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Podcast

180 – Small Town Monsters: Hunting Cryptids With Lyle Blackburn

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Texas cryptozoologist and paranormal researcher Lyle Blackburn has been hunting mysterious animals since he saw The Legend of Boggy Creek as a kid. A 1972 movie about a strange Bigfoot-like creature who was seen in the small town of Fouke, Arkansas starting in the 1950s, it became a traveling film sensation that made the stories renowned across the United States and had a significant impact on a young Lyle Blackburn.

LYLE BLACKBURN
Lyle Blackburn in Fouke, Arkansas at the site of the Boggy Creek sightings

And Lyle has used his inspiration to not only write two books about the Boggy Creek Monster, but also a lesser-known case (which totally needs its own movie!) about a Lizard Man who was sighted in Bishopville, South Carolina.

As a filmmaker, he’s produced and narrated two  films with the Small Town Monsters team, one on Boggy Creek and one on the Mothman of Point Pleasant, West Virginia, and they’re currently working on one set in Wisconsin (oh yeah!)

In his “Monstro Bizzaro” monthly column in Rue Morge magazine, he often delves into the lesser known cryptid stories and legends from all over America as well.

In this interview, we go in-depth with Lyle Blackburn about his favorite monster stories, his investigation style, and the difference between cryptids in different parts of the country. It’s a fun fast-moving discussion that will help you find some investigation inspiration!

Links for Lyle:

For this week’s song, we were inspired by Lyle’s quest for the lesser-known monster stories and cryptid tales of America’s wonderful smaller cities and towns, because even in the “Middle of Nowhere” the weird will find you!

It looks like apple pie and county fairs
baseball games and Sunday prayers
but something strikes uncanny all the same

Watch for the devil hiding concealed
hide from the children in the cornfield,
because you know that nothing is the way it seems.

We don’t need to lock our doors
Cuz evil don’t need to knock
And on every main street square
Lurks a Force under the block
Somewhere in America
The dead will start to walk
In the middle of nowhere
You can’t escape the dark

Watch for the devil hiding concealed
hide from the children in the cornfield,
because you know that nothing is the way it seems

We don’t need to lock our doors
Cuz evil don’t need to knock
And on every main street square
Lurks a Force under the block
Somewhere in America
The dead will start to walk
In the middle of nowhere
You can’t escape the dark

Blog

Billy Zane’s Film From A Real Haunted Studio

I don’t know if you guys love Billy Zane like I do, but if you don’t, I think you should. Yeah, he was kind of an absurd villain in Titanic, but I’m not going to blame him for that . I think James Cameron was more worried about the special effects than he was directing performances on that movie. I mean, he even kinda screwed up David Warner as a bad guy in that movie. Yeah, the man who portrayed Evil from Time Bandits, Sark from Tron, Jack The Ripper in Time After Time… he was born to play bad guys and he was weak in Titanic, so I’m not gonna blame my man Billy Zane.

He gets a free pass for the first Tales From The Crypt movie, Demon Knight. Hell yeah. The Phantom was fun too, but he is so awesome in that first Crypt movie that you kind of root for the bad guy.

Anyway, he’s been criminally underused over the past few years (even though I heard he plays himself in Zoolander 2) so I just wanted to give the man a little tribute on his birthday and draw attention to Ghost of Goodnight Lane – a paranormal thriller about a haunted movie studio that was actually filmed at the haunted movie studio.

They filmed the movie at Media World Studios in Dallas and the owner had experienced some strange things there and even invited a paranormal team in there to investigate. Once they studied the history and learned that the site used to be a ranch where five people mysteriously died, that’s when they decided to make a movie there.

This story on the local Dallas CBS affiliate even talks about the crew experiencing some weirdness there:

Some of the crew have witnessed lights going off and on, ceiling fixtures dropping and even voices calling their names.

His last paranormal movie was The Ganzfeld Haunting in 2014 about college students studying ESP, but his role isn’t too big in it, in fact the most interesting thing that I could find about the movie was the fact that Frog Brother Corey Feldman went to the premiere dressed up in a weird disguise.

Remember when I was on the cover of Tiger Beat and didn’t have to act crazy?

Zane is also fantastic in the Ed Wood-penned I Woke Up Early The Day I Died, which you can watch in its entirety for free on the Internet. There’s no dialogue and it’s got everyone from Christina Ricci to the giant from Twin Peaks, it’s the kind of film you have to see to believe that someone green lighted it.

Anyway, happy birthday to a great and undersung actor who has been in some of my favorite genre work, here’s to hoping for a lot more horror from Billy Zane!