Masters of Horror

Masters of Horror Information

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Masters of Horror is an informal social group of international film writers and directors specializing in horror movies and an American television series created by director Mick Garris for the Showtime cable network.

Origin

In 2002, director Mick Garris invited some director friends to an informal dinner at a restaurant in Sherman Oaks, California. The original ten "masters" attending were John Carpenter, Larry Cohen, Don Coscarelli, Joe Dante, Guillermo Del Toro, Garris, Stuart Gordon, Tobe Hooper, John Landis and Bill Malone. The dinner was an extremely satisfying experience for the directors; a welcome night of camaraderie, humor and mutual admiration of one another's work. Del Toro coined the name of the group in jest when he told a nearby diner celebrating her birthday that the masters of horror wished her a happy birthday.

Subsequently, Garris organized regular dinners with the group, and invited other horror and genre directors to attend including Dario Argento, Eli Roth, David Cronenberg, Tim Sullivan, Rob Zombie, Bryan Singer, William Lustig, Lucky McKee, Ernest Dickerson, Kat O' Shea, Quentin Tarantino, Robert Rodriguez, James Gunn, Mary Lambert, Tom Holland, Peter Medak, Ti West, Lloyd Kaufman and others.

In 2005, Garris created and produced an original anthology television series of one hour movies, written and directed by many of the "Masters" which was originally broadcast in the U.S. on the Showtime cable network. In several international territories, the films were released theatrically. The series debuted to excellent reviews in the U.S. on October 28, 2005 with the premiere episode "Incident On and Off a Mountain Road", co-written and directed by Don Coscarelli. New episodes premiered every Friday at 10pm EST throughout the series' two seasons. The show followed an anthology series format, with each episode featuring a one-hour film directed by a well-known horror film director. In 2009 Chiller (TV network) began showing the show on their Sunday evening line up of shows and in 2010, Reelz Channel began airing episodes of Masters of Horror edited (despite keeping its TV-MA rating) and with commercials.

Episodes

Season 1 (2005–2006)

Ep.	Title	Director	Airdate

Episode 4, "Jenifer", was accidentally made available on-demand to a select audience at the same time as Episode 2, "H.P. Lovecraft's Dreams in the Witch-House". The episode was cut for graphic violence during its initial television broadcast, and the cut scenes can only be viewed in a featurette separate from the film on the R1 DVD release.

Episode 13, "Imprint", originally scheduled to premiere on January 27, 2006, was shelved by Showtime due to concerns over its content. Mick Garris, creator and executive producer of the series, characterized the episode as "the most disturbing film I've ever seen". It is available only on DVD and Blu-ray by Anchor Bay Entertainment, along with the rest of the episodes in the first season. "Imprint" was shown in the UK on Bravo (7 April 2006).

Season 2 (2006–2007)

Ep.	Title	Director	Airdate

Related series

Fear Itself

See Fear Itself (TV series) for more information Series creator Mick Garris stated that Showtime opted not to show the third season and that film studio Lionsgate had begun funding the series. The Hollywood Reporter reported on September 25, 2007 that Mick Garris and Lionsgate signed a 13-episode deal with NBC. Instead of a third season of the show, a new show, Fear Itself, was created with the same premise as Masters of Horror. It premiered on NBC in Summer 2008.

Masters of Science Fiction

See Masters of Science Fiction for more information In 2006, broadcast network ABC and IDT announced that they were developing Masters of Science Fiction, a new anthology series from the creators of Masters of Horror. Six episodes were produced, and they aired Saturdays at 10PM starting August 4, 2007. The episodes feature adaptations of stories by John Kessel, Robert A. Heinlein, Jonathan Fast, and Walter Mosley. Jonathan Frakes has directed a story by Harlan Ellison. The last 2 episodes ('Watchbird' and 'Little Brother') were not broadcast in the USA. They were, however, shown in Canada and the UK.

Masters of Italian Horror

Masters of Italian Horror was also in the works back in 2008 but as of August 2012 there has been no new news on the project. Though not related to the other two show's creators, the first four directors announced were Lamberto Bava, Umberto Lenzi, Sergio Martino, and Nicola Rondolino.

DVD/Blu-ray releases

Rather than the expected packaging of the first season's episodes in one comprehensive set, Anchor Bay Entertainment originally released each episode individually, as well as in double and triple packs. Each DVD promises over three hours of bonus content, such as audio commentaries, interviews, and documentaries. These DVD releases also include covers and interior collector's cards painted by the Award-winning horror and fantasy artist Jeremy Caniglia. With the release of Homecoming, the cover art changed to a more mainstream appearance. With the DVD release of the Jenifer, it appears that Anchor Bay chose to produce artwork tailored to each episode. The Dead by Dawn film festival, which Anchor Bay supports, revealed in their festival guide that Anchor Bay UK had decided to stop releasing double pack editions and instead release a season one box set.

On August 28, 2007 the first season of Masters of Horror was released in a 14-disc box set. There was also a 6-disc Season One Vol. 1 set, and a 7-disc Season One Vol. 2 set. The 14-disc set consists of all episodes, each on an individual disc, plus a bonus disc with all new features.

The first season is also available in four volumes on Blu-ray Disc (volumes 1 and 2 on October 16, 2007, volume 3 on November 13, 2007, and volume 4 on December 11, 2007). Each Blu-ray volume includes 3 or 4 episodes on a single Blu-ray disc. They retain the audio commentaries from the DVD releases but do not include any of the other special features, e.g. documentaries, from the DVDs.

On July 29, 2008 the second season of Masters of Horror was released in a limited edition set featuring skull-shaped packaging. As of November 2009 there is no Blu-ray release of the second season.

Soundtrack

See Masters of Horror (soundtrack) for more information A two-disc soundtrack was released for the series on Immortal Records. The album features heavy metal and rock acts with a few acoustic pieces.

Comic adaptations

IDW Publishing is producing a series of comic book adaptations of several episodes from the series. The first four issues are two-parters, adapting Incident On and Off a Mountain Road and Dreams in the Witch-House. The first two comic covers were painted by the award-winning artist Jeremy Caniglia.

Awards and nominations

Year	Award	Result	Category	Recipient	Notes
2006	Saturn Award	Won	Best Television Presentation	-	Tied with The Triangle
2007		Nominated	Best Presentation on Television	-	-
2007		Won	Best Television Series Release on DVD	-	-
2006	Emmy Award	Nominated	Outstanding Music Composition for a Series (Original Dramatic Score)	Richard Band	For episode "Dreams in the Witch House"
2006	Emmy Award	Won	Outstanding Original Main Title Theme Music	Edward Shearmur	-
2007	Satellite Awards	Won	Best DVD Extras (Season 1)	-	Tied with Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan