Indie Film Distribution Through the Decades with Sam Sherman

Welcome to Part 2 of our interview with writer, producer and distributor Sam Sherman. In case you missed it here's Part 1: Indie Horror Icon Sam Sherman. In this part of our interview with Sam, we discuss how film making and distribution has changed, his relationship with director Al Adamson and how films like Dracula vs Frankenstein came to be. Sam Sherman attended New York’s City College Film Institute, where he ran “Flash Gordon” serials and “The Mask of Fu Mancho” in the student film program and made the 16mm short “The Weird Stranger” in a single day. The first picture he distributed was a re-release of The Scarlet Letter (1934) in 1964. He also worked in the publicity department of Hemisphere Pictures prior to forming the hugely successful production and distribution outfit Independent-International Pictures with Do-It-Yourself indie filmmaker ‘Al Adamson (I)’ in 1968. Independent-International produced and/or released a slew of movies in such genres as horror, Western, science fiction, comedy, action and even blaxploitation for the drive-in market throughout the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s.