Ronald D. Sweed (January 23, 1949 – April 1, 2019) was an American entertainer and author, known for his late-night television horror host character "The Ghoul".
Early life and career
Sweed was born on January 23, 1949, in
Euclid, Ohio
Euclid is a city in Cuyahoga County, Ohio, United States. It is an inner ring suburb of Cleveland. As of the 2020 census, the city had a total population of 49,692.
History
The City of Euclid was originally a part of Euclid Township, first m ...
.
His mother is Irene Barnard.
His father was Robert Sweed.
He grew up in Cleveland.
In an interview with his mother, ''
Metro Times
The ''Detroit Metro Times'' is a progressive alternative weekly located in Detroit, Michigan. It is the largest circulating weekly newspaper in the metro Detroit area.
History and content
Supported entirely by advertising, it is distributed f ...
'' reporter Anita Schmaltz asked, "Did you ever expect to give birth to a Ghoul?" She responded, "Ron was very different right from the time he came out of the chute."
Sweed was 3 or 4 when he went to downtown Cleveland with his grandfather to see
Santa Claus
Santa Claus, also known as Father Christmas, Saint Nicholas, Saint Nick, Kris Kringle, or simply Santa, is a legendary figure originating in Western Christian culture who is said to bring children gifts during the late evening and overnigh ...
and buy him a
Christmas
Christmas is an annual festival commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ, observed primarily on December 25 as a religious and cultural celebration among billions of people around the world. A feast central to the Christian liturgical year ...
present. He picked out a
puppet
A puppet is an object, often resembling a human, animal or Legendary creature, mythical figure, that is animated or manipulated by a person called a puppeteer. The puppeteer uses movements of their hands, arms, or control devices such as rods ...
. When Sweed was 8 or 9, he was given
marionette
A marionette (; french: marionnette, ) is a puppet controlled from above using wires or strings depending on regional variations. A marionette's puppeteer is called a marionettist. Marionettes are operated with the puppeteer hidden or reveale ...
s.
Sweed would put on shows for the neighborhood kids with the marionettes. His fourth grade teacher at one time could not keep his attention. Every Wednesday Sweed would put on a show for the class with his
Jerry Mahoney dummy.
In 1963, 13-year-old Sweed and his friends went to an afternoon
matinee of "
Dr. Silkini and his live stage show of horrors, on stage in person, the Frankenstein monster, Dracula, King Kong and 45 horror movies".
On the way home, he found a gorilla suit in an open trunk of Silkini's. He wore the gorilla suit to a live appearance by
Ghoulardi, a popular Cleveland television personality played by
Ernie Anderson
Ernest Earle Anderson (November 12, 1923 – February 6, 1997) was an American radio and television personality, horror host, and announcer.
Known for his portrayal of " Ghoulardi", the host of late night horror films on WJW Channel 8 on Clev ...
on
WJW. Ghoulardi took note of the costume and brought Sweed on stage, and over the next few weeks, Sweed became Anderson's production assistant.
After Anderson left Cleveland for
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the wor ...
in 1966, Sweed left for
Bowling Green State University
Bowling Green State University (BGSU) is a Public university, public research university in Bowling Green, Ohio. The main academic and residential campus is south of Toledo, Ohio. The university has nationally recognized programs and research ...
, but continued to help with the production of the ''
Hoolihan and Big Chuck'' show, which was Ghoulardi's replacement on WJW.
The Ghoul Show
In 1970, Sweed approached Ernie Anderson with a proposal to revive Anderson's "Ghoulardi" character. Anderson was not interested, but gave Sweed his blessing to revive the character on his own. With that blessing, Sweed took "The Ghoul" to Cleveland's
Kaiser Broadcasting station
WKBF-TV (channel 61) in 1971.
Though it started as a tribute to Ghoulardi, Sweed soon developed his own eye-catching gags and energetic style. Known for his zany, early-adolescent humor (particularly surrounding his abuse of a rubber frog named "Froggy," his well-known penchant for blowing up model ships and aircraft with firecrackers, and his habitual smearing of Cheez Whiz over everything in sight), late night monster movies were a unique experience for Cleveland viewers in the 1970s.
Catch phrases included "zingy-zingy," "Overdey!" and "stay sick, turn blue".
The Ghoul would typically take an unbelievably bad horror movie and dump in sound bites at appropriate moments, using audio clips from novelty records,
George Carlin,
Firesign Theater and rock albums of the '60s and early '70s. And whenever a character took a drink of something on-screen, The Ghoul would supply a good, loud belch.
"Shooting from no-budget studio sets, the Ghoul inserted his own dialogue and sound effects over insufferably bad B movies, blew up food, model cars and figurines with firecrackers, and produced strangely compelling, culturally relevant skits and parodies. The show was destructive and childish enough for little kids, subversive and timely enough for young adults."
Later in the 1970s, Kaiser Broadcasting syndicated ''The Ghoul Show'' to
Detroit
Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at ...
,
Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
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,
Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the capital city, state capital and List of municipalities in Massachusetts, most populous city of the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financ ...
,
Philadelphia
Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...
,
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
and Los Angeles.
It bombed in Chicago—replacing the locally-produced ''
Svengoolie'' hosted by
Jerry G. Bishop
Jerry G. Bishop (August 3, 1936 – September 15, 2013) was a radio and television personality who is known for being Chicago's original "Svengoolie", and for his award-winning twelve-year stint on ''Sun-Up San Diego''.
