Tag Archive for: Charles Addams

The Many Versions of the Addams Family

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by Paula Gail Benson

Mural with Charles Addams from: The Addams Family Secret | The New Yorker

According to Wikipedia, Charles Samuel Addams (January 7, 1912-September 29, 1988) made a career as a cartoonist, first for his high school yearbook, then as a free-lancer for The New Yorker as well as a stint creating animated training films for the Army during World War II. He had a macabre outlook, was drawn to a Presbyterian Cemetery as a child, and, as inspiration for the Addams home, explored mansions in the town where he grew up (one of which he was accused of breaking and entering) and buildings at the colleges he attended.

From the 1964-66 ABC TV series

The cartoon characters with which he is most often identified remained nameless in the New Yorker until they became the basis of a situation comedy, The Addams Family, a television program filmed in black-and-white that initially aired from 1964-66. John Astin played the effusive Gomez Addams who passionately adored his beloved wife Morticia (Carolyn Jones), always moving incrementally in a black, tight-fitting, V-necked gown. Their butler, the deep-voiced, tall, and intimidating Lurch (Ted Cassidy) was originally written to be mute, but when Cassidy ad-libbed “You rang?”, the phrase was immediately adopted as the character’s signature line. Bald Uncle Fester (Jackie Coogan) was identified as Morticia’s uncle and Grandmama Addams (Blossom Rock) as Gomez’ mother. Pugsley (Ken Weatherwax) and Wednesday (Lisa Loring) were the two children. Charles Addams originally wanted to call Pugsley “Pubert,” but that name was rejected as being too sexual. Later, in the film Addams Family Values, the new baby and third child was called Pubert.

Several animated and live action series featured the family in the 1970s and 1990s. One of the animated series had Jodie Foster voicing Pugsley. In 2022, Netflix presented Wednesday, a supernatural coming of age series that had a teen aged Wednesday Addams solving a murder at her school.

From Barry Sonnenfeld’s The Addams Family movie (1991)

A number of films, both live action and animated, have focused on the family’s adventures. In 1991 and 1993, Barry Sonnenfeld directed The Addams Family and Addams Family Values. (Barry Sonnenfeld also appeared in Addams Family Values, as the father of Joel Glicker, Wednesday’s boyfriend at Camp Chippewa.) Raul Julia played Gomez Addams with Anjelica Huston as Morticia. Christopher Lloyd is Fester, who was identified as Gomez’ brother. Morticia referred to Grandmama (Judith Malina in the first film and Carol Kane in the second) as her mother (with a mention in the first film that Gomez’ parents were dead). Interestingly, in the Broadway musical, The Addams Family (2010), when Morticia said Grandmama was Gomez and Fester’s mother, Gomez (played by Nathan Lane) was surprised, saying he thought she was Morticia’s mother. Morticia (played by Bebe Neuwirth) later admitted that Grandmama might not be a member of the family. (Note, Nathan Lane appeared in the movie Addams Family Values, as a beleaguered police officer listening to Gomez demand an investigation of Debbie Jellinsky (played by Joan Cusack), who married Fester and established their home in the suburbs.)

Poster for Broadway musical The Addams Family

In the Sonnenfeld films, while Pugsley (Jimmy Workman) might be older, Wednesday (Christina Ricci) definitely showed greater malevolent initiative. In The Addams Family, when a Girl Scout (Mercedes McNab) asked if their lemonade was made with real lemons, Wednesday inquired if her cookies were made with real Girl Scouts. McNab returned in the role of Amanda Buckman in Addams Family Values, a camper who ridiculed and later was tormented by Wednesday and Joel Glicker (played by David Krumholtz, who went on to star in the TV show Numb3rs).

For the 2010 Broadway musical, The Addams Family, Wednesday (Krysta Rodriguez) is the older of the two siblings, pleading with her parents for “One Normal Night” for the family to meet her boyfriend (Wesley Taylor) and his parents (Terence Mann and Carolee Carmello).

The Penn State Library now displays a mural painted by Charles Addams for a Hamptons hotel. The mural was donated to the college when the hotel property changed hands. Entitled “An Addams Family Holiday,” it features the group at the beach, enjoying the waves that other vacationers are fleeing. Meanwhile, Lurch and Grandmama prepare a picnic lunch of bats and a mixed drink made with poison. All very appropriate for a Halloween celebration!

