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The evening kickoff will include a screening of the 1992 film Candyman with Q&A moderated by Rue Morgue Magazine editor Andrea Subissati

Salem, Massachusetts - February 14, 2023 - Named by MovieMaker Magazine as one of the “best genre festivals in the world,” Salem Horror Fest has announced the kickoff to their sixth edition with an opening night program to be held at the Peabody Essex Museum on Thursday, April 20, 2023.

The event will honor Hollywood legend Tony Todd for his groundbreaking performance originating the iconic role of Candyman from the 1992 film, subsequent sequels in addition to his towering filmography of more than 250 credits including Night of the Living Dead, The Crow, Final Destination with recurring roles in Star Trek: The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, The Flash, 24, Stargate SG-1, Scream: The TV Series.

Author and film critic Kier-La Janisse (House of Psychotic Women, Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched: A History of Folk Horror) will provide a keynote speech about the role of folklore in our history and culture followed by a special screening of the original Candyman and Q&A with Tony Todd moderated by editor and film critic Andrea Subissati (Rue Morgue Magazine, The Faculty of Horror).

“Few people embody the commanding presence, stature, and talent that Tony does. A Hollywood legend, yes, but also an educator with an extraordinary work ethic and kind soul. It is truly an honor to welcome him to Salem,” says festival director Kay Lynch. 2023 will mark an expansive return to pre-COVID levels of production. Previous opening night events honored esteemed guests such as Cassandra Peterson and John Waters.

Salem Horror Fest, in partnership with Cinema Salem and Bit Bar, will run Thursday, April 20 through Sunday, April 30 featuring dozens of premieres, filmmakers and special guests including Linnea Quigley, Amelia Kinkade, Geretta Geretta, William Ragsdale, Amanda Bearse, Stephen Geoffreys with live podcasts Faculty of Horror and Horror Queers. General Admission, VIP Meet & Greet packages and weekend passes are now available for purchase at salemhorror.com. Films, programs, and additional guests to be announced soon.

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ABOUT SALEM HORROR FEST

Salem Horror Fest is a celebration of diverse voices and innovative filmmaking within a genre that best reflects our cultural demons and anxieties. Named one of the World’s Best Genre Festivals by MovieMaker Magazine, the annual event has featured hundreds of independent filmmakers and Hollywood icons such as Cassandra Peterson, John Waters, Joe Dante, Linnea Quigley, John Kassir, Dee Wallace, Rachel True, Riccou Browning, and Ken Foree.

ABOUT PEABODY ESSEX MUSEUM

Over the last 20 years, the Peabody Essex Museum (PEM) has distinguished itself as one of the fastest-growing art museums in North America. Founded in 1799, it is also the country’s oldest continuously operating museum. At its heart is a mission to enrich and transform people's lives by broadening their perspectives, attitudes and knowledge of themselves and the wider world.

ABOUT TONY TODD

Tony Todd is perhaps best known for his chilling portrayal in the title role of CANDYMAN.

Since his film debut in the motion picture SLEEPWALK in 1986, followed almost immediately by a starring role in Oliver Stone's Academy Award winning film, PLATOON. This charismatic six foot five-inch-tall actor has consistently turned in compelling performance after compelling performance.

Tony has become a film icon in the horror and sci-fi realms starring in not only the CANDYMAN franchise, the HATCHET franchise, and also in the FINAL DESTINATION franchise of hit films. Films grossing more than $6 Billion at the box office worldwide have made the name Tony Todd box office gold. Tony has embarked upon his next great franchise staring in the film HELL FEST for producer Gale Ann Hurd.

Tony has added his unique talents to the films TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN, THE ROCK, THE CROW, LEAN ON ME, BIRD, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, and THE SECRET from the award-winning team of Erick Zonka and Virginie Wagon (Dream Life of Angels). A few of the smaller gem films that Tony has starred in have been MANSFIELD 12, THE MAN FROM EARTH, A NIGHT AT THE BIJOU, CHANGING THE GAME, and starring and producing the cult classic SUSHI GIRL. Tony has recently completed starring in the films WEST OF HELL alongside Lance Henriksen and renewed his relationship with CANDYMAN director Bernard Rose in the reimagined FRANKENSTEIN.

Tony has also made his impact on television having recently guest starred in RIVERDALE for the CW, ROOM 104 for HBO, recurring in SCREAM for MTV, and as the Number 1 villain ‘Zoom’ on the hugely successful CW series THE FLASH, as well as in the series DEAD OF SUMMER for Freeform. Tony has also made his presence felt on the hit CBS show HAWAII 5-0, and in the NBC series THE EVENT and recurred on two television series CHUCK for NBC and 24 for FBC. Some of Tony’s past guest starring television appearances include MASTERS OF HORROR, CRIMINAL MINDS, WITHOUT A TRACE, BOSTON LEGAL, NYPD BLUE, BOSTON PUBLIC, SMALLVILLE, LAW AND ORDER, CROSSING JORDAN, HOMICIDE, XENA, HERCULES, THE X-FILES, ANDROMEDA, as well as recurring roles on all three incarnations of STAR TREK.

