126. Gay of the Dead: Unleashing Queer Horror (with Sean Abley)

Snarky Opener (0:00)

Sean Abley

I was actually fine with being gay. So, I wasn't conflicted about it in the least.

What I was conflicted about was being a horror movie fan.

Episode Introduction (0:28)

Rob Loveless

Hello, my LGBTQuties, and welcome back to another episode of A Jaded Gay. I'm Rob Loveless and, today, I am a non-jaded gay because I am almost through the halfway point of my first semester of the MBA program.

So, the one class I'm taking, it's only half a semester. So, this upcoming week is like my final week of class, thank goodness, which I'm super excited about, because I don't know, taking two classes at once.

It's a lot of overlap between the work, and then I just felt very spread thin, and with everything else I'm doing, yeah, it's just been a lot. So, I'm excited to wrap up the one class, which I really did enjoy it.

I just, you know, it was a lot of work. So, I'm excited to wrap that up and then just focus on one class for the remainder of the semester, and hopefully have a little bit more sanity and a little bit more free time.

Happy Halloween! (1:14)

Rob Loveless

And just in time too, because it is almost Halloween. And what better way to ring in the holiday than with a little treat today?

Yes, I have a very special guest joining us for our Halloween episode, and we will bring him on in a minute, but first tarot time.

Tarot (1:32)

Rob Loveless

So, for this episode, we drew the Eight of Wands. Wands, it's tied to the element of fire. It's masculine energy, so it's action-oriented, and it's typically tied to passion, creativity, and sometimes sexuality.

And in numerology, eight represents infinity, success, and power. So, if you think about it, the number eight looks like the infinity symbol.

So, our energy is constantly flowing without end and inspiring us to take action. And when we draw the Eight of Wands, it's telling us to go with the flow and ride that wave of energy.

We have the freedom to move ahead with our plans, so we need to use the momentum of this card to carry us forward toward our goals.

Just like how eight is reminiscent of the infinity symbol, this energy is constant, so we don't want to try to resist it. Sure, we may be moving into the unknown, but we need to trust the journey we're on.

And while we're riding this energy wave, we want to make sure that we're being strategic in the decisions and actions we're taking and making sure that they align with what we want to achieve.

Guest Introduction (2:33)

Rob Loveless

So, without further ado, I am very excited to welcome today's guest.

He is an acclaimed horror journalist, award-winning playwright, and creator of Gay of the Dead. Basically, he is a beary buff, horror buff. Please welcome Sean Abley.

Hi, Sean, how are you today?

Sean Abley

I'm doing well. I'm ready to unjade you on your podcast.

Rob Loveless

That's the point of having guests on. Trying to, you know, heal the jadedness here.

Sean Abley

Yay. Well, I'm here. I'm up for the job.

Rob Loveless

Awesome, awesome. Well, I'm very excited to have you on for our very special Halloween episode this year.

To kick it off, I mean, we have a lot to cover as it relates to queer horror. So, can you just introduce yourself to the listeners?

Talk a little bit about who you are, what you do, pronouns, identity, all that fun stuff?

Sean Abley

Sure. Well, I'm Sean Abley. I am mainly a writer that works in a couple different disciplines, but, but I think probably for the purposes of this interview, we'll probably talk about my journalism the most.

I have sort of carved out a space in horror film journalism, covering the LGBTQ side of things. So, the creators, but also like content, you know, queer horror films, that kind of thing.

And that all culminated in a couple different things, one of which is, and I'm sure we'll talk about this at some point, my book that just came out, Queer Horror: A Film Guide, which is a big encyclopedia of almost a thousand films that have queer content in them.

I, you know, write for Fangoria fairly frequently, and I have my own Patreon. As far as identify, I identify as a gay man, he/him pronouns. I also, you know, you know, right these days, us, all of us, with our labels and denotations, I guess I also identify as queer.

That's more politically, I think, than it is identity if that makes sense. Like I'm almost 60 years old, so I have been, you know, raised and steeped and and basted in being a gay man, and so that suits me, but I also am sort of fascinated by what's happening right now with everything that surrounds us, LGBTQ folks.

So, my piece of that is adding queer to the mix.

Rob Loveless

And I know you said you're here to help relieve some of the jadedness, so I'm going to ask. Today, are you a jaded or non-jaded gay and why?

Sean Abley

Oh, it's so funny you should ask that. You know, I have become sort of the hippie that I never thought I would become, right?

Like, I grew up like, in, you know, I was born in the 60s, and grew up in the 60s and 70s, and so I saw, you know, the counter-culture happening and and just I grew up in Montana, so I grew up in sort of a conservative part of the United States, but I had liberal parents, so I, you know, I saw, I saw a distrust of the government and things like that, you know, sort of outside of my reach, right?

Like, like, this is a group of people over here that have that view. They seem sort of fringy to me as a child. I'm firmly in that category now. I, I don't know if I'm jaded.

I'm just because I think I'm a little too pragmatic to be jaded like I see the the the maybe the problems with our systems that we have in place, but I also know that we're sort of inextricably, just connected to them, and so rather than think about that 24/7, I look for the ways that I can make it the best for me and for, you know, the people around me, if that makes sense.

So jaded, I don't think so. But what would be the, I can't even think of the word that I would use, just like, I don't know, I just, I've just settled into sort of what we have. I fight it when I can.

And, you know, like I was high atop the mountain of gay marriage. You know, marriage equality. Worked on those campaigns, saw change actually happen, right?

It feels like we may be in a time where systemic change on that level may be impossible. So, I don't know if that makes me jaded or maybe it just makes me a realist.

But I think that, you know, within that framework, I remain hopeful in being able to sort of carve out lives that will give us joy within that.

Rob Loveless

And I think, too, to your point of, you know, going from marriage equality to where we're at today, it's sometimes feels like a pendulum, you know, swinging each way forward and backward.

And I think just like that, we can go through phases of jadedness and non-jadedness along with the times.

So definitely feel the swinging back a little bit of the pendulum, but fingers crossed for a more non-jaded future.

Sean Abley

I hope so. You're right. I mean, it's very cyclical. It's just that right now, the cycle also includes things like social media. You know, never, I mean, every generation says this.

Never before have we been able to communicate as quickly and as effectively as we have right this second.

And five minutes from now, it will be even more so and so, you know, we're sort of privileged to be, you know, alive at a time when there's just seismic change in how we do things.

And, yeah, so, so I, you know, it's, it's, it's, you listen to the pundits say, well, you know, the election of 19-something-something was very nasty as well.

I'm like, yes, but technology is different, and the way we live is different. So, it's, it's harder for me to draw parallels to previous cycles than maybe it would have been even 10 years ago.

Rob Loveless

Definitely, it tends to, it's communication and social media, blessing and a curse. You know, it's great to connect, but it also exacerbates some of the tensions, I guess we're seeing in the world.

Sean Abley

Agreed.

Rob Loveless

Well, moving from one scary subject to the next queer horror. Like I said at the top, we have a lot to cover, but I do want to start off with your career.

So, you are a screenwriter, journalist, writer, a founding member of The Factory Theater in Chicago, and an award-winning playwright, and I think that's just kind of the tip of the iceberg there.

So, can you give us an overview of your career from start to present?

Sean Abley

Sure. I, like I said, I was born in Montana, and from the earliest like, you know, as a bookworm, as a kid, my parents read. My parents were also big horror and science fiction fans.

So, it's no surprise that I am the person I am today. You know, involved in writing and reading and filmmaking, all that and loving horror. I want to, I wanted to be a writer from the minute I could know what that was, just as a young child.

The, you know, the book that I just had released was inspired by a book I read when I was 13 years old. And when I was 13 years old, I read the book was The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, aka The Science Fiction Encyclopedia.

For some reason, it had two names in different countries, and at 13 I was like, I'm going to write that book. I want to write a book like this. I want to write a book about horror movies or something that's, you know, this giant encyclopedia. It's a very specific interest to have as a child.

So, I pursued both that and being an actor from a very young age. I went to college to get a BFA in drama. I dropped out of college after four years and moved to Chicago to be an actor, and that was completely driven by wanting to get into Second City and then be on Saturday Night Live because that was, I'm old enough to have watched the first episode of Saturday Night Live.

