Greg Lamberson, I spoke with him a few times before
meeting him face to face at Twisted Nightmare Weekend
2005. He was a friendly guy, seems to enjoy a lot of
the things that I do, thus this interview with him.
Welcome Greg...

First question I want to ask you is this

CWD: What did you want to be when you grew up?

GL: You mean beyond the policeman-FBI agent-astronaut stage? I wanted to
be a stop-motion animator. KING KONG was my favorite film, and Willis
O'Brien and Ray Harryhausen were my heroes. Then I read the 7% Solution by
Nicholas Meyer, and saw the movie version, and started to analyze how story
telling in film works. And then STAR WARS blew me away, and I knew I wanted to
be a director.

CWD: What is your take on the horror movies of your
youth compared to the horror movies of today?

GL: When I was in junior high and high school, I saw DAWN OF THE DEAD,
PHANTASM, SCANNERS, THE FOG and ALIEN in the theatre. Nothing--and I mean
nothing--in recent memory comes close to the freshness and energy of those films.
There was a real outlaw mentality at work back then.

CWD: From reading your bio on www.slimeguy.com, you read
Sci Fi/ Horror literature, which books do you feel
shaped your world?

GL: I Am Legend, Salem's Lot, Interview with the Vampire, and Ghost Story.
Also Logan's Run and The World According to Garp.

CWD: Did you finish your filmmaking studies at New York
City's School of Visual Arts? If not why not?

GL: I only attended SVA for one year. I wasn't happy to learn upon my
arrival in NYC that the school had replaced Introduction to Screenwriting with
Remedial English, and most of my classmates's student films were
bullshit--Super 8 films with 18 year old kids playing Superman and
James Bond. I wanted to make features.

CWD: Did having played the role in "I Was A Teenage
Zombie" pushed you towards wanting to do your own
films?

GL: No. I'd already written the screenplay for SLIME CITY before I worked
on I WAS A TEENAGE ZOMBIE. The 3 key people from SLIME CITY--myself,
cinematographer Peter Clark, and actor Robert Sabin--worked on ZOMBIE
specifically to get the experience we needed to make SLIME CITY. I was
the Production Manager on that film, and I only acted in those scenes
because the actor they'd cast didn't show up.

CWD: Can you tell us what it was like the first time you
saw yourself in "I Was A Teenage Zombie"?

GL: The first time was no big deal. But now, when I see ho skinny I was...

CWD: How about when your first film "Slime City"
played on the big screen?

GL: The first time SLIME CITY played in a theatre--at the Waverly Twin in
NYC--was a disaster. The 16m projector was positioned so that only one
half of the screen could be in focus at any time. I wanted to kill myself.
Then when UNDYING LOVE had its premiere at the Village East Cinemas,
we had a packed crowd, and they were digging the film, and right in the midle,
the projector's plug fused to the outlet and we lost power for 45 minutes.

CWD: Did you feel it was diffuclt going from writing the
film scripts to writing your book "Personal
Demons"?

GL: Personal Demonst started out as a screenplay in 1989. A few years
later, I tried to novelize it, but I ended up with shit. I just wasn't mature
enough to handle all of the material in that story, which blends several
different genres--a difficult task to pull off. In 2001, I tried again. In
2002, other writers started critiquing my 600 page manuscript. In 2003, my
400 page rewrite won the Anubis Award for Horror. I'm a major re-writer.
This was a much longer journey than is usual for me.

CWD: Do you mind sharing with us where the idea for you
script/book for "Personal Demons" came from?

GL: I simply wanted to combine two of my favorite genres--film noir and
horror. By the time I'd finished, I'd also mixed in police procedural, crime
drama, and science fiction. When I started the screenplay, all I knew is that
it was going to start with my protagonist sticking a gun in his mouth. In
the novel, it takes about 80 pages to reach that scene. The novel is much
richer and much moe resonant than the screenplay, although I obviously
liked the screenplay, or I never would have expanded it.

CWD: Do you think that without the HWA you might not
have gotten as far as you have?

GL: Not a chance. My 600 page ms would never have won the Anubis Award.
PaulTremblay, Kathryn Ptacek and Nick Mamatas--HWA members-took the time to
read and critique my ms and point out its flaws to me. They would never
have done that if I hadn't developed relationships with them, and I did
that by joining the Horror Writers Association.