Tony’s television movies include starring roles in TRUE WOMEN, THE BLACK FOX, BUTTER, THE LAST ELEPHANT, BABYLON 5: A CALL TO ARMS, and CONTROL FACTOR, just to name a few.

Tony Todd is not only an icon in the Horror/Sci-Fi world, but also in the animated and gaming worlds as well. Tony has voiced many animated characters in film, television, and games the most notable being CALL TO DUTY: BLACK OPS, TRANSFORMERS PRIME, JUSTICE LEAGUE, HALF LIFE 2, DOTA and MARVEL SUPERHERO SQUAD.

Tony's passion for acting began in theater, first at the University of Connecticut, and then at the renowned Eugene O’Neill National Theatre Institute. Tony was at the inception of the Trinity Rep. His theater credits include originating the title role of award-winning playwright August Wilson’s KING HEDLEY II. He also received a Helen Hayes nomination for his performance in Athol Fugard’s THE CAPTAIN’S TIGER.

Other theater credits include LES BLANCS, PLAYBOY OF THE WEST INDIES, OTHELLO, ZOOMAN AND THE SIGN, DARK PARADISE, AIDA (on Broadway), LEVEE JAMES for the prestigious Eugene O’Neill Playwrights Conference, Athol Fugard’s THE ISLAND, ‘Troy Maxon’ in August Wilson’s FENCES for the Geva Theatre Center, ‘Paw Siden’ in the world premiere of the Marcus Gardley play BLACK ODYSSEY at the Denver Center, and the one man show GHOST IN THE HOUSE as the late great world champ Jack Johnson. Tony made his return to the Hartford stage for the TheaterWorks production of Dominique Morriseau’s SUNSET BABY.

ABOUT KIER-LA JANISSE

Kier-La Janisse (1972-) is a Canadian film writer and programmer, founder of international horror school The Miskatonic Institute of Horror Studies and micro-press Spectacular Optical Publications. She has been a programmer for the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema and Fantastic Fest in Austin, Texas, co-founded Montreal microcinema Blue Sunshine, founded the CineMuerte Horror Film Festival (1999-2005) in Vancouver, was the Festival Director of Monster Fest in Melbourne, Australia and was the subject of the documentary Celluloid Horror (2005). She has mounted many site-specific screenings, activating film locations and showing films in a church, on a screen of snow, and with the audience in the water.

She is the author of A Violent Professional: The Films of Luciano Rossi (FAB Press, 2007) and House of Psychotic Women: An Autobiographical Topography of Female Neurosis in Horror and Exploitation Films (FAB Press, 2012) and contributed to Destroy All Movies!! The Complete Guide to Punks on Film (Fantagraphics, 2011), Recovering 1940s Horror: Traces of a Lost Decade (Lexington, 2014) The Canadian Horror Film: Terror of the Soul (University of Toronto Press, 2015) and We Are the Martians: The Legacy of Nigel Kneale (PS Publishing, 2017). She co-edited (with Paul Corupe) and published the anthology books KID POWER! (2014), Satanic Panic: Pop-Cultural Paranoia in the 1980s (2015), Lost Girls: The Phantasmagorical Cinema of Jean Rollin (2017) and Yuletide Terror: Christmas Horror on Film and Television (2017). She edited the book Warped & Faded: Weird Wednesday and the Birth of the American Genre Film Archive(forthcoming 2021), and is currently co-authoring (with Amy Searles) the book ‘Unhealthy and Aberrant’: Depictions of Horror Fandom in Film and Television and co-curating (with Clint Enns) an anthology book on the films of Robert Downey, Sr., as well as writing a monograph about Monte Hellman’s Cockfighter. 

She was a producer on Mike Malloy’s Eurocrime: the Italian Cop and Gangster Films That Ruled the ’70s (2012), Sean Hogan’s We Always Find Ourselves in the Sea (2017), Mike McKinlay’s Tights Worship: The Processes of THE RITA (2019) and David Gregory’s Tales of the Uncanny (2020), and wrote the fashion films S.W.A.L.K. and S.W.A.L.K. II (2020) in collaboration with designer John Galliano for photographer Nick Knight and Maison Margiela. In 2019 Janisse participated in the restoration and re-release of Harry Nilsson’s 1971 animated TV movie The Point, offering the use of her personal 16mm film print and contributing to several of the bonus features as a producer and editor. Her first film as director/producer, Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched: A History of Folk Horror is due out from Severin Films in 2020.

In 2020 she released a spoken word recording of Catherine Robbe-Grillet’s “Spike Heels” on the split cassette Introduction/Immersion with noise artist THE RITA, and began the podcast A Song From the Heart Beats the Devil Every Time, expanded from a proposed book project about cult kids film and television from 1965-1985. 

She has shared her genre film expertise as a guest speaker in documentaries ranging from Eli Roth’s History of Horror (2019/2020) to Lost Soul: The Doomed Journey of Richard Stanley’s Island of Dr Moreau (2014), and in classes, conferences and conventions across the globe. There is even a character named after her on Season 2 of Torchwood.