And if there's another subject of which I'm a scholar, it's Saturday Night Live. Like I've read every word about that show and and so I wanted to do that.

So, I got to Chicago, you know, was taking acting classes, taking improv classes. And through that, I met a group of people, and we were all basically, you know, young in our 20s and wanted to do theater, and we're taking the improv classes, but we're, like, a little unsatisfied, just sort of bouncing around Chicago trying to be part of other things.

And so, we formed a theater company called The Factory Theater in 1992. I'd written a stage adaptation of Ted V. Mikels' Corpse Grinders, horror movie, B movie, and that was a gigantic flop.

And then I wrote a stage adaptation non-musical, first one by the way, of Reefer Madness, and that was a gigantic hit, and that sort of propelled the group of people that put that together to form The Factory Theater.

And I did that for the next five years in Chicago. I actually lived in the theater for a chunk of time. I lived in the basement of the theater. My shower was backstage like it was, you know, I literally lived in the theater like the Phantom of the Opera, and through that is when I really started writing.

We start we just wrote plays for each other, and we directed each other in plays, and we were, we basically did it all because we didn't know we couldn't, right? Like nobody was telling us we couldn't.

And our theater became a huge success. And suddenly all eyes in Chicago were upon us like they were with other, you know, well-known theaters at the time. And so that was let me know that what I was doing actually was good, I guess, or you know, that people enjoyed it.

I got a job on a CD ROM trivia game called You Don't Know Jack. I don't know if people remember that. I think that came it came back recently, but back in 1996 that game was a, was a monster hit, and it was produced out of Chicago, and I got a job on the writing staff of it.

And it was like the job to get in Chicago as a writer, and I just I lucked into it because a friend of mine had submitted a sample, and I think they'd offered him the job, but he decided it wasn't for him, and he recommended me, and suddenly I was making more money as a writer.

Well, I was making money as a writer, and more money weekly than I'd ever seen in my life, at a job in my 20s, and that job got me an agent and got me to Los Angeles, where I moved to write for television. And I did that for a while. I did, you know, wrote narrative TV.

I took a turn into reality TV. I did that for a solid decade. That was sort of killing me slowly, because it was just, I just, I don't know the the ethics of a lot of reality TV really bother me.

So, I finally got out of that and started producing low-budget movies. I wrote one of my own called Socket and then, but I also produced a bunch of people's low-budget movies, and that was fun and exhausting.

And at the same time, I was still being a playwright and taking it a bit more seriously at that point. And also started my Gay of the Dead blog at Fangoria, which was the first horror blog that specifically targeted LGBTQ filmmakers.

And from there, you know, I've now written for Fangoria in some form or fashion for 15 years. And so that's where my horror journalism, which is sort of if you think about me now as one of the two main things, being a playwright and being a horror journalist, that's where my horror journalism started, and it just sort of progressed from there, writing for the website, writing for the magazine.

I published a book of my first chunk of interviews called Out in the Dark, and just stuck to it. And then I, you know, cut to now, where I have this giant book that I, that we worked on for. There was a group of eight of us.

I was the creator, co-editor, and one of the eight people who wrote Queer Horror: A Film Guide. And that took, I think, nine years to to finally, like, reach bookshelves. Like seven of those nine years, eight of those nine years were actually hard work on the book.

And then you hand in the manuscript, and then you just sit around and wait for the publisher to, like, finally put it out, and for them to ask you to do various things.

And so, yeah, it was that took about nine years. And so, yeah, so here we are. I'm, I'm, if you know me now, even though I do have a very like, I was on another podcast and they listed everything like you just did, and I was like, oh yeah, I guess I have kind of written everything at some point or another.

But yeah, I at one point, I gave up my acting career. I was acting in Chicago, along with all the writing and stuff, and when I moved to Los Angeles, I gave up acting as a job.

I and I, I had this teacher back in my college days who said, if you want to be in TV and film, find yourself in TV and film and that's what you're going to be doing. Theater is where they take chances, TV and film is where they take no chances.

You'll be playing exactly who you are and and like in the month before I moved to Los Angeles from Chicago, I saw this commercial, and it was a fat guy dancing to the song Maniac from the Flash Dance soundtrack because he loved El Paso tacos.

And he looked like me. He was like, sort of gingery. And, you know, baby-faced at the time. You can't see me, but you can see me, but the audience can't see me. I have a giant beard now, but sort of baby face, sort of chubby ginger back then.

And I literally, in that moment, thought, I don't want to be the fat guy dancing, because he loves tacos. Like, it's not that I look down on that work. I just, I just don't want to have to fight for that job, like, I don't want to be in a room with 10 other people, we're all trying to get that job.

I just felt like my ego, and not like big-headed ego, but just sort of my, like mental well-being would take too many hits trying. And if I was going to do that, if I was going to, like, put myself out there and, like, take the hit for rejection, I didn't want it to be for something like that.

I wanted it to be for my writing. And so, I made a very conscious decision when I moved to Los Angeles to sort of give up my acting career.

Yeah, so that's, that's sort of where I am. That's so long-winded, I hope people stick with it, but yeah, that's that's where I am now.

Rob Loveless

That's amazing. And you kind of touched upon this, you know, in your origins of your horror writer career, but you grew up in a household where your parents both loved horror and sci-fi.

There was The Sci-Fi Encyclopedia, and you said how you wanted to write a book like that when you were about 13.

Did you ever see your career going this way, where you become a horror journalist and throughout different medias, whether it's movie, podcasting, book, play, that you're incorporating horror stories in that?

Sean Abley

Yeah, I I think I'm lucky enough, and it took a long time. I mean, you know, this book just came out. But I think I'm lucky in that. To me, it was an inevitability, like I wanted to do that.

I wanted to write a book like that, and I knew that someday I would write a book like that. And, you know, along the way, I like submitted art.

I started submitting articles to Famous Monsters Magazine and Fangoria Magazine when I was like, well, I think it would, I think Famous Monsters, I literally sent something to them when I was, like 11, and, you know, a couple things to Fangoria over the years that they rejected.

And but I just felt like, inevitably, this will happen. And so, I just stuck to it. So, yeah, I guess I did see this, you know, eventually happening. I couldn't, I don't know, maybe this, maybe I'm not unique in this way, but I couldn't see a future that didn't include what I wanted to do in it.

Like, you know what I mean? Like, I just, it just didn't seem like I couldn't imagine a future where I wasn't being a writer. Like that just doesn't even now, as I'm sitting here trying to think, like, if it all ended tomorrow, what would it look like?

And I can't do that. And maybe that's, I don't know. Maybe that's some sort of neuro divergence, I don't know, but it just, it just felt like eventually it would happen.

So, it did. And all through my career, when I became a playwright, a ton of my plays have horror influence in them, horror and comedy. And then when I started writing for TV, it was shows like So Weird for Disney, or the Sabrina animated show where all these different pilots for the people who did like Rugrats, and all of them had some sort of like fantastical or horror science fiction sort of angle to them.

So, yeah, it's always, and now, as an adult playwright, my stuff all has fantastical and science fiction conceits. So yeah, I don't know. I don't know if it's, I mean, I think it's just in my blood, right?

It's, it was, it was never a I'm choosing this. It's I'm gonna write, and that's it. And then that's what came out.

Rob Loveless

And it's like, once you know what your passion is, you never drift too far from it. Like you may venture into a new territory a little bit, but you're still orbiting that initial passion.

Sean Abley

100%. You know, I I, I joke that I have nothing to fall back on. You know, when I was pursuing acting, I didn't I, you know, I went to college for it. I didn't, you know my I had a minor in dance.

If you see me now, if you see me now, just know that, you know, 35 years and 100 pounds ago, I was in a production of A Chorus Line. But, yeah, I never.

Again, it just seemed like an inevitability, and so I didn't prepare for anything else. Yeah, so just, I guess some people call that single-minded, but to me, that implies a purposeful or deliberate mindset.

To me, it was just the default.

Rob Loveless

Well, I'm glad you kept your focus on that, because, I mean, I'm biased, but through watching, I've watched some of your work leading up to this, and reading, you know, Queer Horror: A Film Guide.

And, I mean, I would say that you are a resident expert on all things queer horror. So, it's been really fun watching those films you were talking about again, going through the Queer Horror: A Film Guide.

