2024 will go down as the year that “The Walking Dead” took over Worcester. It will also go down as the year when Worcester totally dropped the ball for not suing AMC for infringement of copyright for calling their latest “Walking Dead” spinoff “Dead City,” a term that’s been synonymous with Worcester for years.
If “The Walking Dead: Dead City” takeover is going to be remembered for one thing, it’s the transformation of downtown Worcester into post-apocalyptic Upper Manhattan. Or, as I like to say, business as usual.
For little more than a day, Worcester had its first subway — or at least an entranceway — at Walnut and Main streets. Or was it Broadway and 72nd Street like the temporary signage indicated?
In addition to a subway to nowhere, an amenity the city truly deserves, Worcester also had a new pizza shop downtown, Joey B’s New York Style Pizzeria, taking residence at the Whiskey Lounge.
And like the city’s beloved Woosta Pizza, both pizzerias are closed — the former due to “wavering foot traffic and increasing property expenses,” while the other due to hordes of hungry “walkers” and the zombie apocalypse.
Walk softly and carry a big, barbed-wire-covered stick
In early May, Worcester made big news all over social media because Jeffrey Dean Morgan _ aka Negan on “The Walking Dead” and its spinoff series, “The Walking Dead: Dead City,” was seen carrying Lucille, his trusty, barbed-wire-covered Louisville Slugger, on Norwich Street and later Main Street.
Lucille, as well as the black-leather-clad Negan, were both introduced in the sixth-season finale of “The Walking Dead” but Lucille was absent in season one of “The Walking Dead: Dead City” and there was no word of the bat’s return until the Telegram & Gazette spotted “Lucille” in action, on the streets of Worcester and posted it for the world to see on social media.
As they were waiting to hear “And action,” Cohan, who plays the leader of the zombie apocalypse settlement the Hilltop, would occasionally pop her head up from the rooftop, which whipped the small contingent of dedicated “Walking Dead” fans on the city street below into a paparazzi tizzy. At one point, Cohan waved at a fan three stories below.
This beats batting practice at Polar Park
On Day Two of filming (May 2) was all about bat-swinging, leather-clad, scene-stealing “Savoir” leader-turned-soul redemptive loner Negan. And Negan came out swinging, both literally and figuratively. And the crowd went wild.
To date, Morgan and “The Walking Dead: Dead City” is responsible for attracting more amateur shutterbugs, onlookers, celebrity gawkers and rabid fans than any production, movie or television series ever filmed in Worcester — more than Christian Bale, Jennifer Lawrence and Jeremy Renner did with “American Hustle,” more than Liam Neeson did with “Honest Thief,” more than Ryan Reynolds did with “Free Guy,” possibly more than all of them combined.
And, in what is arguably the coolest thing to happen on Worcester’s Main Street since Bob Moscoffian’s New England Summer Nationals brought burnouts, flameouts and low-riders to the masses, Negan smacked a “walker” with his bat, a stone’s throw away from Mechanics Hall.
During the San Diego Comic Con, a 70-second teaser trailer for the AMC season two of the series featured the scene with Negan, with the address of 339 Main St. clearly in the background, taking a mighty swing and smacking a “walker” right in the kisser.
Worcester’s inaugural zombie-bashing scene was filmed around 7 p.m. May 2. It started with an armored blue van parking in the middle of Main Street in front of the Burnside Building.
Negan exiting from the passenger side of the van, carrying Lucille. As he’s getting out of the car, some of his leather-clad militants wearing gas masks take out a pair of cylindrical canisters filled with methane and plop them down in the middle of the street like it’s a sacred religious icon to be worshipped.
In another pivotal scene filmed hours later on Main Street, Negan, Lucille and super-baddie Croat (Željko Ivanek) jumped in the Croat’s Ginsu-accessorized, pimped-up Cadillac.
Main Street was littered with abandoned strollers, broken high chairs, queen-size mattresses, desk furniture, bent tricycles, bordered windows, clothing piles, scattered leaves, 20-year-old New York tabloids used mainly to cover up storefronts, and shoes missing their mates to create that authentic Armageddon atmosphere.
Nevermore
For Day Three of filming (May 6), the action focused on menacing, armor-modified vehicles barreling down Norwich Street. Led by a New York City yellow cab, The Croat’s turned-out Cadillac followed in close pursuit. Next came a blue delivery truck, a New York Fire Department ambulance and a green NYC sanitation truck with a black van ending the automotive pack.
For the shoot, several of the doorways of the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences University facing Norwich Street were boarded up or tagged with graffiti, while the sign for the university was covered to promote “New York Pub” and “Central Park Books.”
