George Zucco is my favorite horror movie actor. He made the most of any crappy script he was handed and always turned in a great performance. His trademark sinister stare could even give Boris Karloff the shivers. He was always a standout in any movie cast he was a part of. The Mad Ghoul is Zucco's movie. Even though David Bruce plays the title monster it's Zucco who is the true monster and he is delightfully evil as Dr Alfred Morris.David Bruce was probably the least intimidating monster in any of the Universal horror movies.He plays Ted Allison. Ted is dumped by Isobel and screwed by Dr Morris so he is the chump of the month in this movie In his ghoul make up , he looked like he had stuck his finger in an electric plug at a flour mill.He had kind of a baby face anyway so he was more pathetic than scary. The beautiful Evelyn Ankers portrays Isabel Lewis the singer who seems to be the object of everybody s sexual desires and is Ted's fiancé. Evelyn was Universals top scream queen and she was in top form in The Mad Ghoul. The fact that for awhile Dr Morris is under the delusion that Isabel loves him reveals his personal conceit and how out of touch with reality he really is. Dr Morris apparently exposes Ted to the lethal gas just to remove him from contention for Isabel...truly rotten.Turhan Bey is Eric Iverson, Isabel's pianist and the guy she actually digs. Bey had the look of a Latin Lover although he was actually a Turk. During the war, when the top stars in Hollywood were fighting the war, Bey got work as a romantic lead and occasional villain.He had the acting range of the average pine tree. When the war ended and the top star returned Beys career disappeared.Anyway Zucco turns Bruce into a zombie with an ancient Mayan gas. Bruce has to ingest the serum of the heart of a newly dead human corpse to keep living. Zucco tries to get Bruce while he is in his zombie state to kill Bey and himself so the way will be cleared for Zucco to have Ankers.And so on. Robert Armstrong,yeah Carl Denham himself ,has the role of a newspaper man. Milburn Stone, yeah Doc Adams on Gunsmoke.plays a police detective. Addison Richards, Rose Hobart , and Charles McGraw all have Featured roles. Its Zucco, however, who makes the movie watchable.

Evil professor George Zucco has the hots for singer Evelyn Ankers. He's also been experimenting on animals with an ancient Mayan gas! Zucco decides to clear a path to Ankers by using the gas on her boyfriend (David Bruce). This turns Bruce into a murderous ghoul who needs human hearts to survive. Little does Zucco know Ankers was already planning on dumping Bruce for Turhan Bey. As Homer Simpson would say: "D'oh!"Fun, lively Universal B horror movie with a nice cast and an interesting plot. George Zucco is awesome. I would watch this classy actor in anything. Evelyn Ankers is lovely as she always was in her Universal films. David Bruce, an actor I'm not overly familiar with, gives a sympathetic performance here. Turhan Bey has little to do. Robert Armstrong plays the obligatory wise-cracking reporter. If you're a fan of Universal horror films or George Zucco, you'll enjoy this a lot. It's not one of Universal's best but it's pretty good.

I first saw this film at age 12 in 1943, having played hookey (truant) from school (7th grade) -- a great show for a 12 year old in the middle of WW2.Here's the fun part of the story. Later, when I was 42 or so, I saw a re-run of The Mad Ghoul on TV. Much to my surprise, I discovered a FRIEND in the movie: Milburn Stone, who played "Doc" in the Gunsmoke TV series, and who I had met and visited with at the CBS Studios in California. Doc and I met when we were both visitors at the home of William "Bill" Anders, Apollo 8 Astronaut in Houston, TX during the Apollo 11 Mission. Doc and I hit it off immediately, and he turned out to be a great friend. When I discovered him in the film of my mis-spent youth, I had to tell him about it. We both had a good laugh, and Doc explained that when you are a young, starving actor, you can't be too particular about the parts you take. Doc was a very popular regular in the Gunsmoke series with James Arness, Amanda Blake and Ken Curtis.

MORD39 RATING: *1/2 out of ****Even in a magically sentimental series such as the Universal Monsters there is bound to be a clunker now and then. THE MAD GHOUL is one of the least effective entries out of the 1940's for the horror studio.George Zucco is usually reliable as a ruthless madman, but he doesn't seem sufficiently menacing this time around. He subjects a student of his to a poisonous gas and turns the unsuspecting victim into a zombie-like...well, ghoul. But the events that transpire come off as flat and dull and not as interesting as they should be.Evelyn Ankers, Universal's Scream Queen of the 1940's, is cast as a singer here. The musical segments with her crooning really begin to grate on the nerves after awhile and add boredom to an already limp movie.Turhan Bey is wasted as a love interest with nothing to do but look dashing.There are quite a few enjoyable horrors from 1943 in the Universal stable (FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLFMAN and SON OF DRACULA for example) but THE MAD GHOUL is not one of them.