Born and raised in Chicago Illinois, underground filmmaker Erik Larson has been directing, writing and producing his own Super-8 films since his early teens.

A chance meeting with aspiring film student Uncle Alice sparked a friendship and collaborative relationship that has lasted over a quarter of a century. WIth Uncle Alice as his divine muse and idea sounding board, Erik has set about creating almost a dozen films since the early 1980s.

The first collaboration, for Erik's high school film class, starred a teenage Uncle Alice in various disguises and Erik's sister Linda. Unfortunately, this film disappeared sometime after processing and has never been seen again.

This set off a passion for the production, however, and the two teamed up for more and more ambitious projects as time went along.

First up in 1984 was a short with the awkwardly long title THE DERANGED DAUGHTER OF DAPHNE DICKENSEN AND THE LEFTOVERS FROM HELL. It took an entire year to shoot, and leading lady Gina Cappuccino changed her haircolor and style numerous times during production. For subsequent films , Erik required pretty much everyone to wear wigs. The film premiered in Erik’s basement.

In 1985, the same group collaborated on HOUSE OF SIN, a feature-length film. So many friends wanted to see it, The Roxy, a fantastic movie-themed bar and performance venue, generously offered their space for a screening. It played to several packed houses, and even screened as part of a film festival at Facets called “The Unseen Screen.”

A death in the family in 1986 halted production on the next two films, LIVING IN SIN (a sequel to House of Sin) and HAGS TO RICHES. Neither was ever finished, though footage exists from both and “Hags” eventually provided inspiration for a future film.

In 1987, the short film THE BABY reunited the cast, and introduced new stars such as Carrie D’Waay and Barri Evans to the group.

In 1988, they shot another mini-feature, PROBLEM CHILD, with most of the same cast members and introducing new stars Faith Darling, Karen Terrier, Craig Goding and Mike Kroell (who would provide the music for a later feature). It was also the first collaboration with local musician Jilly Idle, who would become (if you’ll pardon the pun) instrumental in future films. It was teamed up with THE BABY as a double feature and premiered at The Roxy. Sold-out shows continued for the next year.

1989 was the most ambitious project yet, a feature-length original musical (yes, again on Super-8). GRAHAM CRACKERS reunited the group with Jilly Idle, who provided the music and wrote several original songs which were performed by the actors. It once again premiered at The Roxy, and the showings continued to sell out as quickly as they were added.

For the one-year anniversary show, the group made a little holiday short entitled NUT CRACKER to accompany the feature. It starred Linda Larson in pseudo-Crawford mode; the sound on the film came back unusable, so it was quickly dubbed over (because with 3-week processing time, there was not time to re-shoot the movie). It has a surreal feel, but is a fan favorite to this day.

Another GRAHAM showing was teamed with a different special short: a peek back at some of the previous movies, including some of the footage from the near-legendary HAGS TO RICHES.

Despite the roll the group was on, it would be the better part of a decade before they got together and finished a project. There were some started-and-abandoned works: a vampire love story called ETERNITY; a collaboration with a work chum on a sitcom project for her film class entitled THE ROSEMARY HALL SHOW; a completely dubbed FOREIGN FILM, inspired by the NUT CRACKER sound situation; the melodrama A LADY’S HAND, once again bringing Linda Larson a starring role as a hard-edged Crawfordish heroine; and the tale of a rock star on a downhill spiral, expertly played by Christine Bouchard, in SUGAR. But none of these came to fruition... they exist merely as fragments of footage at best, and some fading photographs but delightful memories at worst.

In the mid-90s, Erik enrolled in a film class led by cartoonist Heather McAdams. For this class he created a short on 16mm film, KAFIEND.

A comment by a friend-of-a-friend, who had seen his work for the first time, said "Why did you stop?" That in itself proved to be the kickstart Erik needed.