Lost Actor Found: Who Was Peter Carpenter?

Peter Carpenter
July 25, 1939 - April 02, 1996

(This is my second rumination on actor Peter Carpenter. If you'd like, you can click here to read the other one first)

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"Whatever happened to Peter Carpenter," I still wonder. 

Unfortunately, what happened to actor-singer-dancer-producer-writer Peter Carpenter has never been one of Hollywood's more infamous, hotly discussed unsolved mysteries. He was just a handsome aspiring entertainer of a certain era who acted in a few films. Then he was never heard from again.

Lost Actor Found: Kristen Riter from STUDENT BODIES (1981)

"Whatever happened to Kristen Riter?" I often wonder.

Well, not that often. But every few years, I revisit her sole starring vehicle—that inimitable slasher-spoof tour de force, Student Bodies (1981). Riter starred as Toby Badger, the virginal and resourceful Final Girl, out to defeat a heavy breathing maniac who's using paper clips and chalk board erasers to murder her slutty friends. I said the flick was inimitable, I didn't say it was particularly sophisticated.

THE DEMON (1981) aka The HALLOWEEN Rip-Off That Wouldn't Die!

Like any middle-aged, red-blooded American who isn't a jaded philistine, I'm a fan of Halloween (1978). It's not my all-time favorite, but it charts fairly high—nestled snugly between Taxi Driver (1976) and Saturday Night Fever (1978). I dig everything about it: the story, the music, the atmosphere, everything. If you ask about my favorite horror movie, I'll say it's "the one with the guy in the white mask who walks around and stalks babysitters."

Graham Kennard stalks Jennifer Holmes
THE DEMON (1981)

For some puzzling reason, I also harbor affection for this other, far-lesser-known flick about a guy in a white mask who walks around and stalks preschool teachers. I'm referring to the most egregious Halloween rip-off ever; a grimy, crusty, zero-budget "thriller" so shameless in its desire to be Halloween—even copying whole sequences, shot-for-shot—that, for years, I thought I'd imagined it. I'm talking about Percival Rubens' The Demon (1981): the only film that ever made me doubt my own sanity.

That Mysterious Background Extra from GREASE (1978)

I've always been curious about a lonely background extra from Grease (1978). A haunted young man who briefly appears 2 minutes and 24 seconds into the song Summer Nights, seated behind the Pink Ladies and gazing wistfully into the middle distance. Who is he? Why is he?

Jack's Dungeon of Death: an Interview with John F. Kearney

The detective business has been slow recently. Lotta door knocking, not a lot of answering. I feel like a canvasser. So, desperate for an interview, I decided to pose questions to my father—"exploitation veteran" John F. Kearney.

Actor John F. Kearney in Gary Graver's SOCIETY AFFAIRS (1982)

Lost Movie: What the Hell Happened to LIFE ON THE EDGE (1992)?

What the hell happened to LIFE ON THE EDGE (1992)

I've been morbidly curious about a little lost film called Life on the Edge (1992) for a while now. Supposedly, it was this low-budget, sophomoric, USA Up All Night-type satirical yuck-fest about flakey New Age Angelenos at a party who get trapped in a hillside canyon house after a major earthquake, and hilariously raunchy shenanigans ensue. Fairly typical, right? Nothing spooky here. But get this: it's a lost film because, after its brief theatrical run, it was most likely buried in someone's basement because nobody saw, or heard, from it again!

Lost Actor Found: Lolita Lorre from SCREAM FOR HELP (1984)

Lolita Lorre and David Allen Brooks in SCREAM FOR HELP (1984)

"Whatever happened to Lolita Lorre?" I often wonder.

Well, not that often. But every couple of years, I like to revisit her classic home-invasion thriller, Scream for Help (1984). This endlessly entertaining (for all the wrong reasons) UK/US co-production was an adolescent favorite of mine, as HBO had it in constant rotation in the late-1980's.

Lost Actor: What Happened to Peter Carpenter?

Peter Carpenter in BLOOD MANIA (1970)

Peter Carpenter was a young-ish actor who starred in two exploitation classics—Blood Mania (1970) and Point of Terror (1971)—before vanishing from the face of the earth—leaving behind very few hard facts in regard to his life and death.

"Whatever happened to Peter Carpenter?" I often wonder.

Well, not that often. But every now and then, I check in with my sources to find out if any new light has been shed on this enigmatic, obscure star of yesteryear.

Cult Actors: Donna Wilkes

"Good. Then I'll see ya at the dock at eight."

Until a few years ago, Donna Wilkes was something of a mystery. Donna shot to fame as Jackie Peters, "the chick who won’t stop screaming” in Jaws 2 (1978). She then guest starred in just about every TV series known to man before immortalizing herself in Angel (1984), starring as a “high school honor student by day, Hollywood hooker by night.” 

Then, she vanished! Or, she didn't vanish so much as she just stopped acting in films for a while.

Real Estate Retrospective: BOARDING HOUSE (1982) for Sale

The titular Hoffman House in BOARDINGHOUSE (1982)

It's been a slow week at the Eerie Midnight Detective Agency. But I did find this cool Redfin listing for the original "Hoffman House"—that "10-bedroom" hotbed of love, lust, and telekinesis from the 1982 shot-on-video horror classic Boardinghouse (1982).