CWD: Do you look forward to mentoring someone that is
in need of it?

GL: Maybe, when I think I'm good enough. I've only had one novel published
so far, and by a small press. I have a lot more to learn before I can
mentor someone else.

CWD: You said that you have come out of retirement to
Direct "House of the Psychotic Damned", are you
doing anything to get back into the helm of directing?

GL: I've directed 3 features already, and assistant directed 3 others. Not
to sound cocky, but I know what I'm doing, and the other films were just
training for this. I can't wait to work in an amazing location--Mansfield
Reformatory in Ohio--with real movie equipment, like a dolly and a
crane. The only thing I plan to do to get ready is to work out and drop 20
lbs.This is going to be a 7 - 10 day shoot, which means 16 hour days, and
in no way, shape, or form am I a kid anymore!

CWD: What is your take on all the remakes coming out of
Hollywood?

GL: It's pretty tiresome, but there have always been remakes, especially in
horror. Look at how many different versions of Frankenstein and
Dracula there have been. The difference is that now Hollywood is remaking
films that inspired me in '70s and '80s, and I feel possessive of the
originals.

CWD: Before changing your mind about being a
stop-motion animator, did you do any stop-motion?

GL: No, I never picked up a camera until I went to film school.

CWD: If you had a chance to, who would you like direct
in a movie?

GL: I think that horror films are scarier when you don't know the actors;
the characters seem more real that way. Of course, studios want "names,"
and sometimes you have to capitulate. I wouldn't use any horror icons,
I'll tell you that much. Maybe some character actors from old TV shows I
liked, like Jonathan Banks from WISEGUY and Anthony Denison from CRIME STORY.

CWD: You still owe me for a Writers Dinner from
Twisted, are you going make good on it?

GL: The Writers' Dinner was a great idea, but it wasn't meant to be. I was
trying to come up with more writer oriented events than what the con
was offering, but since Joe Knetter, Edward Holsclaw, and I had tables 15
feet apart from each other, we basically got to socialize anyway. I think
the writers' panel was sufficient, despite the con organizers doing nothing
to promote it.

CWD: Being that you manage the four theaters, does it
give you a closer look into what people are wanting
out of a movie?

GL: I manage 4 arthouses, so almost by definition, the customers are
looking for something good, something different, and something other than horror.
The fact is, people's opinions on movies--just like music and
literature--are so subjective. I don't see a lot of common ground. One customer--the
smart one!--praises LOST IN TRANSLATION, while the other calls it the worst
thing he's ever seen. Every one has an opinion, and no one's matters more
than anyone else's.

CWD: I read or listen to a interview in which you
stated you love to scare the hell out of people, I
myself do also, do you find that common with the
people you meet that are writers/actors/FX/directors?

GL: No, most of the people I've worked with don't like to
antagonize people the way that I do!

CWD: Seeing your mother's painting on the front page of
the web site is the reason for this one, have you ever
painted anything, other than a wall or house.

GL: I was a pretty good artist as a kid, and I dabbled in oil painting, but
I wasn't good enough, ad I didn't have the passion to make myself better.
Filmmaking and writing became my obsessions, and I used to adapt novels
into screenplays.

CWD: Can I trade my paper back of your book for the
hard bound?

GL: Ha! No way. What am I going to do with a trade paperback
personalized to "Chad"? I'd sell you a hardcover at cost, though.

CWD: If NCY Arts had kept the Introduction to
Screenwriting, do you think you would have stayed
there longer?

GL: I probably would have stayed a second year, but I never intended to
remain for all 4 years and get my degree. I'm not big on academia. A
second year would have been good for me, because I would have learned
about sound editing, which I had to learn on my own, the hard way.

CWD: If you had a chance to, would you still make
Personal Demons, the film?

GL: Personal Demons is definitely a cinematic novel, and would make a great
movie. But it would be an expensive movie, and there is no way on
earth that Hollywood or anyone else would give me that opportunity. I'd be
satisfied with writing the screenplay, which would be very different
from the screenplay I originally wrote. Ultimately, the best version of
that story already exists, on the page.

I would like to thank Greg for taking time to do the interview, to find out more about Greg,
his book, or his movies then head over to www.slimeguy.com.