13 Creepy & Kooky Facts About ‘The Addams Family’

As Halloween quickly approaches, there is plenty of content to get you in a spooky mood, including tons of The Addams Family shows and movies. With the success of the Netflix series Wednesday, focusing on the teen Wednesday Addams, it proved that the love for this creepy family is definitely not over. The Addams Family began as a comic strip and turned into a show in 1964, later spawning movies, cartoons, video games, and even Broadway shows.

In honor of the iconic family, let’s talk about some fun facts regarding the shows, movies, and actors involved in The Addams Family franchise over the years.

Lurch was once a lifeguard

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In the 1950s, before he played his iconic character Lurch, Ted Cassidy was actually a lifeguard in Florida. Did you know that Cassidy also played Thing because his arm was the only one long enough?

Wednesday Addams has an interesting middle name

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Her middle name is Friday! In the comic strip, the family didn’t really have any specific names. When the show was in the works, Charles Addams, the creator, and the producers came up with names for everyone in the family. Another odd fact is that Gomez was almost named Repelli. Can you imagine?

‘The Addams Family’ home would have never worked in color

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The show was rightfully filmed in black and white and was perfect for the vibe of the show. Turns out, the walls of the home they filmed in were actually bright pink! That would not have worked but it looks perfectly spooky in black and white.

John Astin’s suit pockets were lined with something dangerous

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John Astin played Gomez in the original series and was often smoking cigars. He put out lit cigars in the pocket of his coat so it had to be lined with asbestos to avoid starting a fire.

The iconic theme song is by just one person

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While it sounds like the tune is done by three people, the studio reportedly didn’t want to pay for multiple singers so the creator of the song, Vic Mizzy, multi-tracked his voice to make it sound like more people were singing at one time.

‘The Addams Family’ made its first animated appearance on another popular show

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In 1972, the clan appeared in an episode of The New Scooby-Doo Movies. For the special, most of the original cast members lent their voices to the animated characters. A year later, they got their own cartoon show.

An unlikely star voiced Pugsley Addams

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In the 1973 animated series, several of the original stars did not want to lend their voices to the news cartoon. A young Jodie Foster actually voiced Pugsley Addams.

Tim Burton was originally asked to direct ‘The Addams Family’ in the ’90s

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Tim Burton was forced to turn it down because he was already working on the film Batman Returns which was released in 1992.

Anjelica Huston really wanted the role of Morticia but later kind of regretted it

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In the ’90s Addams Family films, Anjelica Huston was cast as Morticia. She lobbied for the role but expected it to go to Cher instead. However, when she was cast she found that it wasn’t easy. In her autobiography, she opens up about filming and said it was long and difficult, especially with the makeup effects she had to wear to make her eyes slant upwards.

MC Hammer performed the song “Addams Groove”

He also made a music video for the theme song featuring the family. Do you remember it?

Fester’s Quest is considered one of the worst video games ever

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In 1989, Nintendo released the video game Fester’s Quest, which people consider one of the worst video games ever. In 1992, another video game came out after the success of the movie reboot and it was much better. In addition, The Addams Family pinball machine was once the best-selling pinball machine of all time.

Lurch played another type of monster

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Because of Cassidy’s height (he was 6’9″!), he often played a towering character including Bigfoot in two separate episodes of The Six Million Dollar Man.

‘The Munsters’ may have been the reason ‘The Addams Family’ got canceled

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The original Addams Family series was canceled after just two seasons and many say it was because of the success of The Munsters and people just weren’t interested in watching two monster shows at the time.

Now tell us, who is your favorite Addams Family character?

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