KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park: The Cult Classic That Refused to Die

On October 28, 1978, with Halloween merely days away, NBC aired KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park as part of its “Saturday Night at the Movies” series. The movie starred KISS members Gene Simmons, Ace Frehley, Peter Criss and Paul Stanley, and was produced by Hanna Barbera. KISS was already a household name, unusual for a hard rock band during that time. The movie fell so far under critics’ radar that there are virtually no reviews of the movie from that time. In recent years, it’s been panned as “schlocky” and “just awful” and holds a mere 4.7/10 rating on IMBD. The movie’s mythology persisted, which could lead one to wonder how a hard rock band and a children’s production company created a production so unusual that its folklore continues to endure nearly five decades later.

Before the Phantom: KISS at the Height of Their Power

A mere five years prior to the airing of Phantom of the Park, KISS played their first live show, which lead to their first record deal soon after. In February of 1974, KISS released their self-titled album, followed by an appearance on the Dick Clark-hosted ABC in Concert. This appearance propelled the band into the pop culture zeitgeist, rendering KISS household names.

In 1975, KISS Alive dropped, followed by Destroyer, which gave us hits like “Detroit Rock City” and “Beth.” The KISS Army, the band’s official fan club, was founded that same year. In May of 1977, Marvel Comics published the Super Special KISS Comic book. Not a band to avoid the spotlight, they famously added their own blood to the ink. Then, in September 1978, each member of the band dropped solo albums simultaneously. Each of the albums were certified platinum.

The band’s then-manager, Bill Aucoin, riding the wave of KISS’ mainstream popularity, began licensing merch at a fast pace and on a large scale. This included lunch boxes, jewelry including watches, radios, a board game, Halloween costumes, and even garbage cans. There seemed to be no end in the branding. KISS made more than $100 Million in merch sales in the late 1970s and today are considered to have the highest grossing merch sales of all time.

It was Aucoin, wanting to capitalize further on KISS’ immense popularity, who searched for a vehicle that would turn the members themselves into superheroes. It wasn’t uncommon for a band or musician to make movies. Before KISS were The Who, The Beatles, Elvis Presley, and David Bowie who all blazed the trail of musicians who moved into acting, though not all with the same abilities and success.

Paul Stanley has said of Aucoin: “One of Bill’s follies was the movie Kiss Meets the Phantom of the Park. He thought that film was the next step for us. The Beatles had 4 Hard Day’s Night and Help/, and we should have our film. He sold it to us as 4 Hard Day’s Night meets Star Wars, which had come out the year before. It would have lots of cool special effects.” Stanley also reflected that “we were kind of talked into doing a film that we were told by Aucoin was going to be a cross between A Hard Day’s Night and Star Wars, and wound up being neither.”

Aucoin joined forces with Hanna Barbera and together they collaborated on a story that turned the members of KISS into superheroes. At the time, Hanna Barbera wanted to move back into producing live action tv projects following a several years’ absence. Jan Micheal Sherman and Don Buday, having only co-written Too Hot to Handle, were contracted to write the screenplay.

The budget for KISS Meets Phantom of the Park was large by both television and theatrical film standards. At $3 million, the budget beat Rocky’s (1976) $1 Million. By comparison, Jaws (1975) cost $7 Million to produce. Despite the large budget, the special effects necessary to create the film they intended could not be met. There were also time limitations for editing that also restricted the production team from making the intended film. According to Joseph Barbera, the concert set alone cost $1 Million, a third of the budget.

Dick Hayward, an employee of Hanna Barbera, pitched the movie to director Gordon Hessler as “a longer-length television show.” The script he worked with was completed “by young, inexperienced writers” which “was difficult to do on a television budget” that was not feasible given the very-tight time constraints for filming, which included the concert scene and special effects. The rewrites were evident in the final product. Nonetheless, Hessler was signed to direct the film. At that point, Hessler was a well-known protégé of Alfred Hitchcok who directed The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, many television projects and three vehicles starring Vincent Price. And while there are published reports that claim Hessler was dismissed as director early on, that is not the case.

When Hanna-Barbera Met Hard Rock

Filming began on May 11, 1978. Most of the filming took place at Magic Mountain in Valencia, California, though they filmed some scenes in the Hollywood Hills. According to Hessler, the park was chosen because it was easily accessible, and they were able to shoot close and avoid production fees.

Podcaster and writer, Justin Beahm, interviewed Hessler on his Radio Hour podcast, shortly before Hessler passed away in 2018. Hessler maintained that he enjoyed making the movie, despite the issues he faced at its helm. He found all members of the band cooperative in his presence. While Hessler didn’t find any members out of control or seemingly drunk or on drugs, on he states in the interview that “everyone in those days was slightly high.”

