Zombie Fans Gutted by the Thought of Losing Monroeville Mall

PHOTO BY KRISTY GRAVER

The ghost of George A. Romero haunts Monroeville Mall.

At least, that’s what it feels like when Rick Reed strolls through the shopping center dressed in jeans, a black “Dawn of the Dead” T-shirt, light-blue button-down and striped scarf. The cigarette jutting from his bearded face completes the illusion that he is the late horror movie director.

Reed, a 51-year-old from fan Grand Rapids, Mich., makes the pilgrimage to Pittsburgh to attend The Living Dead Weekend.

PHOTO BY KRISTY GRAVER

The mall, primary filming location for 1978’s “Dawn of the Dead,” hosts the bi-annual celebration that’s happening again Oct. 16-18 — possibly for the last time. Despite efforts to save it, the building is rumored to have a date with the wrecking ball after Walmart purchased it for $34 million.

Any zombie enthusiast will tell you it’s worth so much more than that.

“This is like a funeral,” Reed says as he waits in line for a photo op with the film’s three surviving stars: Gaylen Ross (Fran), Ken Foree (Peter) and Scott Reiniger (Roger). Actor David Emge (Stephen), who died in 2024, is represented at the festival by a dead ringer named Scott Kellaway.

PHOTO BY KRISTY GRAVER

Reed’s uncanny resemblance to Romero provides solace to diehards who have a sentimental attachment to the place.

“What are they doing? “Why do they come here?” Fran asks in the film as she looks down on a sea of undead mall walkers.

“Some kind of instinct. Memory of what they used to do,” Stephen says. “This was an important place in their lives.”

PHOTO BY KRISTY GRAVER

When he was 8 years old, Frank Caloiero lost a toe in a Monroeville Mall escalator; not a rubber appendage from his zombie costume, but real flesh and blood.

It was the mid-’70s and his dad ran John’s Shoe Repair on the upper level alongside other mom-and-pop businesses.

“I grew up in that shop. I have more childhood memories of being there than anywhere else,” says Caloiero, a longtime producer and camera operator for WQED.

As he was heading downstairs to The Candy Tree, his left sneaker got stuck in the gap between the sidewall and the moving staircase. In seconds, the situation turned into a horror show.

A mall manager, who happened to be strolling by, used his key to stop the machinery while a Good Samaritan freed Caloiero and carried him off the escalator.

Staring at the splintered bones sticking out of his foot, the boy worried that his dad was going to yell at him for sneaking off to buy sweets.

PHOTO BY KRISTY GRAVER

Caloiero spent a few weeks in the hospital, followed by a long rehabilitation process, but he doesn’t harbor any ill will toward the mall. He fondly recalls skating on its indoor ice rink and fishing quarters out of a fountain to use in the arcade.

Although John’s Shoe Repair vacated the premises in the 1980s, he still enjoys visiting the old storefront.

“It’s exactly the same,” he says. “On the door where you enter, there’s a little mail slot that lifts up and makes a very distinct metal snapping sound. I used to annoyingly snap that all the time. I still snap it when I walk by.”

PHOTO BY KRISTY GRAVER

Like Caloiero, Romero was a WQED regular.

His commercial film production company, The Latent Image, created slice-of-life segments for “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood,” giving kids a peek into everything from a light bulb factory to Fred Rogers’ tonsillectomy.

Local documentarian Rick Sebak examined the director’s relationship with Pittsburgh in a short film called “George Romero & the City of the Living Dead.” It premiered on WQED in 1991, when the Bronx native was named Pittsburgher of the Year by Pittsburgh Magazine.

Romero was basically the chain-smoking, coffee-swilling Mister Rogers of monster movies.

Marty Schiff, executive producer of Pittsburgh Pictures, grew up in the shadow of Monroeville Mall. His grandmother’s first cousin, Harry Soffer, was part of the real estate development group that built it in the late 1960s.

“Dawn of the Dead” was Schiff’s first film project.

In addition to serving as a stuntman alongside special effects legend Tom Savini, he had dual acting roles as a biker and a zombie.

“So many of us owe our careers to George; not just actors, but directors, writers, composers, gaffers and grips, makeup special effects people, producers and on and on,” he says. “He was my friend and mentor. I miss him, as so many of us do, but he lives on in each and every one of us that were fortunate enough to know and work with him.”

Nearly a decade after his death, Romero continues to unite yinzers.

At The Living Dead Weekend, rabid fans can meet celebrities in the flesh, attend film screenings, shop for creepy crafts and collectibles, pose for photographs on recreated sets, take guided tours of the mall and pay respects to cinematic relics at The Living Dead Museum.

PHOTO BY KRISTY GRAVER

Many folks leave offerings in front of a bronze bust of Romero that was sculpted by artist Christian Stavrakis, whose brother Taso Stavrakis worked on “Dawn of the Dead.” Located on the lower level, it was dedicated on June 8, 2018, during the film’s 40th anniversary celebration.

The undead permeate daily life in the area.

The Pittsburgh Film Office and IATSE 489 installed the mini-museum at Sixth Avenue and Wood Street Downtown to celebrate the city’s role in Hollywood history. It includes memorabilia from “Night of the Living Dead,” “Day of the Dead” and “Creepshow,” along with a pair of Romero’s signature specs.

PHOTO BY KRISTY GRAVER

On a recent walk through West View, where Romero filmed “The Amusement Park” in 1973, I collided with a woman as I was rounding a corner. Instead of telling me to watch where I was going, she complimented me on my “Day of the Dead” hoodie.

We struck up a conversation.

It turns out she grew up on the same street as Russ Streiner, who played “Johnny” in “Night of the Living Dead,” and has a friend who appears in “Dawn of the Dead.”

“He’s one of the zombies in front of Penneys!” she exclaimed.

This kind of weirdly wholesome interaction could only happen in Pittsburgh, Zombie Capital of the World.