.jpg){kind=link}
Original Saturday Night Live cast member Garrett Morris, rapper turned actor Ice-T and his wife Coco, and famed basketball star Dennis Rodman are among the guests who will appear at two competing pop-culture conventions taking place in Northern New Jersey this weekend. The long running Chiller Theatre convention, which will be held at the Hilton Parsippany Oct. 24-26, will celebrate its 35th anniversary with guests from “Night of the Living Dead,” “Back to the Future,” and “Die Hard” films appearing alongside Morris, who is 88 years old. Right across the highway in Whippany, Rodman, Coco and Ice-T will appear alongside KISS’s Gene Simmons, and actor Alec Baldwin at the debut of the Chill Out Expo Oct. 24-25, hosted by The Big Event NY.
Chiller Theatre has held bi-annual conventions in October and April for three and a half decades, serving a community of sci-fi and horror enthusiasts who gather in Parsippany every six months to celebrate fandom, participate in autograph signings, shop the independent vendor market, and dance to live music at the afterparty. The convention is well known for getting rare or noteworthy guests, like Morris, that are atypical of the growing convention circuit. The Big Event NY, which hosts an annual wrestling convention (the next taking place in November), has sponsored guest appearances at Chiller Theatre in the past, giving fans the opportunity to meet stars like Cheech Marin, Christie Brinkley, and cast members from The Sopranos. The company began announcing details for the similarly titled Chill Out Expo just minutes away from where Chiller is typically held in June, after hinting they would not participate in Chiller’s annual event. Chill Out will also feature an afterparty and the cost of an advance ticket is $10, a fraction of the $40 Chiller Theatre ticket, however, previously announced guests like Brad Garrett and Chicago’s Donnie Dacus have mysteriously disappeared from the website, with no announcement or mention of their cancellations of social media.
You can find out more information about Chiller Theatre at chillertheatre.com, and the competing Chill Out Expo at chilloutnj.com.