Hessler formed a particular kinship with Gene Simmons and spoke fondly of the connection they made during filming. In separate interviews, they both maintained there was a “learning curve” during filming. For the band, it was a lack of experience on a film set. Hessler was challenged with filming his first crowd scene with 10,000 members on set during filming of the concert scenes.

By all accounts the members of KISS, Gene Simmons, Ace Frehley, Peter Criss and Paul Stanley were wildly unprepared to film a movie. They had no acting experience except for a crash course just before filming began. In addition, they were not used to the time it took to put on the extra makeup required for the cameras. Additionally, they struggled with maintaining the stamina required to film the concert, which lasted several hours.

Criss, Frehley and Stanley have openly discussed their lifestyle at the time, which included drinking alcohol and doing drugs. (Gene Simmons has remained sober during his lifetime.) In his autobiography, Peter Criss wrote that “We’d drink and snort coke all day while we waited for our calls. That was the worst part of moviemaking, sitting around for sometimes ten hours before they’d be ready for the scene. I wasn’t accustomed to that kind of discipline, especially when we were in our full make-up, waiting hours to do a five-minute scene.”

Criss’ voice was overdubbed by voice actor Michael Ball, though the exact reason was never disclosed. Criss has said that “They said that my voice stunk. Yes, I was stoned all the time. So was Ace. We were both partying animals at that point in our career.”

Hessler felt the best performance came from Anthony Zerbe, who played Abner Deveraux. By the time Zerbe arrived on set, he was a tv and film veteran, with credits including Cool Hand Luke, Gunsmoke and Streets of San Francisco. He felt Zerbe’s performance was better “than was intended by the writers.”

In addition, Hessler, on Beahm’s podcast, insisted that Deborah Ryan, who played Melissa, replaced the original actor after the first day or two of shooting. Though he was not privy to the exact reason, he felt it was because the “network didn’t like” the original actor.

Shooting concluded on May 28, 1978. While out celebrating the end of filming, Peter Criss and KISS’ stage manager Fritz Postlethwaite were in a car crash in Criss’ rented Porsche in Marina Del Ray. Of the accident, Criss has said that “Fritz had been doing ninety miles per hour when he hit two telephone poles, knocked down a mailbox, and sideswiped four cars before ramming into a huge pole that caused the engine to blow up. The explosion threw me through the windshield and fifty feet into the air, at which point I went face-first into a curb in a fetal position.” Criss broke each of his ribs, his nose and suffered a concussion. Fritz suffered burns over 70% of his body, and both eventually fully recovered.

Camp, Confusion, and Comic-Book Logic

The members of KISS played larger-than-life superheroes Starchild (Stanley), Demon (Simmons), Cat Man (Criss) and Space Ace (Frehley), who were forced to regain their superpowers and overcome the evil inventor (and Robot KISS) to save themselves and the amusement park.

Mr. Richards, owner of the amusement park, hired KISS to give a two-night concert at the park, in the hopes of bringing in much-needed revenue. Abner Deveraux, park’s “inventor” and ride engineer, was obsessed with creating animatronics. However, due to several malfunctions with the park’s rides, Mr. Richards felt he had no choice but to terminate Deveraux. Deveraux did not leave the park after getting fired. Instead, he created KISS robots, which were designed to sabotage the band and ruin the park.

This film had 70s camp all over it. There were animatronics, missing handsome boyfriends, four magical talismans, flying monkey-like creatures, inept security guards, Demon’s supernatural roar, mind control, telekinesis, laser eyes and much, much more! There’s also a group of local heavies named Dirty Dee, Slime and Snede. They literally have no role in this movie and if they were removed it would not change any other part of the movie.

KISS themselves didn’t appear until about 32 minutes into the film, almost 1/3 of it. The setup for the movie was much too long. And when Demon, Star Child, Space Ace and Cat Man do arrive, it’s the first night of the concert. The best part of the film was the concert footage, even though the music wasn’t live, and the concert scenes proved that KISS were master showmen. While the US version of the film relied on creating superheroes out of KISS, its theatrical release in Europe focused on the concert footage. The US version included only a handful of songs, including “Rock ‘N Roll All Nite.” The European version had more than three times more songs.

The spectacle had more than just the special effects and evil inventors. In one memorable scene, Mr. Richards confronted Star Child, Space Ace and Cat Man after Demon was witnessed breathing fire and attacking park employees. (This, of course, was Robot Demon.) Demon growled with a sound like a cross between Darth Vadar and Cujo as he entered the scene and climbed up onto one of four director’s chairs so high that Mr. Richards had to look up to see them.

