“Monster Mash” is always a graveyard smash at any Halloween party! Ever popular since its release in 1962, the hit song is becoming an animated movie at Miramax.
Miramax CEO Jonathan Glickman, who has been behind such its as Netflix’s series Wednesday, and The Addams Family animated movies at MGM, has optioned the rights from Reservoir and Capizzi Music Co.
Performed by Bobby “Boris” Pickett, who co-wrote it with Lenny Capizzi, the song has been ranked by Billboard as the “Biggest Halloween Song of All Time.”, and for good reason.
Though adapting a song into a feature film might sound like a stretch, the storyline is all there in the lyrics: a mad scientist’s monster rises from his slab to perform a new dance, inspired by the ’60s dance craze the Mashed Potato. The new dance becomes “the hit of the land” when the scientist throws a party for a host of other neighbourhood monsters, with guests including the vampires, the ghouls, the zombies, Wolfman, Dracula and his son, Igor, his baying hounds, the coffin-bangers, and the vocal group The Crypt-Kicker Five.
Said Glickman: “For more than 60 years, nothing has said Halloween quite like the ‘Monster Mash.’ We’re thrilled to be entrusted by the Pickett and Capizzi families and to be partnering with Reservoir Media to bring this iconic song to life as an animated musical for all audiences. It’s a project that celebrates the fun and spirit of the original — and should become a perennial ‘graveyard smash’ for years to come.”