What is Horror? (21:38)

Rob Loveless

So, with all that in mind, with your 30+ career of incorporating horror into your work, how would you define horror?

Sean Abley

That's interesting question because for the longest time, I didn't know how, and it seemed like everybody had such smart answers, but I've, I think I've settled on every horror movie, almost every horror movie, has one thing in common, and it's an ordinary person in extraordinary circumstances.

And for the person to survive the extraordinary circumstances, they have to become an extraordinary person. Sometimes they don't, PS. They don't all end well.

But to me, that's horror, and I and it really and the more that I sort of, you know, I've been talking about it a lot more, but now that this book is out, I realized that one of the reasons I'm drawn to horror is, you know, I can't think of a better sort of analogy for being a queer kid in a small town, right?

Like I, you know, you're in extraordinary circumstances. You're an ordinary, what you believe is an ordinary person. And to, you know, get out you gotta, you've gotta be able to be extraordinary.

And so, yeah, so I think so, I think that's both sort of for me, what makes horror and it's also what makes me drawn to it as a human being.

Rob Loveless

You talked about your relationship with the horror genre previously.

Can you tell us a little bit more, though, about some of the early works you did and what inspired you to fuse horror in there, even if it if it might have not seemed like the most popular genre to go with?

Sean Abley

Well, it's funny because I one of the earliest things that I did in high school. You know, I was in the drama club, and we were going to put on a variety show and write sketches.

And I remember a sketch that I wrote was a, it was like a, it was like a TV show where you could write in and have them do something to to your request.

And one of them was to make a pair of cowboy boots out of ET. And so, the action was going to be like taking an ET doll, you know, one of those bigger ones, and like cutting it off stage. I mean, that's, that's like my freshman or sophomore year in high school.

And even before that, I still have the story now that I think about it. You know, I was reading Stephen King before I should have been reading Stephen King. Like, the first Stephen King book I read was The Stand, and how old was I, like, 12 at the time, and I remember writing a short story because I also I produced fanzines.

We called them back then. Now they call them zines. We called them fanzines back then, and I collected them, and I made my own, and one of the things I wrote for it was this story called Two, Two, Two Mints in One, which was an advertising slogan at the time, and it was a story about how commercials were made with people that had been basically zombified.

So very early on, like from the earliest of early, I was like dabbling that. By the time I got to Chicago and started the theater company you know, I was really steeped in comedy at the time as well.

But I what was happening in Chicago at the time was there was a lot of pop culture media being translated to the stage. There was a company called The Annoyance Theater Company.

They're still around as well. They got very famous for being the home base for the real-life Brady Bunch, but they did a ton of this pop culture stuff, and I really, like was all starry-eyed about them, and so I wanted to do the same thing. So that's why my first play was Corpse Grinders, which is a horror movie.

But moving from there, I, you know, I, I don't know. I just always was drawn to adding horror stuff, you know, I wrote the first really big hit for our theater company was a play I wrote called Attack of the Killer Bees. And it's all like, you know, 15 B movies all rolled into one plot.

And I wrote that in four days over a Christmas break, where I was house-sitting for someone. I was still living in the theater at the time, but it was freezing cold in the theater, and some friends took pity on me and let me house-sit for them over Christmas, and I had nothing to do, and so just over four days, I wrote this play, and it turned into be like one of my biggest hits as a playwright.

And yeah, I don't know it just again I, I wish I could say it was planned so I could take some credit for some, some of my, like, career. But really, it was just what came out of me at the time.

And and it was really popular, you know, thankfully, and so from there, you know, I did, I adapted Santa Claus Conquers the Martians into a musical with some friends/ Trying to think what the other horror stuff I've written is.

But, yeah, I don't know. It, just it, it's omnipresent. And I there's just something. It's such a shiny object for me. I'm just drawn to it every time.

Queer Horror (27:07)

Rob Loveless

In past episodes, we've talked about horror tends to appeal to the LGBTQ+ community, since there are usually themes of otherness that we can relate to.

And you just touched upon that as well, that horror usually takes a ordinary person in an extraordinary circumstance.

And that's a good metaphor for, you know, maybe a queer child in a small-town area where they're not understood. So, over the years, you know, we've seen some horror stories that are very queer-coded.

Now we have some films that are explicitly queer. So, in your own words, can you explain a little bit further how you think the horror genre and queer identities intersect each other?

Sean Abley

Sure, I think one of the biggest examples, and this is one that I've actually sort of rebelled against for a long time, although it was put in perspective for me by a good friend, Michael Varrati when we were on a panel together.

So, I think if you talk to any gay man over a certain age and be like, what's, you know, the horror film that speaks to you? They'll all say, Carrie, right? It's the girl who's special.

No, you know, parents don't like her specialness. Other kids don't understand her specialness. Eventually, she takes revenge on the bullies, and I totally understand that, right?

Like who wouldn't want to be able to take revenge on the bullies? Although I'd probably save cutie pie John Travolta and just use my mental powers to make him kiss me, but, but what we often don't acknowledge about Carrie is that she dies in the end.

And and I think that that really is a great example, actually, of where we were, and to extent, maybe still are, as far as like, how we feel about how we fit in the world, like, you know, we know we're special.

People don't understand, eventually, we'll have the strength to, like, tell those bullies to eat shit and get back at them, but inevitably we feel like society will destroy us. And it's, it's sort of, you know, a sort of a Doom, you know, a doomed existence that we lead.

But in the me, but while we're here, we'll, you know, do what we can and be the most amazing people that we can possibly be, and you know, they'll regret it when we're gone.

I I'm glad that we are now at a point where we have enough movies, horror movies that, like the young queer people, can see films where that we don't die in the end, right?

Like, one of the things about doing this book, this queer horror book, is that I realized, you know, when we first started, it was going to be a couple hundred titles, and then as we started doing research, it was like, literally over a thousand titles.

And I realized that, yes, we've been there all along in these films, but also that horror films, queer horror films, have been fed poison for decades. We have been told that we aren't worthy of survival.

We've been told that we aren't smart or strong enough to survive to the end, you know, being the first out in every horror movie. Like, you know, it just the genre was betraying us for so long.

And, you know, holding up Carrie as, like, the best example of, you know, even though we die in the end, it just it really, it really, if you think, if I think about it too much, it makes it really sad, because I took such refuge in horror, right?

Like it's the thing that made me happy, and then I realized, oh my gosh, I was been fed poisoned this whole time.

And so, I'm glad that we now have so many, you know, out LGBTQ filmmakers that are making sure that we're in the films and that you know, that we're making sure that, you know, we survive and we have good representation.

So, I think it's the, you know, if we're, if we're going to go, you know, with the connection between queer people and horror, now is the great time like now is a great time to be a horror fan for young people because you can look at all that old bad representation and just sort of roll your eyes at how ridiculous it was.

And for people like me, who've been around for a while, we can sort of rejoice that our efforts have have made a difference, and we now have the stuff that we wish we would have had back then.

But the bigger, the bigger picture of, like, the relationship between queer people and horror, I think, is, is truly what I said earlier, that we can see ourselves in that narrative so easily and but in that narrative if we like, swap ourselves in for the final girl or something, we can also be the victor.

We can also, you know, rise above and, you know, I can't, I can't overvalue that enough. Am I saying that right?

I can't, I can't make that I mean that to me, is just invaluable. Invaluable. I'm not going to invent a word. I'll just say it's invaluable.

Rob Loveless

So, with that being said, though, how has your identity as a queer person shaped your perspective on horror?

Sean Abley

It's interesting because when I grew up gay, I was actually fine with being gay. I was fine with being gay from I knew I was gay from the minute you could know, like, I remember, like, pre-third grade, knowing.

You know, I lived in a liberal household, the word was spoken. I knew what it meant. It wasn't said derisively in my home. But I also was smart enough to know that where I lived and that I just needed to, like, keep my head down until I could, like, go off to college and live my big gay life.

So, I wasn't conflicted about it in the least. What I was conflicted about was being a horror movie fan, because gay people, I mean, what, you know, what, what, like, little sliver of gay that could make its way to my eyeballs, you know, as a child, like, was it René Auberjonois on Benson. Didn't he play a gay guy?

Or, like, you know, there was, like, the gay side, oh no, he was in, he was in Eyes of Laura Mars, playing the gay guy. But I think there, there was a gay character on Benson, I think.

