The fictional horror host of Count Floyd is a character in the television series - that is about the life in the day of a fictitious television station: Second City TV (aka SCTV) in the town of Melonville. To emulate small television stations of the time, in each episode, the cast took on a number of different characters. In particular, one of the news anchors - Floyd Robertson (played by Joe Flaherty) also doubled as Count Floyd, the host of SCTV's "Monster Chiller Horror Theatre". Almost Shakespearian! Joe Flaherty was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA on 21 June 1941. When Flaherty moved to Chicago, he commenced his comedic career with "Second City Theater". He then worked on the "National Lampoon Radio Hour" from 1973 to 1974. After seven years working in Chicago, he moved to Toronto, Canada and collaboratively established the "Toronto Second City Theatre Troupe". It was during this period that his character of Count Floyd was born on the "Second City TV" show (SCTV). It has been suggested that Count Floyd is based on Bill Cardille's character - "Chilly Billy". Count Floyd usually did not know much about the movies he was presenting, and would often admit that he had not watch them. His catch phrase was to howl at the moon like a werewolf, even though he was a vampire. Whenever he felt lost for words, he would howl. Portrait of "Count Floyd" by Dave Dunlap. Occasionally "Steve, The Pittsburgh Midget" (played by Paul Flaherty) would assist Count Floyd. For more information on Steve The Pittsburgh Midget use the below link: The series changed name through the years: "Second City TV" 1976-1981 (Seasons 1 - 3) "SCTV Network 90" 1981-1983 (Seasons 4-5) "SCTV Channel" 1983-1984 (Season 6) SCTV Season 5 opening During the six season run of the series, Count Floyd would host a number of different shows, appearing in about 24 episodes. These shows included: "Horror Chiller Monster Theatre" "Count Floyd's 3D Firing Line" "Scary Previews" For more information on Woody Tobias Jr. in "Scary Previews" use the below link: As well as a SCTV Special Presentation of his fictional "3-D House of Beef" restaurant promotion. It was during this period that Flaherty's Count Floyd character began to grow outside of the series. In 1982, Flaherty released "Count Floyd Mini-LP" which featured four songs: "The Gory Story of Duane Debbie" "Treat You Like A Lady" "Reggae Christmas Eve in Transylvania" "Count Floyd is Back" Between 1983-1985, The Count also made his presence felt in "Australia", when SCTV was aired on the 0-Ten Network. During the last year of the show, Count Floyd appeared on stage in "Rush: Grace Under Pressure Tour 1984", which was released as a direct to video in 1985. When the series ended in 1984, it was not the end for Count Floyd. But the Count would be born again through the 1988 animated series "The Completely Mental Misadventures of Ed Grimley". The shows episodes were: Tall, Dark and Hansom (10 September 1988) Ed's Debut (17 September 1988) E.G., Go Home (24 September 1988) Ed's in Hot Water (1 October 1988) Crate Expectations (8 October 1988) Grimley, P.F.C. (15 October 1988) Moby Is Lost (22 October 1988) Good Neighbor Ed (29 October 1988) Driver Ed (5 November 1988) Blowin' in the Wind (12 November 1988) Eyewitness Ed (19 November 1988) Eddy, We Hardly Knew Ye (26 November 1988) The Irving Who Came to Dinner (3 December 1988) Count Floyd had his own show within each of the above episodes - "Count Floyd's Scary Stories", the only non-animated part of the show. His segment was as a host of a children's scary story show. 1988 Count Floyd also featured in another direct to video production - "Kid Safe: The Video". This was an educational docudrama in which Count Floyd shows children how to deal with emergency situations. The Count being a bit of a prankster released his own direct to video production - "Making Real Funny Home Videos". Watch out for sharpened stakes! But in 1999, Count Floyd went from a fictional horror host to being a fully fledged horror host when he was a special guest host on "MonsterVision's" episode - "Haunted Halloween Weekend" that aired on 31 October 1999. As the Count was not seen again, great fear was held for him, with most thinking that he got caught in sunlight. 2007 saw a fan known as "A Farcical Mosaic" via his "Chiller Diller Theatre" post on Youtube a tribute to "Count Floyd", by resiting The Count's dialogue from SCTV's Season 3: Episode 9 - "The Odd Couple" segment of "Monster Chiller Horror Theatre" that originally aired on 14 November 1980. But just when you thought he was dust, Count Floyd resurfaced in the 2008 episode "Emos, Joes and Rose" and 2010 episode "Blowed Up Zombie Real Good", both from the series "Caution: May Contain Nuts", which was a Canadian sketch comdedy. I have not been able to locate as yet any video of this particular episode. In the 2014 music video "Nightlife" by the Canadian rock n' roll band "The Wet Secrets", Count Floyd as a major part. While Count Floyd has been a part of Flaherty's life for over 30 years, Flaherty is well known as a popular and well etablished comedic actor and writer; appearing in many moives and television series, including: "Deadly Nightmares" (1986) "The Incredible Time Travels of Henry Osgood" (1986) "Innerspace" (1987) "The Best of SCTV" (1988) "Who's Harry Crumb?" (1989) "Monsters" (1990) "Back to the Beanstalk" (1990) "Maniac Mansion" (1990-1993) "Little Dracula" (1991) "Dinosaurs" (1993-1994) "Police Academy: The Series" (1997-1998) "Freaks and Geeks" (1999-2000) "Go Fish" (2001) "The Legend of Tarzan" (2001) "The King of Queens" (2001-2003) "Clone High" (2002-2003) "Family Guy" (2008-2011) In 2021, Joe Flaherty - "Count Floyd" from "Monster Chiller Horror Theatre", was inducted into "The Official Horror Host Hall of Fame". Uploaded to Youtube in 2008 is "The Second City and Beyond: Joe Flaherty" The Second City and Beyond presents an interview with Second City and SCTV alumni Joe Flaherty. It was hosted by Mark Warzecha at the Second City training center Los Angeles, USA. In 1982 WDIV obtained the broadcast rights for the 1954 3-D movie Gorilla At Large. Program manager Alan Frank approached producer/writer Tom De Lisle to come up with a vehicle to showcase the film. Both De Lisle and Ryan were fans of the Canadian sketch comedy show SCTV, especially Joe Flaherty as the bumbling horror movie host Count Floyd. They decided to do a takeoff of Flaherty's vampire character and named him Count Scary, after Count Floyd's tag line, "Oooh, that's scary!" Wendy's distributed the 3-D glasses needed to view the film. For further information on Tom Ryan as "Count Scary", click on the links below:d Joe Flaherty passed away on 1 April 2024.

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