on the driveway are from a drain grate. The cars are pointed to the sun. Look at the shadows of the front wheels, they are behind and more or less parallel with the vehicle. The exhaust pipe shadow is also parallel to the vehicle and goes out of sight just inside the rear wheel.
I don’t think that is the Marilyn we are all used to. Pat Priest starred in episodes 14-70 while Beverly Owen was the first Marilyn, I think this is a promo shot for the Munsters Go Home movie, which featured Dragula. Marilyn in the movie was played by Debbie Watson. Pat Priest was hurt by the producers decision not to include her.
That is definitely Pat Priest in the photos.
I’ve seen this, or at least a replica of it, at the Volo auto museum a few times I’ve went. What I find impressive is the thing is a legitimately built up drag car with true speed parts where you can’t even see them. I think that’s the most fascinating part about 60s car culture Hollywood, even low definition black and white TV they’d use the budget to be authentic. Walk up to a TV or movie car from the 80s to present and it’s all fake appendages around a tired small block, with paint that looks to have been applied with rollers up close.
Ironically I watched the Munsters semi regularly when we got cable and Nick at night or TV land showed episodes, yet I still have never seen the Dragula episode. I first heard of it from the Rob Zombie song, which oddly only used the coach in the music video.
Plus 1 on the Addams Family. I never saw the TV show until I was an adult but it’s actually still funny as one. The Munsters has some funny gags but it feels more like a kids cartoon show by comparison, and much more of a period piece.
I will second the nomination that peak car culture was early 60’s. Think of all the great car songs of that era. TV shows like this, Rt. 66, 77 Sunset Strip with the T-Bird’s and Cookie’s hot rod (recently restored BTW). My 3 Sons had a tiger painted GTO in one episode. The MonkeeMobile, done by Dean Jeffries and not Barris. Scale model cars were selling like hot cakes. I always thought that the Drag-U-La (a popular model kit too) was in a Munsters movie.
“Munster, Go Home!” was the movie.
As a kid I never caught the episode with Dragula, although you could catch a glimpse of its front end during the closing credits. Having missed the episode, it always drove me nuts wondering what was pulling up behind the Munsters Koach. No Google in the mid ’60s!
I have to agree that the 1960s was peak car culture. TV shows were teeming with special cars for their stars, from the Munster’s coach, the Monkee-mobile, to Mannix having a custom Toronado convertible. For one thing, the custom shops were at their peak, with Barris, Roth, and others cranking out fantastic (and some craptastic) cars, and even for shows that did not feature custom versions for their main characters, many shows were specifically sponsored by the automakers. The Cleavers drove a Ford in the first season, but had a new Plymouth in every other season. Bewitched was Chevrolet, with new product in the driveway every year. And the Beverly Hillbillies was the best. Ms. Jane Hathaway always had a new red convertible Dodge (or Plymouth) and Mr. Drysdale had an Imperial, as the show was a Mopar show. The Andy Griffith show featured Fords. While this carried over, to some degree, into the shows of the 1970s, by that point, it was fewer and fewer tie-ins. A good example was Cannon, with the large William Conrad in his new Continental. Otherwise, the “car as character” was often an older model, not a new car, like the Torino in Starsky and Hutch or the Peugeot convertible used by Columbo.
Starsky and hutch started when the Torino was a current model, that was product placement until the decision was made not to change it to a LTD II for the 1977 season, though Ford apparently missed the memo
Well, perhaps, but the car was a 1974 Torino, and the series premiered in 1975, so it was a year old car when the show came out. I don’t think that a full tie-in with Ford would have facilitated that to happen. I don’t doubt Ford used the show’s success to try to tie in the LTD II, but it was a reverse of the way Hollywood usually worked the deal. Rockford Files had a gold Firebird, but it got updated to the current model year as the series progressed. Hawaii Five-O was interesting in that the Marquis was updated twice, but the cars served several years each, not replaced yearly with a current year model. Product placement was very specific in the 1970s compared to how it was in the 1960s.
Part of it is just costs, as having the OEM provide vehicles at a reduced rate or free in lieu of promotional exposure made it financially viable for both the show and the OEM. Cop shows, with their inherent need for more vehicles, often went with cheap used cars that were destroyed in chases, while the other shows were a better way of showing product being used by families, or successful singles, or executives, or whatever the prime market for the car was.
The original car was supposed to be a Camaro, but was nixed specifically because of the Ford tie in.
