Kingsport city officials have demanded the first commercial for Saturday Night Grindhouse be taken off the air.
The show is a horror movie showcase which began airing on MyTown Channel 16 in Kingsport on May 3, and is the creation of ETSU graduate Justin Simpson and Shannon “the Cinema Warrior” Wallen.
Simpson, 24, Kingsport, graduated in December 2007 as a digital media major.
During his last semester, he began interning at Elixir Media Group in Kingsport.
Elixir Media is contracted to provide programming for Kingsport’s public television channel.
Although the city is a client, they provide the channel for the stations use.
“Not long after I started, I was given the assignment of fixing our schedule,” Simpson said. “I noticed certain nights were designated ‘theme’ nights, and one of those was ‘Saturday- Sci-fi/ horror.’ So I pitched the idea of tying the movies shown together with a host, and I knew Shannon would be the perfect person for it.”
In February, Simpson met with Shannon Wallen, of Duffield, to get things started.
The first advertisement was filmed that evening.
Not only was that not planned, but they did not even have a name for the show until immediately before filming the promotion.
“I had mentioned to him before, how I’ve always wanted to do something like this, so I’m happy to actually be able to do it,” Wallen said.
The commercial began airing a week before the premier, and unexpectedly incurred the wraith of the mayor of Kingsport.
“Around noon on Tuesday we got a call,” Simpson said. “The mayor had seen the promo and immediately called the city manager to tell him to watch it. They told us the mayor was ‘really mad’ about the promo and had told us to take it off the air immediately.”
There is still some speculation as to why that decision was made.
“All we were told was ‘they didn’t like the big guy yelling at the screen,'” Simpson said.
Since the commercial was pulled, the show has been allowed to continue as planned.
In its place, an altered version of the original commercial airs, which does not feature Wallen on camera.
“So far the only other thing I’ve had to edit was two seconds of a naked woman shown from behind in ‘Night of the Living Dead.’ ” Wallen said.
“Kingsport is trying to look really progressive with efforts to bring arts to the area,” Simpson said, “but they don’t want you to be creative, they seem to want you to make what they want you to make.”
Plans are being developed to expand the range of the show beyond Kingsport.
Deals are being worked on with Bristol, Johnson City and Mt. Caramel/Rogersville.
A company in Atlanta is showing strong interest, and Knoxville is in the process of preparing for the show.
To make the most of their budget, Simpson and Wallen used mostly their own props, including a melon for head that was shattered in the process of the evening, by Wallen with an axe.
Local Chaotic Underworld recording artist Mannequin Holocaust provides the theme song to the show, with a different Chaotic Underworld song serving as the closing theme each week.
Simpson’s technical proficiency and marketing abilities make an effective pairing with Wallen’s charisma and extensive knowledge of even the most obscure horror films.
“I have lived for horror all my life and I think it’s an underdog that needs to be fought for,” said Wallen. “The studio PG-13 horror isn’t real and if we don’t fight for it, real horror will die. I would love to work with horror/underground/indie moves in some form for the rest of my life.”
New episodes debut Saturday nights at 9 p.m., and are re-aired every night at midnight.
The upcoming new episode will feature “This Is Not A Test” and “Last Man On Earth,” which was recently remade as “I Am Legend.”
A Myspace page contains further information on the show as well as the banned promo. For more information, visit http://www.saturdaynightgrindhouse.com/ or http://www.myspace.com/saturdaynightgrindhouse or contact terror@saturdaynightgrindhouse.com.

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