SHOCK THEATRE

JIM PETERSMITH - "PROFESSOR GIDEON"
? - "TROY"
? - "MIKEY"

The above poster is AI generated based on the below photographs and information. "Shock Theatre" was a hosted horror movie show with Jim Petersmith as "Professor Gideon" presenting horror movies on KGAN Channel 2, Cedar Rapids, Iowa over a 13 week period around 1979. The show was screened after the 10:00 o'clock news on Friday nights. Movies screened where schlock and included "They Saved Hitler's Brain". The show also included a hunchback named Troy and a little boy experimental subject named Mikey. The show was canceled over putting a cat into a microwave. The actors who played "Troy" and "Mikey" are not known. JIM PETERSMITH Jim Petersmith was an American actor and television horror host, born James Robert Petersmith on April 14, 1954, in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. He developed a varied acting career encompassing television, film and theatre, playing characters ranging from fathers, professors and businessmen to villains, eccentric scientists and other character roles. Petersmith's unusual place in television horror-host history came in 1979, when he portrayed Professor Gideon, host of Shock Theatre on KGAN-TV Channel 2 in his hometown of Cedar Rapids. The late-night horror program aired on Friday nights following the station's 10:00 p.m. news and ran for approximately thirteen weeks. As Professor Gideon, Petersmith introduced horror and exploitation films and appeared in comedy-horror segments between portions of the featured movie. The Professor was accompanied by a hunchback named Troy and a young experimental subject named Mikey. The program included such films as They Saved Hitler's Brain and became one of Iowa's comparatively short-lived examples of the American television horror-host tradition. Petersmith subsequently continued acting in theatre and motion pictures. His screen credits included 100 Proof (1997), The Hebrew Hammer (2003) and The Tear (2010), among other productions. His stage career included work at the Actors Theatre of Louisville; in 1991 he appeared in the company's production of William Shakespeare's King Lear, directed by Jon Jory. He also appeared in a 1992 production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat at Derby Dinner Playhouse. Petersmith was known as a versatile character actor. His obituary summarized the diversity of his work by noting that over the course of his career he portrayed such characters as a father, professor, banker, truck driver, pit boss, bartender, Johnny Appleseed, evil scientist, ghost, gunslinger, Klingon and cult leader. Jim Petersmith died on December 13, 2018, at Regis Woods Care Center in Louisville, Kentucky, at the age of 64. He was survived by his sons Mike and Dan, his grandchildren Dean and Georgia, his brother John, and his sisters Margie Ridler, Kate Modzelewski and Celee Philipp. Below is a trailer for "The Madmen Of Mandoras" aka "They Saved Hitler's Brain" that was shown on "Shock Theatre".

LINKS

Internet Movie Data Base "Shock Theatre"	E-gor's Chamber of TV Horror Hosts "Professor Gideon"	Internet Movie Data Base "Jim Petersmith"
Legacy "Jim Petersmith"		Courier Journal "Jim Petersmith"

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