THE MOST BEAUTIFUL STILL OF THE MONTH

A regular feature of movie fan magazine Screenland was "The Most Beautiful Still of the Month". In the July 1936 issue the honor went to a Roman Freulich-lensed photograph from Dracula's Daughter. The still depicts Marguerite Churchill and Otto Kruger in a pensive moment from the film.

Freulich was a staff photograher for Universal. He was the brother of the head of Universal's photography department, Jack Freulich. In 1944 he became head of the stills department at Republic.

LUGOSI ON THE SET OF MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE

Another pre-code perversity was Universal's very loose adaptation of Poe's "Murders in the Rue Morgue". Bela Lugosi and director Robert Florey had both been ushered (no pun intended) from the production of Frankenstein and Murders in the Rue Morgue was their consolation prize. Even with the advantage of hindsight, it is hard to imagine that a Florey-directed Frankenstein would have eclipsed Jame Whale's, Arthur Edeson's, and Jack Pierce's creation of monsterdom's most iconic imagery.

Presented here is a two-page spread of an on-the-set photo from the filming of Murders in the Rue Morgue (Universal, 1932) from the February 1932 issue of Photoplay. Also seen in the shot is the Rue Morgue's murderous ape. Although Charlie Gemora designed and created the ape makeup, it appears in the photo to be more likely stuntman Joe Bonomo, who doubled for Gemora. Nearly a decade earlier, Bonomo had also doubled for Lon Chaney in The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

Included here are full-page ads from the February and March issues.

KARLOFF AND LUGOSI POSE FOR THE BLACK CAT

Universal's odd and perverse thriller, The Black Cat, had premiered just a couple of months earlier when this on-set shot of Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi appeared in the July, 1934 issue of Modern Screen magazine.