TEXT BY MICHAEL MUSTO, PHOTOS BY MICKEY BOARDMAN | Celebrity lasts forever at Chiller Theatre Expo—the autograph show held every April and October at the Parsippany, NJ Hilton—where stars of your youth (and THEIR youth) greet their fans while selling photos and other wares to cement their eternal bond. Many of the stars have never stopped working—they’re still “hot”—they simply enjoy interacting with the people who’ve kept them in clover.
“I like doing these autograph shows,” one celebrity said to me. “It can be humbling. Or it can be humiliating, with every aspect of the human condition on display.” But he generally finds the experience a gratifying part of the fame game.
Through the years—starting with my first Chiller back in the aughts—I’ve gone to reconnect with my old faves (like Pam Grier, Tatum O’Neal, and Joan Collins) and also get to know stars I’d never met before (like Mother Dolores Hart, who abandoned Hollywood in favor of serving the Lord). Don’t worry, that doesn’t happen very often—and even if it does, Chiller generally lures them back in for a full weekend’s return to showbiz.
The celebrity fest provides a chance to remind yourself why you love this stuff in the first place—because of the people, whether it be the talented celebrities or the diehard fans, all of which approach the weekend with a driven passion. At the center of it all is organizer Kevin Clement, a genial ringleader for some glittery notables who simply want to be loved.
This time, Clement rounded up fun comedy names (Steven Weber, Cathy Moriarty) as well as a reunion of some Back to the Future stars, an assortment of offbeat rockers, and Randy Quaid.
There was also a reunion for The Seduction, the 1982 thriller co-starring slinky Morgan Fairchild as a TV anchor being stalked by an obsessive lensman (Andrew Stevens). Alas, Colleen Camp—who played Morgan’s friend—wasn’t there on Sunday, when I went. I asked Morgan how long they shot the hot tub scene where she kissed screen husband Michael Sarrazin for what seemed like hours while the characters were in severe peril. “We shot the whole night,” she recalled. “My skin was burnt from that. My lips were chafed!” What she liked about the movie was that it “turned the tables.” Fairchild, who’s the object of obsession, decides to pretend to want Stevens, in order to throw him off his game. Alas, the steamy result didn’t ignite a large screen career for either.
Propelled by Wings, however, Steven Weber has seemed to do everything, including Broadway, so it was nice to see him still commingling with the fans from behind a table covered with his body of work. At the center of the tabletop was the poster for Jeffrey, the 1995 gay sex comedy—“the movie that ruined your career,” I joked. He corrected me. “As a result of that movie, I helped a lot of confused guys out in the Midwest,” Weber remarked. “And so did I!” I shrieked, feeling silly.
Judith O’Dea was there—the lead screamer from George A. Romero’s Night of the Living Dead (1968). Judith said she wore a blonde fall in the film, and in fact, she didn’t have to wear it to the premiere because her real hair had grown out. Does she ever wonder if John Waters actress Mink Stole pilfered her look just a little bit in later trash classics? Thankfully, that hadn’t occurred to O’Dea at all; I don’t feel like stirring up any diva shit this holiday season.
Blonde bombshell Beverly D’Angelo was there to greet her pubic and I needn’t have announced myself by saying that way back in 1978, she had handwritten me a long letter arguing with a bitchy item I had written about her in After Dark magazine; Beverly remembered it like it was yesterday. And I had brought the letter with me! As we revisited it together, we agreed that it was great that she—a just-starting-out actress at that point—was both brave and smart enough to stand up for herself by showing me the humanity behind the bold-faced name. “You really educated me,” I beamed.
Joyce Bulifant was as delightful as her character, Marie Slaughter (Murray’s wife), on The Mary Tyler Moore Show. “Aren’t Murray and Marie the two most genuinely nice people on the show?” I asked Joyce. “Thank you!” she responded, sans filter. Did she ever feel weird that Ted’s babe, Georgette (Georgia Engel), had a similarly woozy speaking voice as Bulifant’s? “When we were both in the same room,” she remembered, “it was stereophonic sound. The reality is I was on two other shows at the time, so I couldn’t always do the episodes I was asked to do. Once, I was pregnant! So, they said, ‘We have to get a girlfriend for Ted who is not on two other shows.’ ” Voila—Georgia Engel.
I loved overhearing Bulifant then talking to a fan dressed like some kind of an Oscar Mayer product for Halloween. “Is that a colon or a hot dog?” she wondered, with smiling concern.
In another room, an unrecognizable Louise Lasser was sitting alone, without having gotten the proper production values from her support team. I didn’t get up the nerve to approach her, but let me now officially state, “I adore you, Louise Lasser! Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman changed my life!”
I had awkward interactions with Mena Suvari and Tara Reid—the fame-discordant hookups are not always magical—but as I left the event, there was already a lovely message from Beverly D’Angelo! A whole new letter! Life is good.
MICHAEL MUSTO | Musto is a columnist, pop cultural and political pundit, NYC nightlife chronicler, author, and the go-to gossip responsible for the long-running (1984-2013) Village Voice column, “La Dolce Musto.” His work appears on ChelseaCommunityNews.comas well as thedailybeast.com, and he is writing for the Village Voice(which debuted in April of 2021) and RAG Magazine (which debuted in October of 2025). Follow Musto on Instagram, via @michaelmusto.
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