RALEIGH, N.C. — You should see the skeleton that Craig Vance keeps in his Knightdale garage.

Or maybe you would be more interested in the corpse named “Dead Lou” propped up on a bench.

Even more interesting is the world Vance has created in this one-car garage known as the local television show “Monster Creature Feature.”

Along with co-creator Kenneth McGuire, Vance is the co-writer, director, producer, filmmaker, host and editor of the local horror-host show seen locally on public access channels in Raleigh and Durham.

For those who have seen the show on Friday nights at 10 p.m. and midnight and Saturday afternoons at 3 p.m. on Raleigh’s RTN Channel 10, Vance is the ghastly host “Ormon Grimsby — the undertaker of the already dead.”

Each week, Vance and his show “Monster Creature Feature” highlight old sci-fi and horror flicks along with interviews, special segments and guests and the always interesting commentary from Grimsby.
“The show is kind of a throw back to the old horror-host shows of the ’60s and ’70s and what we are shooting for is the whole nostaglia feel of what you grew up with,” Vance said. “I was really missing the kind of programming I grew up with as a kid and I wanted to bring some of that back to Raleigh.”

Shown in black and white, it is hard to believe that such a show is filmed with one Panasonic camera with a set of things collected and pieced together in the garage of a modest suburb.

Vance, who works as a computer graphics animator in downtown Raleigh, started the show here two years ago after nostalgia brought him back to his youth in Detroit where he watched the local horror shows and became hooked on the genre.
“Typically in the old days you had the local weather man and they would slick his hair back and draw in a widow’s peak with a magic marker and you had a horror host,” said contributing writer Clay Griffith. “This is a cut above that.”

Now, “Monster Creature Feature” and its Web site, have grown quite a cult following throughout the Triangle.

Unlike some communities, the Town of Cary does not dictate when kids go trick or treating; since Halloween is always on October 31, that’s the day most families in Cary go door-to-door in costumes for candy and fun.

In addition to or instead of going door-to-door, families may want to take children to the Town of Cary’s annual Safe N Sane Halloween Celebration for kids 15 and under, which will be held on Friday, October 31 from 5:30 p.m. until 7:30 p.m. at the Cary Towne Center Mall.

Also, the Town’s Haunted House will be held on Saturday, October 25 from 5 p.m. until 9 p.m. at Herbert C. Young Community Center, 101 Wilkinson Ave. For more information on these or other activities in October, call the Town of Cary’s Parks, Recreation, and Cultural Resources Department at (919) 469-4061 or click here.