Amid this chaos, a young woman named Melissa, searched the park desperately for her missing boyfriend, Sam. Deveraux put Sam into a trancelike state to be used to steal talismans that kept the members of KISS’ superpowers alive. Without them, Star Childe, Space Ace, Cat Man and Demon would become ordinary people. And for no reason, three thugs run around the park, making trouble before Abner kidnaps them. All of this happened under the less-than-watchful eye of Mr. Richards.

The special effects by today’s standards felt substandard, which was surprising considering the size of the budget. The film relied on laser beams and supernatural voices to give it the sci-fi feel it required to work, none of which were particularly convincing.

Despite the common complaint that none of the band members could act, they didn’t need much acting skill. In addition to Simmon’s Demon growling, Frehley did little more than repeat the line “Ack!” throughout. The film smartly relied on the other actors, like Carmini Caridi who played Mr. Richards and Zerbe, as Abner Deveraux, to do most of the heavy lifting in the acting department. The band members’ lines were minimal, and the lines they had were written for brevity, likely a way to mitigate the lack of experience.

There was no end of bad acting in Hollywood during this decade. In fact, the acting was panned in Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, which was a theatrical release the same year. Variety writes that Peter “Frampton and the Bee Gees are competent musicians but hopelessly miscast as leading men.” Janet Maslin, in her New York Times review, calls the acting in Sgt. Pepper “surprisingly lifeless.”

Another criticism of the film was that the movie played into the absurd and was more comical than its intent. That seemed a strange point of contention, when the production company behind the movie also brought us The Flintstones and Scooby Doo and tv shows such as Dinky Dog, Laverne and Shirley in the Army, and Captain Cave Man and the Teen Angels. They created and produced children’s entertainment, exclusively. The film itself reflects that.

Absurdity was common in 70s television series and movies. In fact, less than three weeks after this film aired, The Star Wars Holiday Special aired, which had suffered its own poor reception for decades and created its own mythology. Two years prior, KISS performed on The Paul Lynde Halloween Special, which also featured singers Florence Henderson and Donny and Marie. The Lynde special was considered campy, but has become a cult classic, as well.

The most inexplicable part of the movie was that there is no phantom. We know that Abner Deveraux was the bad guy from the beginning of the movie. From his lab, Deveraux declares “I will destroy you! All of you!” He was the villain, but he was no phantom.

Marketing KISS to the Masses

The movie itself was a vehicle for cross-promotion. One of the print ads promotes not just the movie, but each of the bands’ solo albums. There were also interviews with the band members and promotional ads in teen and rock magazines. KISS sold posters that are still available for sale on eBay today. For its part, NBC heavily promoted the film in the weeks leading up to its premiere.

A Ratings Miss and a Critical Shrug

The movie failed to bring in a large audience. Dale Sherman, KISS expert and writer, wrote that “KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park was nowhere near the Number One slot. It wasn’t even in the top 25 for the week. It finished at #45, leading to Variety to proclaim ‘NBC had its worst Saturday of the year,’ with the KISS movie being the reason. Its failure in drawing interest as a television movie was only the starting point of concern for those connected to the film.”

Why Phantom of the Park Still Haunts Pop Culture

Film reviews of the time were scarce, but it’s likely that critics universally panned it. That criticism has softened into a more nostalgic, almost affectionate reflection, today. The movie reflected a time when television gave us weird programming, and this was no exception. There was no doubt that KISS made an indelible impression on the rock ‘n roll of the 70s. There was no shortage of merchandise, and they had one of the largest fan clubs of the day. KISS Meets the Phantom of the Opera may have been slammed by critics and angered fans, their legacy far outweighs its mark on popular culture throughout the last decades of the 20th century.

What is remarkable about KISS was that they were a heavy metal band that became beloved by the masses. They were so well known that multiple generations, from children to grandchildren, sat in front of their TVs on the Saturday night before Halloween in 1978 and tuned in to watch Peter Criss, Ace Frehley, Gene Simmons and Paul Stanely become the superheroes Cat Man, Space Ace, The Demon and Star Child become superheroes. In the minds of the KISS Army, they already were.

Rock Gods, Cult Classics, and TV History

In a video with VH1, Gene Simmons remarked that KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park is “a classic movie … if you’re on drugs.” Reportedly, he also compared the film to Planet 9 from Outer Space and argued they should be a double-feature at a drive in. Perhaps, though, it should be played at midnight on Saturday nights in indie theaters as a double feature with The Rocky Horror Picture Show. In the end, the superheroes didn’t fight the phantom to save the park, they redefined what it meant to be rock stars in the 70s. They rose during a decade when television dared to break boundaries, which turned KISS’ commercial image into pop mythology.