In 1952, Ben Chapman took the lead role in a new horror movie from Universal Studios and became a star; of course you wouldn’t recognize him because he was hidden under a rubber suit as the Creature From the Black Lagoon. Although Chapman is now retired, 81 years old, and living in Hawaii, he still travels the festival circuit signing autographs for fans of all ages.
First, it’s a real pleasure to meet you. You’ve certainly seemed to hold out a lot younger than some of the younger guys here; you’ve really taken them to school.
(Laughs) Well, I believe in the fans. The fans take the time to come down and see you, and I think you should be nice enough to stick around.
I read on the Internet that you started as a dancer. How did you get into that?
Well, I’m from an island called Tahiti, and my family was a show business family, so when I graduated high school in San Francisco, I headed down to Southern California and went into the business.
A lot of the feature work you did was as an extra in musicals. How did you end up in the Creature From the Black Lagoon?
I was under contract at Universal, and I came in one day, and a woman from casting asked me if the studio talked to me about this new movie about some kind of a creature in the Amazon, and I said, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” So I came back the next day to meet some people, and at the time I was getting $150 a week, and they bumped me up to $300 per week because I had to do some swimming. So it was as simple as that, that’s how I got the part.
What was it like it the suit?
It was comfortable, but a little hot. Ricou [Browning] did all the underwater stuff in Florida while Julie Adams, Richard Denning, Richard Carlson and myself shot on the sound stage in California, and that way we made the movie in eight weeks.
Do you have a favourite memory from the set?
We were a big family; there were no egos; there were no problems, you know. We showed up in the morning with big hugs and kisses asking what did you do last night, just a big family.
When you were doing the movie did you have any idea that this creation would join the Universal Monster family?
No idea, it was just another job.
At what point did you feel that Gill-Man was reaching legendary status?
Much later, when we started receiving fan mail we were like “Wow, this is really something.” Today, me and Julie still tour and we thank the fans, and a lot of celebrities don’t do that. We’re very grateful to our fans because without them the Gill-Man would have been dead and buried a long time ago, and we’re very grateful.
Every now and then there are rumblings about a Creature from the Black Lagoon remake. What are your thoughts on that?
I don’t believe in it. I think when a movie becomes a classic it should be put on a shelf and left alone because there’ve been a lot of remakes of classic movies and they come out really dumb.
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