For his first scene of the day, Morgan, riding shotgun with the Croat behind the wheel and the Dama (Lisa Emery) in the backseat, popped out of the Croat’s Caddy. As the scene continued, Negan walked toward an approaching zombie and bashed its brains in with Lucille. Waiting for his next scene, Morgan twirled Lucille like an old vaudevillian star doing a soft-shoe with a cane. That is, when not practicing his swing.
For Day Four of filming (May 7), shooting commenced on Portland Street. Negan, carrying what looked like a cross between a harpoon and a spear, sat down at a patio table in the middle of the barren street, drinking wine and talking business with the Croat.
For Day Five of filming (May 8), Maggie and zombie extras were spotted in the morning hours filming in the backwoods of Bell Pond Park, off Belmont Street, while in the afternoon on a close set at Union Station, Kim Coates filmed his first scene as season two super-baddie Bruegal. Looking like an Edgar Allan Poe cosplayer, Coates made some kind of exchange with Negan, the Croat and the Dama for those nasty methane canisters.
Fool for the city
A month later, “The Walking Dead: Dead City” rolled into Worcester for the sixth and final shooting day here.
Jeffrey Dean Morgan walked through the front door of the historic Morgan Mansion, named after Paul B. Morgan, president of both Morgan Construction Co. and Heald Machine Co.
Still no word if Jeffrey Dean Morgan is a distant relative of Paul B. Morgan or if Paul B. Morgan ever swung a barbed wire-covered bat, which is “The Walking Dead” star’s preferred weapon of choice.
Barbed wire, by the way, was manufactured in Worcester. Maybe the veteran character actor is rightful heir of the barbed-wire fortune and doesn’t even know it.
Besides, people love this guy, and he loves them right back. During downtime and when production for the day was breaking down, he often posed for selfies and signed bats and baseball. A true class act.
We all scream for Silver Scream
Although Jeffrey Dean Morgan was in the running of Worcester’s Unofficial Man of the Year, the undisputed bragging rights goes to Swampscott native Spencer Charnas, who was instrumental for this year’s coolest, three-day weekend in Worcester.
Not only did Charnas bring the horror convention back to downtown Worcester roughly five years after the last nail in the coffin was hammered into the annual Rock and Shock festival, his band, Ice Nine Kills, killed onstage in front of a crowd of more than 5,000 in the packed parking lot behind the Worcester Palladium.
A little over a year since he last played the Bay State, Charnas and the latest incarnation of Ice Nine Kills has been sharpening their stage skills on “Metallica M72 World Tour” and it shows. Despite the disappointment that they didn’t play a scheduled Metallica date Aug. 4 in Foxborough due to Mother Nature, they made up for it in Worcester.
Held Sept. 13 to15, Silver Scream Con III at the DCU Center had crowds estimated at 2,000 Friday and more than 5,000 Saturday, which easily outnumbered the three-day total of 5,000 it reached the previous year when it was held in Danvers and that’s not factoring Sunday’s crowd.
Inspired by Charnas’ love of slasher films, the band delivered an energetic and entertaining 70-minute, 14-song set midway during Silver Scream Con III weekend that was killer, both figurative and often literally.
Not only has the handsome, clean-cut Charnas proven himself a worthy successor of shock rockers Alice Cooper and Rob Zombie, the singer had the longest autograph and photo op lines at Silver Scream Con III. This, despite Art the Clown (David Howard Thornton) doing photo ops with and without his “Terrifier” clown makeup, and“Terrifier” trilogy writer and director Damien Leone and castmates Amelie McLain, Lauren LaVera, and Elliott Fullam being on hand.
And, if the celebrities weren’t enough to convince you buy a photo op, there were killer backdrops depicting famous scenes from recent horror classics constructed by Auburn native and “master carpenter of horror” Mike Nelson.
Announced on the closing day of Silver Scream Con III, Ice Nine Kills made the song and music video “A Work of Art,” the love song from “Terrifier 3.”
Joyner takes over
Hip-hop artist Joyner Lucas, easily Worcester’s highest-profile musician working today, duplicated the success of his sold-out 2021 Joyner Fest outside the Palladium, this time with a June 22 concert that featured as guests up-and-coming rappers from around the region, including TyShawn Dion, who told Worcester Magazine, “Having something like that in the hometown, where there are still aspiring artists, goes to show that these heights can be reached. It’s not a far-fetched thing and it doesn’t have to be a one-off occurrence.”
That was hardly Lucas’ only accomplishment this year. He appeared in the summer blockbuster “Bad Boys: Ride or Die,” alongside Will Smith and Martin Lawrence, and released his second studio album, “Not Now I’m Busy.” The album’s title song was nominated for a 2024 MTV Video Music Award in the “Video for Good” category.