Anyway, you know, that gay people liked, you know, nice things and the finer things, and they were fussy and, you know, fastidious and, and that wasn't me.

I liked, you know, I flipped open the first issue of Fangoria and saw, or maybe was a second issue, you know, pictures from a Herschel Gordon Lewis movie like, you know, was somebody laying On the beach with their brains ripped out and, and, you know, watching Grindhouse movies that I could get my hands on and, and I just thought, no gay, I'm the only gay person who likes this.

No gay people like this. And so, I thought I was going to grow up to have, like, no gay friends that liked horror movies. And I didn't know what I was going to do about that.

And so, I don't know if horror influenced my me being gay, but my being gay influenced my consumption of horror.

And then eventually that changed when Clive Barker came out, and that was a big deal and but it was also not a big deal. I remember Tony Timpone, who is the editor for Fangoria, wrote this long editorial about so Clive Barker came out, who cares?

Like it was, you know, he's a genius filmmaker. That should be the least interesting part of him.

And that's when it all sort of changed for me, like, really, it's, you know, and through that, Fangoria again, Fangoria has been such I've been reading it since issue number one Fangoria has been a really big part of my life, that I wrote a letter to Fangoria, thanking them for that and for that editorial and said, Please print my address so I can correspond with other gay horror fans.

And I got letters from I mean, but this is back when we wrote letters, right? So, I got letters from people, and I kept up with correspondence with a lot of, like, gay horror fans for a while, and as a matter of fact, all these years later.

So that would have been like, let's see. I left Chicago in '97, we started The Factory in '92, so this would have probably been 1994, one of those people just came to my book signing two, three weeks ago here in Los Angeles.

Like we've, we've met each other in person over the years. We've kept in touch all this time.

So, yeah, I think it's sort of, it is interesting because I think most people, it is truly, you know, how has, you know, horror influenced your, you know, your gayness or whatever.

And I think I'm sort of the opposite, a rare case maybe, of it being the opposite.

Rob Loveless

It's interesting your answer too, because I got into the horror genre probably ninth or tenth grade in high school, and I had been interested in scary movies before that, but I would actually get legitimately scared and then not sleep afterwards.

So started getting into it where I wasn't, like, scared of it around then, but around that time, I was deeply closeted. I didn't know that I was gay. I didn't wonder if I was gay.

For me, it was more so like, a fear, like, I can't be gay. And that's a podcast episode for another day, even though I pretty much talk about in every episode.

But the whole point of that is, while I didn't necessarily recognize my sexuality, I did notice, like I would try to gravitate towards things that wouldn't be seen as quote-unquote stereotypically gay.

So, I thought, you know, horror movies that's very macho. You know, people are getting killed and stuff. Guys watch these.

But it's interesting though, that subconsciously, there are all these queer undertones in that, and even just in how they depict characters.

Because, you know, of course, there's always the beautiful woman with the big breasts that they're showing, you know, topless at the beginning being the first kill.

But then I was like, looking at her boyfriend, who was shirtless, running away, and that's where I was more drawn to.

So even though I was trying to prove to myself, like, oh no, I'm macho, I like horror movies. I wasn't, you know, I think I was seeking out the subconscious queerness without recognizing it.

Sean Abley

Yeah, you know, it's funny, because it's so true. There's so many boobs in horror movies that when you would see male nudity, oh my goodness, it was just like, imprinted on my brain.

Like, there's a Friday the 13th, where there's a kill in a tent when this couple is making out, and they actually show the guy's bare ass, you know, stuff like that.

It was like, you know, 15 seconds maybe, but it's on, like, the permanent highlights reel in my brain.

Rob Loveless

And it's funny, too. Looking back at so many movies that definitely, I don't know, I don't know if the directors knew what they were doing if it was just a happy accident, but I'm starting to watch some more of the classic horror movies.

You know, I watched a lot as they came out around my time. But I'm going back to some of, like, you know, old, old ones, like, you know, House on Haunted Hill, things like that.

And then some of the more, like modern classics, like the 80s. And I watched Sleepaway Camp for the first time a few months ago.

And there's that, you know, baseball scene where it's like the, I think they're young adults, like the camp counselors, and they're wearing their crop tops and tight denims.

I'm like, all right, you can't tell me this is not, not gay, you know?

Sean Abley

Yes, you wonder. But also, you know, having been sort of that age at that time, that was the style, like that sort of booty, short crop top thing was actually what like straight dudes would wear.

I just, I think it's hilarious, and I love that that is the reference. Because if ask any horror gay, and they'll be like, so, like, if you had to pick some guys from a horror movie like Sleepaway Camp, Sleepaway Camp baseball scene.

Rob Loveless

I know it was just and I was watching with one of my friends who had also never seen it, who's also gay, and we both said the same thing. We're like, oh my god. Like, hello. Like...

Sean Abley

Right, where are those men now?

Rob Loveless

Exactly, I was trying to find them because I wanted to know, I'm like, Are these guys actually gay, though?

Because, like, they're just, you know, again, like you said, that was the style, because even, um, Johnny Depp in Nightmare on Elm Street, he has that crop top and, like, the sweatpants style and everything.

But I'm like, you know what happened to some of these guys? Like, where are they at now?

Sean Abley

I do that deep dive too. You know, I guess we can thank things like LinkedIn and Facebook and like, you know, you can sort of find people and then put together, like, all the clues just to see.

But, you know, then some people, some of them, turned out to be gay. Like, I think Russell Todd is out.

Which one was he in? I can never remember the numbers anyway, but like, he's a super-hot daddy these days running around West Hollywood.

Rob Loveless

Yeah, I know it's interesting when you see those horror movies from the day and you like, try to get the vibe. Like, I think there was I watched Prom Night with Jamie Lee Curtis because I had seen the remake that came out when I was in high school, but I saw the one with Jamie Lee Curtis last summer.

And I think her date, or one of the more prominent guys in it, was actually gay in real life. That kind of gave off a little vibe there in it. And then there's obviously Jesse from Nightmare on Elm Street 2.

And I think the one guy from Sleepaway Camp is because I couldn't find confirmation, but his Instagram is like very like interior design and, like, fashion, chic heavy.

So, I'm thinking, I mean, again, that's kind of stereotypical assumption, but maybe it's wishful thinking too.

Sean Abley

Sometimes the stereotypes are come from truth. And quite frankly, how is it an insult to say that someone is good at design or, like, making women look beautiful with makeup and hair?

Like, to me, that's like, great, no, well, I'll take it Yes. I wish I had those skills, right?

Gay of the Dead (41:07)

Rob Loveless

Well, shifting gears a little bit. You did mention your blog, Gay of the Dead that was hosted at Fangoria. I think that was 2009 when you debuted it, right?

Sean Abley

Yes, it was 2009. Tony Timpone, who was the editor at the time I had made, befriended him over the years, seeing him at conventions and and he had been very kind, promoting my movie Socket around that time.

And, you know, the mid-2000s were when gay horror, as we called it at the time. Now we call it queer horror, but then it was mostly just gay horror was starting to become a thing, and I was part of that scene, and he reached out to me.

Out of the blue, I was on the set of, like, a really miserable reality TV show that I was working on, and I just was like, this is the worst. And I got a text. I mean, he's like, give me a call. And I called him.

He's like, I'm literally on set, like, over in a corner, like, what's up? And he's like, how would you like to write a gay horror blog for Fangoria? And that was the I'd had yet to write for Fangoria.

And so, like, that was that dream coming true. Like, absolutely, yeah. And that's and it started, and it, I didn't know exactly what I wanted it to be. If you look at the first, I mean, it's not online anymore, but if you look at the first couple entries in it, I was just sort of trying to find my way.

And then it hit me like I should be interviewing people. I should be like shining a light on actual people. And then it took off.

Rob Loveless

And tying it back to Sleepaway Camp, I saw that recently. Well, it's recently to me, but September 2021 is now, actually three years ago. In my mind, it was just last year. Crazy how time flies.

Sean Abley

Right. Well, pandemic to me. If I say last year, I actually mean 2019.

Rob Loveless

Yeah.

Sean Abley

Last year, when we Yeah.

