Romero didn’t just create the modern zombie. He made it a force for social commentary.
George Romero, the legendary director of the Night of the Living Dead trilogy and its followups — and widely considered the architect of the zombie genre as we know it today — died Sunday at the age of 77 after a brief battle with lung cancer, according to a statement given by his producing partner to the Los Angeles Times.
According to the family, Romero died in his sleep with his wife and daughter at his side, while listening to the score of the 1952 film The Quiet Man .
Romero got his start in the movie business after being hired to shoot short films by none other than Fred Rogers, who gave a leg up to numerous actors in the Pittsburgh area through his children shows, including Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood. (In a 2010 interview, Romero recalled that Rogers had not only encouraged him but had also gone to see his zombie films.) From there, Romero started his own production company and made his film debut at the age of 28 with one of the greatest horror films ever made.
Along with his co-writer John A. Russo, Romero is credited with creating and codifying the modern zombie in Living Dead. The famous 1968 horror movie was a low-budget, minimalist project that Romero produced independently with a small team comprising local Pittsburgh actors and crew members. Stark and unflinching, the movie was notable for featuring Duane Jones in the leading role, making him among the first black actors to be given a starring role in a film that did not explicitly call for casting an actor of color.
This casting gave Night of the Living Dead an immediately political resonance as an allegory of race relations in America, abetted by an ending that remains relevant and recurrent in horror films to this day. (The recent film Get Out is in part a sweeping homage to Living Dead, particularly in its ending.) So, too, did the grave, emaciated forms of the film’s zombies — which, though the similarity was unintentional, have long been compared to liberated Nazi concentration camp victims — and the Vietnam-like guerrilla-style combat the humans use to battle the zombies. In the 2009 documentary Nightmares in Red, White and Blue, Romero himself stated that Living Dead was about revolution:
Night of the Living Dead was an immediate hit, grossing an estimated $30 million worldwide on a budget of $114,000. Ten years after the film, Romero subverted, parodied, and extended his own zombie tropes through the classic Dawn of the Dead, generally considered one of the greatest horror films ever made.
In addition to giving horror the imagery of the shuffling, bumbling zombie that’s nevertheless fiendishly difficult to kill, Romero’s latter zombie films were explicitly anti-capitalist explorations of modern consumerism and nihilism in American society. Dawn of the Dead gave us the famous theme of zombies-as-consumerism via its shopping mall setting, and the followup, 1985’s Day of the Dead, explored the theme of abuse of government power, hyper-violent masculinity, and the dangers of an armed domestic military force. All of these themes have become standard parts of the language of zombie narratives, animating future zombie projects from 28 Days Later to The Walking Dead.
The Dead franchise spanned numerous remakes and offshoots, additionally inspiring the non-Romero horror comedy franchise Return of the Living Dead. Romero would go on to direct horror for the rest of his life, including other classics of the genre like 1973’s The Crazies, 1988’s Monkey Shines, and the Stephen King-scripted Creepshow in 1982. King joined numerous horror creatives and filmmakers on social media who mourned Romero’s passing.
Others remembered the role Romero played in boosting the film industry in Pittsburgh and beyond.
And finally, there were those who hoped that, like his famous creations, Romero would live on.
