Aweful Movies with Deadly Earnest (1967)

Hedley Cullen was the fifth and final actor to play Deadly Earnest in Australia. He was one of the five different actors to play Deadly. The Deadly Earnest character was originated in Western Australia's TVW-7 in 1959. Cullen's show aired between 1967-1974, and 1975 on SAS-10 Adelaide; and TVW-7 Perth in 1971; specials in 1975 and 1977 for ADS-7, Adelaide. In 1978 the show was reborn as Deadly Earnest's Nightmare Theatre. In 1975, Cullen also hosted as Deadly Earnest, a children's afternoon cartoon show - "Deadly's Delirious Delights". Cullen started his television career by appearing the 1962 telemovie "The Valley of Water". He was to appear in 19 movies, telemovies and televisions shows including "Consider Your Verdict", "My Name's McGooley, What's Yours?", "Boney", "Homicide", "Matlock Police", "Solo One", "Sunday Too Far Away", "Storm Boy", "The Last Wave", "Weekend of Shadows" with his final appearance in the movie "Call Me Mr. Brown" released in 1990. At the start of each show, Cullen would rise from his coffin. He would introduce each movie followed by his laughter slowly fading away. His trade mark was a set of googly eyes, which made him look very scary. He also had a skull named Yorick as his partner. Cullen had a large following, with children sending in their drawings. In an interview he was quoted as saying that he was paid only $20 per episode.