Rob Loveless

Right? Well, September 2021, your column took a look at a very queer classic Sleepaway Camp, which we had talked about, and you covered it in one of your columns called Problematic Films, which discusses the more troubling elements of some older horror films that may not stand up to today's societal standards.

So, can you tell us more about this column, and you're writing for Fangoria?

Sean Abley

Sure. So, I, I, you know, sort of bounce back and forth between writing for the website and writing for the magazine, although I haven't written anything for the website in a little while.

But that column was I am I am against films being sent to film jail, but I also acknowledge that Sometimes things we love have an expiration date. But also, sometimes things that we felt were problematic at a time, now may not be so.

Like you know, a film is preserved in amber as a piece of art, but the viewing experience, the way we consume it, is not because, you know, literally every second we're changing.

Every five minutes we're every minute we're changing. So, we're a different person. So, society is different. So, the context within which we see art is going to color how we, you know, consume it.

And so, my goal with that column was to sort of pull some films forward and look at them with today's eye and acknowledge what would not be great back then, but also maybe, you know, re-contextualize the films.

And Sleepaway Camp, I think is, is, I don't want to pat myself on the back for picking the perfect film, But Sleepaway Camp was kind of the perfect film for this analysis, because, and this isn't my unique, unique take on it.

I actually first read it; Harmony Colangelo wrote an essay on the film that really opened my eyes about it. Which is, if you know Sleepaway Camp, and you know the you know the ending, and we're gonna spoil it, because it's, you know, how old is the movie?

You know Angela, the young girl in the movie, is actually not, she's been she's actually a boy who's been forced to live as a girl. And that's revealed in the final moments of the film.

And have and being forced to live that way is caused her to be a murderer, basically, is like Carrie, you know, she's dispatched all of the bullies. And then we don't really know what happens to her the end. Well, we do, because she's in the next two movies.

But if you you know, when the movie first came out, it was like, ah, transgen, well, transsexual was the word we used then. Transsexual killer. You know, transsexual is inherently crazy, and so that's why, like they're the killer.

But if we look at it today, more nuanced and with more little more detailed eye, yes, she's less trans and more forced feminization, right? That's sort of a term from the Fetish community, forced feminization. She's been forced to live as a girl. She's not, she doesn't identify as a girl.

She's been forced to do this and so, while, yes, that can be on the trans spectrum, it's not representative of transgender people like she's not a transgender person.

And so, in that sense, we can look at it now in a time when a film like that doesn't have to answer for every you know, slight that transgender people have suffered at the hands of filmmakers over the years.

And we can, like, say, okay, maybe this isn't as problematic as we once thought it was, and which is my opinion. And you know, we all get to have our opinion. We can all, we can disagree. That's fine.

But I also look at it like, if you know, we're at a time where there's so much more queer content happening in horror movies, and yet, there's a movement to take everything that has anything queer in it, off bookshelves and off video store shelves, and like silence those voices.

So, it's important to me that we like look backwards and we pull forward anything that we can that has queer content in it, that we can contextualize as either positive or neutral because we need to make it as hard as possible for those people to take everything off the shelves.

You know what I mean? Like, we not only need to be making movies that are just like queer, queer, queer, queer, queer, but we also need to be pulling forward maybe some of their favorites, and being like, Nope, this, this belongs here too.

So, I don't want to get too high-minded about that, about that column, but that's, you know, that's sort of my overall philosophy about it is, is that is, was my reason to sort of examine these films.

Rob Loveless

Going from Fangoria, can you walk us through the evolution of Gay of the Dead?

Sean Abley

Sure, Gay of the Dead was the original title for my blog back on Fangoria.com in 2009. I'm a huge zombie fan. Dawn of the Dead is my favorite horror movie of all time, original flavor, although I do like the remake, and I just wanted it, my the title to be have something to do with zombies.

I, you know, I didn't want to do Sean of the Dead. And although Day of the Dead is not my favorite, I think, you know, it just works with Gay of the Dead, so people get it.

And so, it started out like I said, I was sort of started finding my way, and I was writing about movies a little bit, and then I took this hard turn to interviewing creators, and did that for several years on the Fangoria website, and then those initial interviews became a book called Out in the Dark.

And that, when did that come out? Was that like 2011, 2012? It's out of print now, but the so, so I did that for a while at Fangoria.

Fangoria went through some changes, went through some ownership changes, I moved on for a little bit to like writing for like Shock 'til You Drop and Blaster and a couple other Chiller TVs, you know, their website.

And then I came back to Gay of the Dead recently-ish, because so back in the day when I first started the blog finding filmmakers to go on the books as queer in an interview was difficult.

Like, I really had to work to find these folks. Now, like people are just like crawling, you know, falling all over themselves to let you know that they're gay, right?

And so, I saw an opportunity to not only go back and re-interview all my original subjects but then, of course, add to them. So that original book had, well, the original book had not only filmmakers, but it had authors, and it had actors.

And that was honestly to fill out the book like, that's how few people I had to put in the book. I had to like, well, the publisher wanted me to put authors in there, and I put actors in there, just to sort of fill it out.

So, taking out the authors, taking out the actors, I had, like, maybe 20 interviews in the book of filmmakers. And now I'm now Gay of the Dead has transformed to a Patreon, which will eventually be a book.

And right now, in the queue, I have 50 interviews, and with a bunch more that I haven't even touched, like people I haven't even approached yet, like another dozen probably. So yeah, I saw an opportunity to like, let's, let's do something with this.

And so, the Patreon Gay of the Dead the Patreon is me rolling out the next book, chapter by chapter each week. So, for five bucks, you get four chapters of the book, and then the book book should be published in mid-2025.

This version is also, I'm calling it a coffee table zine, because the layout, it's a it's like a coffee table book. It's got tons of photos and stuff. But, you know, I'm doing the design, and I am a design enthusiast.

I'm not a trained like a graphic designer, but, you know, I know my way around some Photoshop and stuff. And so, I'm basically putting together a book that I think looks fun and has great content with these interviews, some of which span from back in 2009 to like, being updated like yesterday.

Like they're, you know, they're career-spanning interviews. Yeah, and I'm really loving it. I have to say, I'm really enjoying, like, talking to all these folks and having people be so much more open.

I don't know. It just makes me feel good. It also makes me feel like I've been in this for a long time. When I think about having written for Fangoria for 15 years. Like, what else have I done for 15 years?

Rob Loveless

That's awesome. It sounds like you've built quite a community within the horror genre there, especially queer horror between, you know, starting off in 2009 when it was difficult to find those queer creators to now, like you said, having them crawling to let you know. Like, hey, I'm here. I'm queer. Put me in your book.

Queer Horror Community (52:20)

Rob Loveless

And in addition to some of the community building there, in 2014 you also created the Queer Horror Panel at San Diego Comic-Con. Can you tell us a little bit more about that?

Sean Abley

Sure, I'm trying to remember how. So, Prism Comics is the organization that sort of facilitates that with Comic Con, and Ted Abenheim reached out to me.

And I'm trying to remember, honestly, I can't remember how we made contact, but somehow, he knew that I was like the queer horror person, and asked if I wanted to do a panel. And I said yes. And so, I got, I think that first panel was Jeffrey Reddick, Brian Fuller, oh, who else was that?

Was, was JT Seaton on that one too? I'd have to look at, there's a photo and Guinevere Turner, forgive me if I'm forgetting you on that panel. Oh, Mark Bessinger, anyway, so I just reached out to the people that I knew, and were like, hey, do you want to be in a panel at Comic-Con? You get a free pass.

And it had never been done before. Andy Mangel's Gays and Comics gay comic panel had been going on forever, but there wasn't a lot of, you know, gay content at Comic-Con. And so, they approved the panel, and they put us in a room that was like, I don't know if you've been to San Diego Comic-Con, but it's in their convention center.

And it was in a room that was like, literally, like the suburbs of the convention center, like the furthest away from anything you could possibly be near like it was so far away. And, you know, my expectations were low. You know, they never done, like, who's going to come to see this?

And the room was packed, packed with people, and I hadn't even announced, like, Brian Fuller, who was, like, the most famous guest, like he came. He literally just showed up the on the I'd asked him, but I hadn't gotten a response yet, and he just showed up on the day.

So, we weren't even, like, riding on the fact that, like, super famous people were going to be there. It was just the subject matter. And it was so great. I can't tell you how great it is to be in a room full of gay nerds and your gay nerd-safe space like I could proudly consider myself one of them.

