HALLOWEEN PICTURES

Who are these people??? The masks look old but the shoes look more modern. I''m guessing that these are amusement park workers posing in the 40s or 50s. 

Here's another picture I can't identify. It looks like it's from an anime film.

A few of my own rubber masks are torn and brittle now. I have to cover them up with props to disguise the flaws.

Here's an old, brittle half mask that I accidentally crushed in storage. The lips bonded to the cheek but...surprise, surprise...it looks great this way!

This has been a great year for neighborhood Halloween stores. For one thing, it marks the introduction of the adult muscle suit. Finally we adult men can have muscles without all that tedious exercize.

Above, an upscale version.

There's some new masks this year, too! This one (above) would have looked better minus the snot and with a smaller head behind the nose.

Something like this (above, drawn by a cartoonist friend) would have worked better. The mask industry really needs to take in more cartoonists. Non cartoonists tend to be too literal. 

Latex masks are also limited by the necessity to fit over the head. That's why girls make good mask subjects. You can make the mask broad and disguise the width with the hair.

Who's this? It looks like a 90 year-old version of "Bill Nye, the Science Guy" from TV.

Hmmmmmm....masks for twins. Yeah, sure, why not?

 I'm happy to report that dog costumes continue to improve with every passing year.

Wow! What a great T-Rex mask! 

I'm still curious to see if someone can come up with a good Jessica Rabbit mask. The face above is from a figurine. It fits the movie perfectly, but could still be a bit more sultry and cartoony.

Here's (above) a reconstruction of the young Steve Buscemi, proving that he'd make a great mask. 

Geez, Buscemi and Peter Lorre could have been brothers.

Come to think of it, why haven't we seen a Peter Lorre mask?

The world desperately needs a good Rondo Hatton mask (above)...

...and maybe a cool hat to go with it.

  

This picture (above) shows how a decent mask might be made of Tippi Hedren.

Some of the best masks used to be free on cereal boxes.  Why are the cereal people so resistant to Halloween now?

This time of year Disneyland should sell cheap reproductions of their Haunted House paintings, don't you think?

Here's a great gorilla mask...or is it a caveman?...used by Ernie Kovacs in his famous "Nairobi Trio" sketch. It's very funny and may still be in print, but if it is a caveman, how accurate is it? Cavemen are always portrayed as ugly, but were they?

So far as I can tell cavemen would have been exceptionally handsome. Assuming they were polygamous, the handsomest cavemen would have had many wives and children, and ugly, mateless cavemen wouldn't have had any.  That means most cavemen would have looked like Brad Pitt or Johnny Depp...only with bigger browridges.

I searched the net for a better picture of the Kovacs mask and came up with nothing. In desperation I typed "Ubangi Mask" and to my surprise I came up with.....ME (above)! Yes, ME! My Photoshopped ears have earned me a place on the Ubangi sites!

For comparison (above), my unretouched ears.

Recently I wondered out loud if my buck teeth would look good on a mask. A friend suggested that I already have a mask (above). Maybe he's right. I shouldn't be greedy.

Here's an example of the starched cheesecloth masks that were all over the place when my dad was a kid. 'Kinda nice, huh? I like the transparent hat.

Last but not least, here's a frame from The Simpsons "Treehouse of Horror XXVI." Wow and double Wow! John K continues to amaze!

BTW: my costume this year: Mr. Meek (above).