Jaye Ferrone has no doubt a single screening of the 1957 Roger Corman film, "Attack of the Crab Monsters" will change peoples’ lives.
“But maybe not for the better," she said.
The movie, revolving around a team of scientists as they battle telepathic, radioactive crabs on a remote island, is campy and bizarre and the perfect film to show at Miss Baltimore Bombshell’s 1-year Anniversary B-Movie Party, at The Screening Room, 127 E. Congress, this Thursday, June 23.
A native New Yorker, with time spent in Maryland and Northern Virginia, Ferrone, whose stage name is Miss Baltimore Bombshell, spent her childhood with her father, uncles and grandfather, watching terrible science fiction and horror flicks.
“We used to make commentary and rip them apart,” she said. "We were like the original ‘Mystery Science Theater 3000.’”
Ferrone started watching B-movies again after picking up a DVD set of cult classics from an estate sale during the pandemic.
From there, “it spiraled out of control,” she said. “I started collecting weird B-movies, stuff my family hadn’t even heard of."
She befriended Screening Room Manager David Pike after her friend rented the downtown movie house to celebrate Ferrone's graduation from the University of Arizona.
Pike and Ferrone discovered they had similar interests, which led to the creation of B-Movie Night, a once-a-month affair showcasing the some of the best-because-they-are-the-worst movies ever made.
Their first screening was the 1957 film, “Plan 9 from Outer Space,” starring Bela Lugosi and shot by cult film director Ed Wood. The 1994 film, “Ed Wood,” starring Johnny Depp, was, in part, about the director’s struggles to get “Plan 9” made.
From there, Ferrone screened cult classics such as the original “Night of the Living Dead,” “Cat-Women of the Moon,” “The Crawling Eye” and “Killer Shrews,” a Ray Kellogg vehicle from 1959 about, you guessed it, killer shrews.
“People are still talking about that one," Ferrone said.
Thanks to local spots like Zia Records and Casa Video, Ferrone has an extensive collection of cult films that will keep the event going for the foreseeable future. Even her 96-year-old grandfather is in on the action.
“He is obsessed with this now,” Ferrone said. “He calls before the show to see what I am doing this month and calls after to see how it went.”
Ferrone said, with all that has gone on in the last few years, it is nice to be able to share a laugh and smile over a campy movie.
“It brings a little bit of levity back into all of our lives,” she said.
The B-Movie Party starts at 7 p.m. and includes the “Crab Monsters” screening, trivia, a costume contest and a performance from local psychobilly band The Reztones. Admission is $8.
More info: screening roomdowntown.com/b-movie-night