And it was just really great, and we had such a fun time. And, you know, it was needed. It just, it really, like, like, the light bulb went off, like, this is needed, right? And when people talk about, you know, there's a lot of discourse about, is it a horror community, or is it just a fandom?

I say community. I feel like it's a community. I feel like you can't feel anything but being a community when you go to these panels. And yeah. And so, I did that for several years, and then I went to grad school, and so I handed it off to my friend, Michael Varrati.

Michael, that's your second mention, if you're listening, second mention today. And he took it and ran with it, and he, you know, continues to make it like a must-see panel every year.

I came back, I got invited back to be on the panel this summer, you know, because Michael is one of the contributors to the book as well. And so, we were the, you know, there to promote the book and stuff. And so, I and again, room packed. They sold out. They had to, like, not let people in. It was so fun.

It's one of, you know, I went back to Comic-Con for the first time this year. You know, pandemic killed it for a couple years. And also, it just gotten so big that it was not as fun for me, you know? I don't necessarily love crowds.

And the internet ruined being able to get any sort of deal in the vendor room, like, if people don't sell it there, like, back when I back in my day, when I first started going to Comic Con, you know, they didn't have an option to sell this stuff online. And so, you could get real deals, like on the Sunday, right?

And so, I just, I'd stopped going, and I was only going to the smaller ones, like the Anaheim or Long Beach, but I went back for this, and it was just so great because I'd, what I'd forgotten about Comic Con was that everybody's there to have a good time, everybody's in a great mood.

Like, it's not if you're there to look down on it or like, be superior to the nerds, you will not have a good time.

And you can tell like you just look like the biggest asshole in the world if you're like, they're like, rolling your eyes. It's nerd safe space, and it just not to get too woo-woo about it, but it really was what I needed at the moment of just being like filled with this community of like, weirdos all being their weirdoest, because you can there, and I just, I don't know. I just love it.

Rob Loveless

And I agree with what you're saying. I think queer horror is more than just a fandom. I do think it's a community because I've been able, you know, there's so many different outlets there.

I've connected with a few different people as well for collaborations on episodes. And it really, it does feel like a community, like a supportive community, where people love to just geek out on these things. You know, talk all things horror, queer horror, all of that.

And actually, funny enough, you had mentioned Michael Varrati before. This is actually, while it's the second time you mentioned him, I actually, two weeks ago, had recorded an episode with Bobby Torrez for another Halloween-themed episode, and he mentioned him too.

So, I might have to have Michael Varrati on in the future. Maybe next October. It's like a Beetlejuice thing. You say the name three times and he appears.

Sean Abley

Right? And then you'll never get rid of him.

Rob Loveless

Yeah. All right, Michael Varrati, if you're listening. Well, anyway, circling back to the community piece. You've really, I mean, I think you've really established a queer horror community through your writing, Comic Con, playwright, all these things.

Queer Horror Insights (58:10)

Rob Loveless

I do want to circle back on the Gay of the Dead Patreon, and how you've doing some interviews with queer filmmakers. From these conversations, what have you learned about the horror genre?

Sean Abley

Wow. What have I learned about the horror genre? That's such a good question. I wonder what I've learned about the horror genre. You know, the interviews.

My goal with the interviews is not only to talk about horror but just to talk about what they go through as queer people, right? Because when I first started, it started the Gay of the Dead blog, so many young people, like, thank you for this.

Thank you for putting people out there that I can read about, you know, thank you for putting people's stories out there. And so that I honestly, I lean really hard into that in these interviews.

Like, they always start out with, like, what was it like growing up gay and that kind of thing? I think for me, I don't know, maybe, maybe what I've learned is not necessarily something specific about the genre, but it's just to appreciate the different approaches to it, right?

Like I you know, we all have our personal likes and, you know, preferences. And I think in this age of like, everybody has a megaphone, we can get very like, you must do this in your horror movie. This movie didn't do this, but they have to if they want X, Y, and Z.

And I think listening to these filmmakers talk about how they put their films together and their vision for things, I've I have, like, had my eyes opened to what's great about things that maybe weren't my favorite genres previously, and I've become very forgiving about, like, what makes a good movie.

So, so maybe less about horror specifically, and more just about being a person receptive to another person's art and meeting that art where it is.

Queer Horror: A Film Guide (1:00:12)

Rob Loveless

And then, in addition to these conversations, you also have touched upon your book that recently came out, Queer Horror: A Film Guide.

So, can you tell listeners a little bit more what they can expect from this?

Sean Abley

So, if you are looking for a book with almost a thousand capsule summary reviews of horror movies that have LGBTQ content in them, have I got the book for you.

Yeah, Queer Horror: A Film Guide. It is think of something like a Leonard Moulton film guide, or, you know, one of those things, but a lot more specific, but also, I think, more extensive.

So there's, I created the book, I co-edited with Tyler Doupé, and we had, there was a group of eight of us that actually wrote the book together, and people of the eight of us, you know, most of us picked films that we enjoy, and so you'll find really great, not only like, you know, plot synopses, but like historical context and critical, you know, critique in these essays for again, almost a thousand movies.

What's really great is there's eight different voices in the book. So, like, if, and there's an appendix that lists every entry that by sorted by author of that entry. If that makes sense.

So, like, all the ones that I wrote are like, in a list, and all the ones that Tyler wrote in a list. So, if you have a specific writer that you enjoy, their style you enjoy you can, like, just follow them through the book.

But mostly it's, you know, it's a great like, pick it up and read for a little bit. Film guide about horror movies. You know, it's, it's, um, you know, am I? Am I describing this accurately?

You've got the book. I mean, at the at the end of the day, it's an encyclopedia of films, you know, that horror films that have LGBTQ content in them. But it's not quite as dry as that might seem, because we because, although it's an academic examination, none of us who wrote it are like true academics, but we are all film, you know, historians and archivists.

So, there's like, fun information about the films and how they were made, and they're, you know, just what's in them, critical, you know, critical context, all that stuff.

I'm, here's the thing I'm avoiding saying it's a bathroom book, but it's a great bathroom book. It's a great bathroom book. You can, like, open it up and read a couple entries and, like, put it down and pick it up later. So yes, I'll cop to it. It's a great bathroom book.

Rob Loveless

Well, I keep it on my dining room table, and it is a great encyclopedia. I've been reading through it as part of, uh, dictating my spooky season watches this year.

So, I've been, I wish I was a little bit further through it, but grad school has been taking up a big chunk of my time. I'm only halfway through the B's, but I've been enjoying it because I find that, you know, I always want to find something like queer horror, but if you just do a Google search of queer horror movies, it's usually bringing up, like, the same 10 every time.

And not that they're not good. But there's, I know, there has to be so much more out there.

So, this, really, I mean, it's, it's a thick book with two C's, so it's, it's got everything covered, everything you could want from queer horror.

Sean Abley

Yeah, it's almost 500 pages long. It's 300,000 words, which, if you're in the book publishing industry, you're like, what? That's actually a big book.

I didn't realize that was a big book when we handed in the manuscript. Yeah, it's, you know, it's not complete. I'm not gonna say it's definitive because we did stop at 2021. That was the year, you know, films made up through 2021 was the cutoff.

And we have a whole, you know, appendix in there of films that we just didn't have room or time to put in. And that's another couple hundred films right there.

And I have already gotten some emails. Hey, my favorite film insert film title here isn't in the book. And I'm like, please refer to the part in the book where it says that we missed a few but, I mean, I love it.

I mean, I love that people are that engaged in it. And certainly, if we do, like a volume two or an update, all that stuff is invaluable information.

Rob Loveless

So, if you get the book and read it and love it, send those emails to Sean. If you're talking about something that's not included in there, keep it to yourself.

Sean Abley

I do. I mean, maybe I should, like, soften that a little bit, because I do, you know, I do want to know, like, when we did the research for the first, for the first for for the book, like it was just us combing the internet, right?

Like, just like for, you know, taking recommendations and just like it was just to find titles, right? So, you know, we got a thousand of them, but, but we weren't probably as methodical in the beginning as as maybe we should have been.

