“Sandy Frank!!! Sandy Frank!!!” “He’s the source of all our pain!!!” “Sandy Frank!!! Sandy Frank!!!” “Gads about the house all day!!!” “Sandy Frank!!! Sandy Frank!!!” “Thinks that people come from trees!!!” “Sandy Frank!!! Sandy Frank!!!” “Gets horrid movies from Japan!!!” Paramount Sales Executive then moving to NBC, Sandy Frank produced and distributed the Lassie and Lone Ranger TV Shows prior to starting his own sales group which released The Bill Cosby Show, The Dating Game, Face the Music, and Name That Tune. The company also gained rights and provided dubbing for all the Daiei Monster Movies. Because of airing constraints in the UHF Movie of the Week Format, these English versions were substantially shorter than the originals.
The Gamera Series, The Legend of the Dinosaurs (1977), Humanoid Woman (1981), Mighty Jack (1986), Fugitive Alien (1986), Star Force: Fugitive Alien II (1987), Time of the Apes (1987). These populated the KTMA Season of MST and most reappeared in Season 3. They like FVI are a big piece of the early puzzle. Sandy Frank. Godfather of Cheese or The Bringer of Nightmares?
Sandy Frank evolved into a punchline on MST but absent his craziness would we love Mystery Science as much? Beneath are links to conversations on every Sandy Frank riffed episode during the KTMA and Comedy Central Seasons.
Note: Episode 208 jokingly made actor Hugh Beaumont one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse for a host segment. With how much Sandy Frank’s name is thrown out in the experiments, the inspiration hit me to title this thread “Sandy Frank. The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse?” It is an in-joke to Lost Continent (1951) and to the level of unhappiness Joel and the Bots experience at the utterance of his name. Not to mention their dismay when seeing it in titles. The question is not a serious one but a nod to the show’s own tone and history.
Where would MST3K be without Sandy Frank? He gave them a lot of cheap riffing material in their early days, and introduced the turtle Gamera. Imagine MST3K without Gamera! It doesn’t bear thinking about.
Those Sandy Franks and the FVIs conceived the right handling of bizarre and inane material. What they afforded MST3K is limitless angles to harvest levity out of neverending inspiration. How the show matured and grew into what it is largely is thanks to those Sandy Frank and Film Ventures experiments.
It’s something of a minor miracle that they could razz him to that degree and STILL get the DVD/streaming rights to his works.
I remember there was a time when having such rights seemed like an impossible thing, as if this was some late-in-the-game retribution, but… Shout managed to navigate the rights issues, because Shout Factory has mad skills like that.
To be frank (lol), he doesn’t actually own the movies used on the show. Gamera is owned by Kadokawa and Fugitive Alien, Time of the Apes, and Mighty Jack are all owned by Tsuburaya. Even Legend of Dinosaurs is owned by Toei. He was just a US distributor and all of this reverted back years ago.
