#bela wouldve LOVED modern fan conventions

[tipsywench]

I found this story on the Bela Lugosi blog, about a young fan (Arthur Lennig, who later wrote the book The Count about Bela Lugosi, the interview is actually for that book - Lillian and Bela Lugosi Jr are included too).

I was 15, I met Mrs. Lugosi and I met Bela, first backstage, when he was doing Dracula in summer stock, then on later in Arsenic & Old Lace. And I told them that I had this shrine in my cellar of my house, and I had always worshiped him. And he was just as pleasant off-screen as he was unpleasant onscreen. So, I was delighted about that. He said “I’d like to see what you have at home.” And so, he made Mrs. Lugosi drive. The great Bela could invent all kinds of things as a mad scientist, but he couldn’t drive a car. And so they drove about eight or nine miles back to my house. And he came in and—there was my mother—and said “Hello, mother,” and he shook her hand. And we went down the cellar, and I had all my photos on the wall. He was kind of proud of me, and patted me on the back, and we had our photos taken. Mrs. Lugosi took the two of us together, and I took them together. And it’s in my book, I have those pictures.

From the photo caption on the blog: A 15-year-old Arthur Lennig photographed outside his home with Bela Lugosi