Yeah, so I, you know, I don't know. I don't want to downplay our effort, because they were, they were gargantuan, and the internet is the Wild West, so it's hard to get a rope around that, but so yeah, we we just combed and combed and combed the internet, and got to a point where, like, people need what we have right now.

Spooky Season Celebrations (1:05:36)

Rob Loveless

Awesome, and shifting gears a little bit from your work to just you as a lover of the horror genre. How do you celebrate spooky season?

Sean Abley

You know, I almost because I'm also Irish, and I kind of look at it almost like and I'm also gay. So, I look at like, St Patrick's Day, Pride, and October sort of the same way. It's like, I'm this all year round, so now it's amateur hour. You know what I mean?

For for how, for spooky season, the one thing that I do every year now I'm doing things a little differently because I'm, you know, a content creator, and I put that in the most like, you know, eyeball rolling, air quotes, I can possibly put it in. I'll be doing like movie recommend.

Like during Pride, I did a bunch of, you know, gay horror movie recommendations, and I'll probably be doing a bunch of movie recommendations for October.

But on Halloween itself, I either kick my husband out of the house or rent a hotel room. I watch horror movies only from the minute I wake up until like two, three o'clock in the morning, just one after another, and I have a big bowl of Halloween candy, and I have sugar soda and I have frozen pizza and tater tots.

I can have all the like, garbage, you know, teenage kid food, and stay in my pajamas all day. And that's it, that that's like, it's like Christmas morning/day. For me, I just literally indulge in that.

And I can't, like, alone. I spend it alone. I don't go out; I don't go to the parties. I just stay home and watch all the horror movies, and it's one of my I'm an introvert by nature, and it's just one of my favorite days here quite frankly. Sometimes if I stay at home and my husband is here, he has to be quiet.

He's not allowed to, like editorialize as I watch the movies. And he'll typically get to pick one. Like we get, he'll pick one around dinner time, and we watch that, and then he has to be quiet again and just watch whatever garbage I decide to watch.

And I usually have a theme, like, one year I did all Blumhouse movies, and I think this year I might do one year I did only movies I could find that were mentioned in an issue of Rue Morgue magazine. And then this year, it may be only Tubi movies. I'm fascinated by, by the low-budget splendor of Tubi.

And you know it's you would say it's where people send their cheap horror movies to die, but I say it's where they send their cheap horror movies to live. So I might do only Tubi movies this year. I don't know. Still thinking about it.

What Scares Sean? (1:08:29)

Rob Loveless

That's awesome. And when it comes to chills and thrills, does anything really scare you?

Sean Abley

1,000%. And here's the thing, I'm a chicken. Ah, the thing I don't like about spooky season is I don't like haunted houses. I can't do them. I cannot do a haunted house. I don't like people jumping out at me.

I don't if you've ever been to these haunted attraction, you know the theme parks, like the people running around with like, metal cans full of beans, shaking at them, you you know, them at you, and jumping out of the shadows. And I can't stand that stuff, so I like, pass on all the horror nights.

I do get like, I watched, I was by myself, and I watched Skinamarink in my home by myself at night with all the lights off, and then went to bed and I little legit was, like, nervous. Like, so yes, there are I, here's the thing, I don't love being scared.

So, for me, horror movies aren't about like, how scary they are. You know, like, I've watched enough horror movies now that you know, I know when it's coming, right? I know, like, oh, if all the sound drops out of the soundtrack that we're about to get some big thing or whatever.

So, like, if that's coming, I just look down because I know that it's about, like, stuff like that. Other than that, like, I'm claustrophobic, I'm afraid of heights, so just in life, those are scary. But also, if, like, people are, like, being buried alive, or, you know, dangled off a building in a movie that that's tough.

Yeah, I got thrown out of a raft in a class four rapids on my 40th birthday. And basically, rode that class four rapids in my life jacket, thinking I was gonna drown, and got pulled out of the water eventually. And so now, anytime I see anything water in movies, I'm like, totally like triggered, you know. So, yeah, those are the things that scare me.

Rob Loveless

So, stay away from movies with that in there.

Sean Abley

Oh yeah, yeah. No, anytime we go to the movies and there's some, like, you know, a big wave hits somebody, I just like, Oh yeah, it's the worst.

Rob Loveless

Have you ever seen the Hell House LLC movie series?

Sean Abley

Oh yeah, they're in the book. The, okay, there's one of one of the I think they're up to four now, right? I think number two or number three, I can't remember which one it is has a gay couple in it. So, they're in the book.

Rob Loveless

Oh, that's right in the second one.

Sean Abley

Yeah.

Rob Loveless

Yeah, I think the fourth one is coming out in October, so might be out now, by the time the episode comes out, but I watched so I found them recently.

My friend and I watched them, and we watched the third one too, where it's the how have you seen the third one with the House and the clowns moving around in there? I don't know what it was.

Something about that freaked us out. My friend actually ended up staying over my house that night. He stayed in my guest room. I stayed in my room because we're like, neither one of us can like sleep in our houses alone in our 30s, you know? But still it, it gave us a chill for sure.

Sean Abley

Yeah, there are movies that still just like, do it to me, and it's mostly the ones that are like, like I said, like Skinamarink that are little less, you know, axe murder running through the forest.

No, not scary, but like, weird, paranormal shit out of my control, that that doesn't have, like, a real-life, analog version that. Yeah, those are, those are the things that are scary for me.

Rob Loveless

I'll have to give that one another try because I put it on twice. But I was with friends, and I'm a talker, so I like the I like the movies where you can talk during it, like, oh, look, that person's running from the guy with the knife.

And so, I wasn't really getting a semblance of the movie because my big mouth was moving too much. So, I might have to try that again when it's like, just me by myself and I don't have anyone to talk to.

Sean Abley

Oh, you mean Skinamarink?

Rob Loveless

Yeah.

Sean Abley

Yeah. It's, it's, I think, I really do think it's a solo, a solo experience, even though it's a film that's like, released in theaters. If you get a chance, look up the proof of concept short that he did and watch that after you watch the movie because it adds a little context to the movie that I think isn't in the movie.

But once you see that short, you go, oh, okay, that makes more sense. I love a big swing. I love something weird, you know.

So, I would never try to make people love Skinamarink, but, yeah, I think it's, I think it's a solo. It's definitely like a late-night solo experience.

Rob Loveless

Definitely. And it's shot a little bit differently too, because you're, like, looking up at the ceiling and you hear like, whispers of people talking.

It's not your standard shot video, so you really need to be, like, focusing in on it, I think.

Sean Abley

Yes. And when it does show stuff, it's, it's disturbing when it, when it does, like, narrow in on something. Yeah.

Rob Loveless

Okay, that that might be going on after this interview then.

Sean Abley

Oh gosh, it's too, wait till it's dark. Wait till night.

Rob Loveless

Yeah. All right, well, if you get messages on Instagram for me at 3 am because I'm terrified, you know why. They're like, Hey, you're right. That was really scary. Shifting gears a little bit though.

The Future of Horror (1:13:37)

Rob Loveless

We covered a lot, obviously, in terms of, you know the horror genre. The good, the bad, the ugly. So, what would you like to see from the genre going forward?

Sean Abley

I think that, really, I don't know if I want anything specific. I think it's just so the horror genre is unique in that the fans are the filmmakers are the journalists are the, you know, that it's the one genre where everybody can be everything and remain everything else.

Like the the fan can become the filmmaker and remain the fan can be then become the journalist. Like can become the, you know, the academic and so we can create stuff in our ecosphere, and I think as we do that, obviously people come into it from the outside as well, and that's fine, but I think what I would like to see is that we continue to ask for more.

I am not averse to a popcorn movie, or some dumb low-budget something, you know, gore for gore's sake. I love all that stuff, and it definitely is, you know, part of my horror movie diet. But I also love this, this sort of art house stuff that's coming out right now.

And um, you know, I loved In a Violent Nature and Skinamarink. And, you know, these types of films that, really, you know, when we say push the boundaries, I don't mean like an extreme gore. I mean in, like, what you think an audience will put up with.

And I think that's good for our you know, it's very easy. You know, one of the things that is sad but true is that making a horror movie is like the easiest way into Hollywood, and it's one of the easiest way is to get your film seen, because there's a built-in audience for it, and we as a community have proven that we will consume like the cheapest shot on your iPhone made for $5 horror movie offered to us.