BTW, did you know that Charles Addams received an Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America?

Mural from: The Addams Family Secret | The New Yorker

The Story Behind the Story – Part 3

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By Lois Winston

The Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mysteries take place in Westfield, NJ, the town where I lived for twenty-three years until my recent relocation to Tennessee. Westfield is famous for being the home of cartoonist Charles Addams of The Addams Family fame, as well as the infamous John List, who murdered his entire family in 1971, then disappeared. The hunt for List made international headlines, but it took eighteen years and an episode of America’s Most Wanted before he was finally apprehended.

 

In 2014 Westfield once again made headlines when both the national and international press descended on a stately, historic street a few blocks from where I lived. The mystery that drew this unwanted attention centered around a Dutch Colonial built in 1905. The house had recently sold for 1.35 million dollars.

 

However, shortly after the new owners took possession of the house, they received a very disturbing anonymous letter from someone who called himself The Watcher. Subsequent letters followed, threatening the new owners’ children. The Watcher knew the children’ nicknames and mentioned having seen their young daughter painting at an easel, asking, “Is she the artist in the family?” Fearful for their safety, the family never moved into the house, although they continued to make extensive renovations to the property. 

 

Since the family received that first letter, they’ve sued the former owners, claiming they knew of The Watcher prior to the sale of the house. The former owners counter sued. Home disclosure laws vary from state to state. In NJ, even if the former owners had previously received letters from The Watcher, they wouldn’t have had to disclose that information.

 

The new owners tried to sell the house several times, each time reducing the price, but the home’s notoriety kept buyers away. They tried to have the house demolished but failed to get zoning approval to divide the property into two lots to build two smaller houses to recoup their losses. 

 

In a bizarre twist, at one point the husband admitted to sending nasty anonymous letters to some of the neighbors.

 

In 2016 the house became the inspiration behind a Lifetime movie and toppled the Jersey Devil from the top New Jersey’s creepiest horror myths. 

 

Extensive investigations over the years have failed to unmask the identity of The Watcher. Suspects have included the schizophrenic son of a neighbor as well as the owners of the house. 

 

In 2018 the family sold the rights to their story to Netflix in a 7-figure deal after a bidding war that included Universal, Warner Brothers, Paramount, Amazon, and Fox. This gives credence to those who believe that the family concocted the entire story, and there never was a Watcher.

 

BuzzFeed’s Ryan Bergara and Shane Madej of “Unsolved” profiled the Watcher House in the first episode of their fifth season. You can watch it here.

 

The Watcher House eventually sold in 2019 at a $400,000 loss.

 

With this real-life mystery unfolding in my own backyard, how could I not incorporate it into one of my books? In a subplot in Scrapbook of Murder, the sixth book in my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series, The Watcher becomes The Sentinel, and his first letter arrives shortly after food editor Cloris McWerther and her husband sell their house. Although the police haven’t been able to solve the mystery of The Watch after eight years, Anastasia solves the mystery of The Sentinel.

 

Scrapbook of Murder

An Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery, Book 6

 

Crafts and murder don’t normally go hand-in-hand, but normal deserted craft editor Anastasia Pollack’s world nearly a year ago. Now, tripping over dead bodies seems to be the “new normal” for this reluctant amateur sleuth.

 

When the daughter of a murdered neighbor asks Anastasia to create a family scrapbook from old photographs and memorabilia discovered in a battered suitcase, she agrees—not only out of friendship but also from a sense of guilt over the older woman’s death. However, as Anastasia begins sorting through the contents of the suitcase, she discovers a letter revealing a fifty-year-old secret, one that unearths a long-buried scandal and unleashes a killer. Suddenly Anastasia is back in sleuthing mode as she races to prevent a suitcase full of trouble from leading to more deaths.

 

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USA Today and Amazon bestselling and award-winning author Lois Winston writes mystery, romance, romantic suspense, chick lit, women’s fiction, children’s chapter books, and nonfiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. Kirkus Reviews dubbed her critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” In addition, Lois is a former literary agent and an award-winning craft and needlework designer who often draws much of her source material for both her characters and plots from her experiences in the crafts industry.

 

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