Education
Born Jairus ...
—and in Boston, but found success in Detroit at
WKBD (channel 50) and enjoyed varying degrees of success in the other markets. Despite the show's popularity, Kaiser eventually canceled it in 1975 amid complaints from parents about the content of some of Sweed's skits, as well as the permanent closure of WKBF by Kaiser itself. But ''The Ghoul Show'' resurfaced on independent Detroit station
WXON (channel 20) from 1977 to 1979,
followed by a brief stint at
WGPR-TV (channel 62) for several months in 1979.
WKBF-TV's successor station
WCLQ-TV (channel 61) revived the show from 1982 until the spring of 1984;
this iteration of the show was also syndicated to WXON.
Sweed was on and off the air in Cleveland and Detroit for over three decades, at times even branching out into radio and the internet.
The Ghoul returned to Cleveland TV in 1998 on
WBNX-TV (channel 55) where he remained for the next six years airing on Friday, then later Sunday nights. He also did a Saturday night request show on classic rock station
WNCX (98.5 FM) during the same time period.
The same year, Sweed co-authored (with Mike Olszewski) ' (), a book collecting memories, on-set photographs, transcripts, correspondence, and memos from his years on the air. Said Robert St Mary, a Detroit journalist and author of ''The Orbit Magazine Anthology: Re-Entry'': "Ron understood that times had changed from the beatnik version of Ernie. It was spectacle. It was blowing stuff up. He was using the crazy hip lingo that Ernie had, and tweaking it a bit more."
In 2015, Sweed appeared at the
Redford Theatre. It would be his final appearance there as he was scheduled to perform there in October 2018, but due to health problems, it was canceled.
In an October 2017 interview with ''Metro Times'' Jarrett Koral, he stated how he gets ready for a show: "smoke a good kielbasa," further remarking that "smoking a kielbasa will take you to places Steppenwolf never imagined on his magic carpet ride." For a boost of instant insanity? "Snort a couple blobs of Cheez Whiz."
Influence
The Ghoul was well known enough in the Cleveland and Detroit markets that some of his catch phrases ("Overdey!", "Hey group!", "Scratch glass, turn blue", "Stay sick, climb walls", "Pluck your magic twanger, Froggy!", "Holy Parma", "Amrap" and Froggy's "Hiya gang, hiya hiya hiya!") are still widely recognized among the children of the 1970s.
An interesting side element is that the aforementioned rubber toy referred to simply as "Froggy" (and much abused by the Ghoul) was a toy dating from 1948 by a company named Rempel and featured often in comedic skits on the 1955 television show ''
Andy's Gang'' where he was named
Froggy the Gremlin. The Ghoul's oft-uttered catch phrases "Hiya, gang. Hiya, hiya, hiya" and "Pluck your magic twanger, Froggy" originate from that earlier show.
Awards and honors
On March 5, 2016, Sweed was presented with a Certificate of Recognition by Cleveland mayor
Frank G. Jackson
Frank George Jackson (born October 4, 1946) is an American lawyer and politician who served as the 57th Mayor of Cleveland, Ohio from 2006 to 2022. He was first elected on November 8, 2005, unseating incumbent Jane Campbell, and re-elected in 2 ...
to commemorate the 45th anniversary of his debut on Cleveland TV, and to honor his continuing popularity in the city.
In 2020, he was inducted into the
Rondo Hatton Classic Horror Awards' Monster Kid Hall of Fame.
Lawsuit
Sweed sued Keven Scarpino, a.k.a. the
Son of Ghoul
The Son of Ghoul is a horror host played by Keven Scarpino, appearing on ''The Son of Ghoul Show'' based in Akron, Ohio, where a B movie is presented along with comedy sketches. In 2020, he was inducted into the Rondo Hatton Classic Horror Awards ...
, in 1987 for infringing upon The Ghoul's character, but eventually lost the case. The judge ruled that no infringement occurred, as most horror show hosts portrayed the same basic character - a ghoulish individual who pranced about in costume, performed comedy routines, and showed horror movies.
Personal life and death
Sweed met his first wife, Barbara J. King, when she was 17, and she was 18 when they married. They were married for 14 years. King and Sweed remained friends after divorcing.
He met Mary Therese Matousek in 1988.
Sweed later married Matousek around 1993 as they were married for 26 years.
Sweed died on April 1, 2019, five months after suffering a massive
heart attack
A myocardial infarction (MI), commonly known as a heart attack, occurs when blood flow decreases or stops to the coronary artery of the heart, causing damage to the heart muscle. The most common symptom is chest pain or discomfort which m ...
. He had undergone triple
bypass surgery on November 7, 2018.
References
Further reading
*
External links
TheGhoul.com- Official Site
HorrorHosts.com*
Obituary of Ron Sweedon Ferfolia Funeral Home
https://www.facebook.com/groups/TheGhoul/ Facebook group dedicated to Mr. Sweed
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sweed, Ron
1948 births
2019 deaths
People from Euclid, Ohio
American male television actors
Writers from Cleveland
Television in Cleveland
Television in Detroit
Television personalities from Cleveland
Horror hosts
Bowling Green State University alumni