Ben Chapman passed away at 12:15 am Hawaii time on Thursday, February 21 at the VA hospital in Honolulu. His health began to deteriorate February 12 and he was admitted to the hospital on February 20. His life support was turned off Wednesday around noon and his pacemaker was turned off shortly before he died. He died peacefully with his wife, Merrilee, and son, Ben Chapman III, by his side.

His body will be cremated and a memorial service will be held at a church near the beach in Honolulu. More information will be distributed as it becomes known.

RIP

‘Creature’ actor Ben Chapman, 79, dies

LOS ANGELES | As an actor, Ben Chapman never landed a star-making role. Far from it. He had small parts in only a few films, including an uncredited bit part in “Ma and Pa Kettle at Waikiki.”

But Chapman nevertheless achieved a degree of movie immortality -- and he did it without uttering a word of dialogue or even showing his face.

The 6-foot 5 former entertainer played the title character in “Creature from the Black Lagoon,” the classic 1954 3-D monster movie that developed an enduring cult following.

Chapman, a retired Honolulu real estate salesman, died Thursday of congestive heart failure at Tripler Army Medical Center in Honolulu, said his longtime companion, Merrilee Kazarian. He was 79.

For Chapman, playing the so-called Gill Man in “Creature from the Black Lagoon” was the role of a lifetime.

“In the big picture, he achieved a small amount of success as an actor, but for baby-boomer monster kids,’ he was the bomb,” Tom Weaver, author of the 1992 “making of” book “Creature from the Black Lagoon,” told the Los Angeles Times on Friday.

Chapman, who was briefly a contract player at Universal in the early ’50s, always said landing the Creature role was “a matter of being in the right place at the right time.”

He was on the studio lot one day, when he was called into a casting director’s office.

“They were looking for an imposing creature, and at 6-feet-5, I filled the bill,” he told the Palm Beach Post in 2003.

In the film, which stars Richard Carlson and Julie Adams, a scientific expedition venturing along the Amazon River in search of fossils of a legendary prehistoric man-fish unexpectedly encounters a live specimen, who terrorizes them but falls for the expedition’s only female (played by Adams).

“The creature suit was a one-piece outfit that zipped down the back with dorsal fins, hands that were gloves, feet that were like boots,” Chapman told the Honolulu Observer several years ago.

“They had me lay on a table, take a complete plaster of Paris mold of my body, then design this costume. I couldn’t lose or gain weight, or it wouldn’t fit right. The whole experience was like climbing into a large body stocking with creases.”

Chapman told Weaver that he got so hot on the sound stage wearing the costume, which included a large helmetlike head, that someone had to stand by with a water hose to cool him off.

When they were shooting on the back lot, Chapman said, “I would just stay in the lake to keep cool.”

Chapman, as fans of the movie know, wasn’t the only person to play the Gill Man in the black-and-white film.

Ricou Browning played him in the underwater scenes, which were shot in Wakulla Springs, Fla.

As Chapman once explained: “When you see the movie, anything below the surface of the water, it is the (stunt) doubles in Florida and anything above the surface is us at Universal in Hollywood.”

Neither Chapman nor Browning received screen credit for playing the Creature; the studio publicity department, according to Chapman, didn’t want audiences to think of the Creature as “a guy in a suit.”

I met Ben many times at the Chiller Theater show (and other fan conventions). Great guy, with a great "claim-to-fame". He will be missed.

RIP

One of my favorite monsters as a kid. Rest well in that Black Lagoon in the sky.

I never understood movies like TCftBL.
Why was Creatch the villain? He wasn't attacking, he was defending. Nosy humans decide to just stomp through his home, and he reacted.
Of course, when the humans decided to hotfoot it, he DID block their way with logs, but STILL.

1) Monster living happily alone.
2) Stupid people invade.
3) Monster eats some of the less-attractive ones.
4) Stupid people get angry, and kill monster.

He bogarted a White woman. So the White Guys had no choice but to kill 'em.

Ask King Kong what happens when you fall head over heels for White chicks.


Anyway, RIP Chapman. You really did bring "the creature" to life.

RIP

Ben Chapman

RIP. I met him a couple of times a few years ago, really nice guy.

Wrong kind of 3-D glasses, BTW. CRTBL was originally released in polarized (clear glasses) form. The red/blue re-issue version dates from the early 70's and looks like junk.

I always thought the villain was Mark, the rich dude footing the bill. He was the one pushing for the creature's capture, dead or alive, for purely monetary gain. He was no scientist.

The creature was a sympathetic monster and many of his actions were understandable.

RIP Ben.