Originally, Starsky was to drive a Chevrolet Camaro convertible, however, when production started on the pilot episode, Ford Motor Company’s Studio-TV Car Loan Program was the lease supplier for Spelling-Goldberg (the show’s production company). They looked at lease stock and chose two 1975 V8 2-door Gran Torinos.
https://drivetribe.com/p/starsky-hutch-ford-gran-torino-a5om90AfTzOIkwdZs91m0g?iid=Mwgh6TaVT-CN4x2xh3Znsw
A 1974 Gran Torino is nearly indistinguishable from a 75 or 76, especially when all are cosmetically modified. They had to perform stunts and it was very common for substitutes to be used, which was often done on the Rockford files(the pilot used a 70-73 to blow up), and like starsky and hutch did not change to a new model Firebird for 1979 either
I’ve noticed a trend in TV show cars. If it’s an expensive or exotic car, and it’s a generation or two old rather than a current model, it’s likely to be blown up or crashed during the episode. Current model cars are (usually) safe.
Even Star Trek got into it with the Jupiter 8 from the Breads and Circuses episode where the Roman Empire never ended.
I can’t believe I was looking into “The Munsters” and Fred Gwynne’s bio this weekend, and read about the cars. I distinctly remember the show and it was pretty cringey. It was one of those silly 60s TV shows like “Gilligan’s Island”, “My Mother the Car”, “Flying Nun”, “My Favorite Martian” and “Batman”, where it seems that networks catered to young families with light comedy shows about families. I guess it was hip to be silly during these years. My older brother had a model car fetish and my bedroom had shelves filled with models of the “Green Hornet”, Batmobile, Muster’s Koach, Drag-U-La, Monkeymobile, and other Rat Rod cartoon cars.
As to Fred Qwynne, frankly few actors were so opposite of their television character as he was to Herman Munster. Erudite, cultured, an author of many books, highly intelligent and an actor dedicated to the point where he threw himself without barriers into becoming a ridiculous Frankenstein cartoon. His performances as Muster held nothing back and hear the end of his life, he admitted that he had come to value his work during that show. The only other actor I can think of that comes close to Gwynne in the Musters is John Lithgow in “Third Rock from the Sun”. As a kid, I didn’t appreciate what Gwynne brought to the show with his performance, but as an adult, I’m amazed at his commitment to the character.
What ended the Munsters was Batman. After two big years, everyone in school switched to Batman, sending the Munsters into ratings oblivion and ending the show. Batman ruled for two years until its rating suddenly collapsed. Kid’s shows – they have the shelf live of a moth, don’t they?
I thought Batman and The Addams Family were something beyond typical harmless happy family situation comedies – rather parodies, with humour on more than one level. Very much in keeping with the changing times.
I too preferred the Addams Family, at least partially because even before I saw the show, I had seen Charles Addams’ cartoons – you know, the kind drawn on paper and printed in The New Yorker or in coffee table books. But of course I knew the Munster cars, along with almost everything else George Barris and his contemporaries designed and built for TV shows, Hot Rod Magazine, or the “custom” versions of AMT 3-in-1 model kits. In some ways, though the custom stuff was pretty far removed from production cars, or even usable drivability, they were the pre-cursor to the more recent Fast and Furious and drift phenomena. Cars are not dead for young people – yet.
I believe the one at Volo museum was probably a replica. Volo is good at doing replicas. Supposedly, there were two built originally. One for the show and a second promo one, slightly smaller. The second promo one resides in Midwest Dream Car Collection, in Manhattan KS. https://www.midwestdreamcarcollection.org/
I can still remember watching this episode when it was first run….
+1 on Fred Gwynne – a superb actor who showed real comic flair with his Herman Munster characterization and as Officer Muldoon on Car 54…
I must give credit to Fred Gwynn for his performance in “Pet Cemetery”. New England accents vary a lot for such a relatively small area and most actors who aren’t from here butcher it trying. Fred did a very admirable job.
Here’s a modern day version.
https://bangshift.com/bangshift1320/bangshift1320-spotlight/halloween-fun-the-taylors-dragula-inspired-coffin-car-fires-up-and-does-halloween-burnouts/
They say that if you can remember the sixties…..something or other.
Addams Family all the way. More sophisticated. Though I enjoyed the Munster’s cars.
And Fred Gwynne is great in “My Cousin Vinny”
I can admire both shows, but I agree that the Addams Family was a bit more sophisticated, based on the existing history of the comics they based it on. But both relied on the family not realizing that they were so different from the rest of the world, oblivious to reality, but otherwise “normal”. To me, the reason was simple. The Addams Family was rich, so they lived a life spared from dealing with the common folk. The Munsters were plopped into suburbia, at 1313 Mockingbird Lane, with Herman working at the funeral home, while the Addams family had apparently done well via investments (stocks were implied) and really rarely dealt with outsiders unless they came to the house. As such, a lot of the Addams Family issues were internal and specific to the characters, while the Munsters often dealt with dealing with the outside world.