And so, there's, there can be a a temptation just to get in on it, right? That's fine, but I hope that we will also make sure that we let the like Jordan Peeles of the world know, I'm dropping his name like he's got any worries in the world, but letting the people like that make the Skinamarinks and the In A Violent Natures know that we appreciate what they're doing, and so not only will they make more, but other people will see that and be like, Oh, well, I've got this idea that I was worried that maybe wouldn't land because it's a little too like, nuanced or esoteric, whatever. I'm gonna give that a shot. That's what I would like to see.

Get Involved in the Queer Horror Community (1:16:25)

Rob Loveless

And how would you encourage listeners to get involved in the queer horror community?

Sean Abley

Well, like I just said, you know, the fans are the filmmakers are the journalists are the academics, like we do everything, so just be part of it. You know, just, just pick a lane.

You don't have to stay in that lane but just pick one. If you want to make a movie, make a movie. I you know there's, there are filmmakers that I've talked to, notably Joshua Pangborn and the Monster Makeup Guys who wanted to make a movie had never made a movie, didn't know about making a movie, but made a movie, and they're having success.

So just, sort of, not just sort of, just be part of it, honestly. Now it's it will be, you know, there are some brighter lights of the horror community that may seem unattainable, or it may seem a little cliquey or what have you, but you know, I think that there are other tables besides the cool kids' table that you can sit at, and that's where sometimes the more interesting people are.

So yeah, just if, if, if you are a person who loves horror, especially if you're queer, or you know, the horror community is very welcoming to queer people, just like, jump in somewhere, and then you'll, you'll, you'll find it.

Episode Closing (1:17:52)

Rob Loveless

And connecting it back to the tarot, Eight of Wands. Again, this is a very action-oriented card telling us to ride the wave. Let the energy take us forward.

Don't resist it and just trust the journey that it's taking us in the right direction. And as it relates to today's episode, don't be afraid to put yourself out there to find somebody who can match your freak.

Like we talked about, there is a huge queer horror community out there. Besides today's episode, we've talked about this in previous episodes, a couple weeks ago with Bobby Torrez, even last Halloween, with Ralph Anthony.

There is this huge space for queer horror lovers, creators, nerds. There's a space for us there. You know, a lot of times when people refer to the LGBTQ+ community, they typically associate that with the queer party scene.

And sure, that can be a place of community. But for a lot of people, they may not feel like they fit in there. So, it's really important to be mindful of all the other sub-communities that make up this large umbrella LGBTQ+ community.

And as we've talked about in so many episodes, queer horror has offered a space of representation, although not always perfect, and it's really evolved today, where now we do have these different venues.

Like Sean talked about, he's conducting interviews with queer film creators. He's hosted a queer horror panel at San Diego Comic-Con. There are podcasts, YouTube channels, now film guides.

There is so much opportunity. So obviously, the horror genre speaks to a lot of us as queer people, and it's not just something we have to sit in silos anymore, where we're watching these films and enjoying them ourselves.

We can find ways to connect with others who share this interest with us. So don't be afraid to take action. Don't be afraid to subscribe to a YouTube channel or Gay of the Dead Patreon or a podcast or going to some queer horror event.

Don't resist it. Let the energy flow. Take that action and really find ways to connect with others within this community.

Connect with Sean (1:19:32)

Rob Loveless

Well, Sean, thank you again. So much for coming on. This was a really fun episode. As we're getting towards the end of this, can you tell us a little bit about some of your future projects?

I know you mentioned, obviously Queer Horror: A Film Guide is out, and you mentioned the book coming out in mid-2025 we're looking at for the one with the interviews with queer filmmakers.

Anything else on the horizon listeners should keep their eyes open for?

Sean Abley

I have a pretty good track record with being in Fangoria Magazine, although I can never guarantee it.

So, keep your eyeballs out for that. I have probably a podcast, I say probably, but I know that I'm gonna do it, that I'm not gonna give all the details about right now, but let's just say that it will be a thoughtful examination of horror movies and yeah, that's, that's basically it right now.

I, you know, as as a person with a little ADHD, I always have a million projects that I think I'm going to get to, but those are the ones that I feel like are at the top of the list and will get done.

Rob Loveless

And where can listeners learn more and connect with you?

Sean Abley

You can definitely find me as Gay of the Dead just about everywhere, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Bluesky. Am I forgetting any of them? Oh, Patreon, the most important one. Patreon.

And just side note, my Patreon is forever in free trial mode, so you can get in there and look at it for a week without paying any money and see if you like it, and if you do, then you can stick around and it's only five bucks a month.

An Excerpt from Queer Horror: A Film Guide (1:21:06)

Rob Loveless

And to close out the episode, can you read us an excerpt from Queer Horror: A Film Guide?

Sean Abley

I sure can. Um, I would love to read a selection from this book. This is the entry that I wrote on The Shining which might surprise some people, is in this book:

"Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson), a writer and recovering alcoholic, takes a job as winter caretaker for the Overlook Hotel located high above the snow line in the Rocky Mountains. He brings his wife, Wendy, and son, Danny, and the trio prepare for the Colorado winter to snow them in trapping them in the hotel for months. Jack has high hopes for the seclusion.

He has writing to accomplish, and the lack of distractions will be a blessing. Unfortunately, the spirit-ridden hotel has other plans. The Shining, based on the novel by Stephen King, is included here for one brief but indelible moment in the third act of the film.

Once the hotel has taken hold of Jack, driving him to murderous madness directed at his wife and child, ghosts and visions flood the minds of all involved. Having been threatened with her life, Wendy is searching the hotel for her son when she's treated to a vision of a man in a bear costume performing fellatio on a man in a tuxedo.

Although this character and actor are uncredited in the film, in the novel, this man is Horace Derwent, the owner of the Overlook Hotel. Cue Wendy's shocked and disgusted reaction. This moment is included both in the book and the film as part of the depraved set dressing to establish the Overlook as a free-wheeling Sodom and Gomorrah in the snow.

Roger and Derwent's furry-inspired tryst is presented as just one of a myriad of exhibits meant to shock and disgust our poor heroine, letting her and the audience know that this place is the worst. For the record, the other pieces of evidence are murder and free ghost booze for alcoholics.

So why have we included Roger earning his employee of the month award in this book? This writer can only speak for himself, but as a 14-year-old gay in 1980 starved for any version of himself anywhere on a movie screen, Roger and Horace were a blip that let me know I was seen and reviled.

Those few seconds were immediately burned in my memory, and of everything I remember about the film, that scene is front and center. The queer cinema landscape has certainly improved since then, but some of us are still trying to escape the grip of that haunted hotel."

You may have heard me get a little emotional during that because it really, it really affected me as a kid, and I look back on that kid, and I just think what you were being told about yourself was such a lie, but it was by the genre that you love.

Rob Loveless

Thank you for sharing that. That was an amazing example. And once again, that is an excerpt from Queer Horror: A Film Guide by Sean Abley.

Sean, thank you again, so much for coming on today. This was an awesome episode.

Sean Abley

Well, thank you. I hope I've chipped away at your jadedness for at least a small amount of time.

Rob Loveless

Oh, absolutely. And you left me with some great movie recs I need to add to my list now.

Sean Abley

Aha, that's my secret agenda.

Rob Loveless

And once you're done listening to this episode, definitely check out the show notes to connect with Sean.

You are going to want to get a copy of Queer Horror: A Film Guide. It's going to be your essential guide for all horror movies for this Halloween season. Can't recommend it enough.

Connect with A Jaded Gay (1:24:33)

Rob Loveless

And you know the drill for A Jaded Gay. Any questions or feedback, you can reach out to me rob@ajadedgay.com. Please remember to rate, review, and subscribe. I greatly appreciate it.

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And remember: every day is all we have, so you got to make your own happiness.

Mmm-bye.

Outtake (1:26:00)

Sean Abley

I'm a writer. I have nothing to do except my husband, who's once again, making noise in the kitchen.

Sean's Husband

I'm thirsty.

Sean Abley

Why is why is water suddenly so loud? Like water is never loud, but only when I'm recording a podcast. It's like you're pouring, you know, a bucket of bolts into a metal pan.

Sean's Husband

I can be louder.

Sean Abley

Honey, go away. Feel free to keep that in. This is 20 years of being married.