Zombies Devour Pittsburgh; Invasion Threatens to go Global

April 21, 2008 - PRLog -- A zombie gathering which drew more than 1,000 people to the Monroeville Mall outside Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on a Sunday morning last fall has been certified as a Guinness World Record™ for the second consecutive year.  The zombie walk, sponsored by The It’s Alive Show, a late night horror host television program originating from Pittsburgh, also raised more than 1,200 pounds of food donations for the Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank.

What is a zombie walk? According to organizer Mark Menold, producer and host of It’s Alive, a zombie walk is an organized public gathering of two or more people who dress up in zombie costumes and make up. “There doesn't have to be any point to a zombie walk”, says Menold.  “I like it when 10 people show up somewhere and just shamble around for no reason.” But when zombies have chance to walk at the location where George Romero shot Dawn of the Dead, you can expect the walking dead will come from all over the country to participate. “Since we have such great turnouts, we have added a charity, the Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank, to our event. We have over 1000 people showing up for a free event, so it's really easy to ask them to bring a non-perishable food item. Our Monroeville Mall Zombie Walk is in the fall, so this works out nicely to help in preparing the food bank for Thanksgiving.”

The latest Pittsburgh Zombie Walk was also honored earlier this year with a Rondo Hatton Classic Horror Award for Best Fan Event of 2007.  The Rondos, named after 1940s character actor Rondo Hatton, are a fan-based survey of the classic horror community sponsored by the Classic Horror Film Board website. The email-only vote was the biggest classic horror fan survey in online history.

So what’s next for zombie enthusiasts?  Menold has set his sites on raising awareness of world hunger and hopes to achieve it through World Zombie Day, which will be held October 26, 2008 in conjunction with The It’s Alive 2008 Zombie Fest.  “Since we established the world record in 2006, many other cities around the world have tried to beat out record and failed. I felt bad for these other cities not getting enough people to break the record because they were getting big turnouts, 600, 800 zombies and still feeling like they failed.”

World Zombie Day allows all the zombie walks around the globe to participate in one big event and add their attendance numbers to one grand total. “Once again, I'm encouraging organizers to include their local food banks and ask their zombies to bring food donations. We’ll compile attendance numbers into one big number, and the total weight of all the food donated. Everyone can feel really good about it.”  

At press time, the following cities, in addition to the hub in Pittsburgh, have signed on to participate in World Zombie Day:

•Adelaide, Australia
•Ann Arbor, MI
•Asheville, NC
•Atlanta, GA
•Brisbane, Australia
•Chicago, IL
•Corpus Christi, TX
•Fort Wayne, IN
•Indianapolis, IN
•Jacksonville, FL
•Kansas City, MO
•Lawrence, KS
•Los Angeles, CA
•Lyon, France
•Middletown, RI
•Nashville, TN
•New York, NY
•Philadelphia, PA
•Rockledge, FL
•Sacramento, CA
•Salt Lake City, UT
•San Francisco, CA
•Seattle, WA
•Spokane, WA
•Stockton, CA
•Tampa, FL
 
www.myspace.com/worldzombieday

# # #

It’s Alive is a television show produced in the same format as the highly successful Pittsburgh favorite Chiller Theater. Classic horror movies are presented by a talented cast performing comedy and live music.  The show is aired Saturday nights at 10:00 PM on Pittsburgh’s WBGN-TV, and streamed 24/7 via the show’s web site at www.theitsaliveshow.com.

Website: www.theitsaliveshow.com