Interview with Mark Phillips, Master of Metal from Nightmares Unlimited

Two weekends ago, I was at HorrorHound Weekend in Cincinnati (repping Crypt TV! Check them out!) and interviewed some awesome folks in attendance. One of these was Mark Phillips, a metal artist who makes some truly badass horror props through his company Nightmare Unlimited.

Mark’s first glove (left) next to his newest (right). Far left is a Wes Craven tribute glove.

I took a moment to interview Mark on what he does. Check it out!

Johnny Macabre: Mark, why don’t you tell the readers a little bit about what you do?

Mark Phillips: At Nightmare Unlimited, our slogan is “hardcore props for hardcore fans” and what we do basically is we do prop replicas of horror cinema’s most notorious killers. Freddy, the Tallman, Re-Animator. We are branching out though, we’re doing a lot of concept work. We’re making original props for independent horror movies.

JM: Very cool! We love the indie stuff. I see you also do a lot of custom work as well. How do you come up with some of the ideas for these?

MP: It’s really just a mashup of different properties that I love. Like the steampunk glove and the medieval glove. I wanted to marry some of the properties I love. Phantasm and Nightmare on Elm Street are two of my favorite franchises.

Medieval Freddy glove signed by Robert Englund.

JM: How did you learn to do this type of thing?

MP: I’m self taught. I still have the first glove I ever built. There have been a lot of growing pains (laughs). I started 15 years ago. There were some glove makers, some sphere makers out there. But no one really shared secrets or anything. It’s all about being self taught. There wasn’t a whole lot out there as far as reference goes.

JM: Very cool. And that’s what came first? This glove here (see first picture)?

MP: Yeah, I still have it right here. It’s the first one I ever built. It’s junky but it’s mine and I was so proud of this when I first built it. I’ve come a long way in 15 years.

JM: Yeah, very impressive! I can see that obviously Robert Englund is aware of some of your work (see 2nd pic).

MP: He is.

JM: Did Angus Scrimm ever get a chance to see any of your stuff?

Angus Scrimm tribute sphere.

MP: We were actually doing a lot of shows and events with Angus when we came back onto the scene about 18 months ago. So we had the opportunity to talk to Angus and he was quite familiar with my work.

JM: That’s cool! Obviously we lost a lot of icons in the past year or so. Just one after another it seemed.

MP: It was a horrible year last year for horror fans. Angus Scrimm, Wes Craven, Betsy Palmer just to name a few. And unfortunately for horror fans, it’s going to get worse. I urge everybody to go out to these conventions and meet your stars while you can.

JM: Absolutely. Well, thank you very much for this interview. Is there anything else you’d like to tell the readers?

MP: Always love horror! And please, come visit us at NightmaresUnlimited.net. Our site launches soon! But for now you can find us on our Facebook!

Re-Animator re-agent.