Cry Baby Lane is a made-for-television movie first broadcast on Nickelodeon on 28 October 2000. It went unaired for 11 years thereafter, leading many to believe that it had been lost. In 2011, after Reddit users had launched a search for the film, an amateur VHS recording from the original broadcast was uploaded. In response, Nickelodeon reaired the film on TeenNick several times over next few years. The film is now widely available online for all to enjoy.
Broadcast History
The original broadcast was on 28 October 2000 as a part of SNICK,
hosted by Melissa Joan Hart. Cry Baby Lane was followed by a presentation
of Are You Afraid of the Dark: The Tale of the Silver Sight. Cry Baby Lane
would never see another airing on the main Nickelodeon network again.
Cry Baby Lane would not be aired again until 31 October 2011, when
Nickelodeon reaired it for the first time on TeenNick, in light of the
film leaking online and the popularity of 90s era content on the network.
All subsequent reairings would occur on this channel. Other known
broadcast dates are 31 March 2015, 31 October 2015, 31 October 2016, 8
July 2017, and 20 October 2017.
Production
Cry Baby Lane was originally intended to be a $10 million feature film; however, it was ultimately slated to be made-for-television with a budget of $800,000. Filming took place in Kingston, NJ and Tontogany, OH in less than a month. Nearly every scrap of film was used, making any deleted scenes unlikely to have been filmed. There were apparently two scenes that were cut - a graveyard scene with an old man's head on a baby's body, and a skinny dipping scene - but it is unclear whether these were filmed or just scrapped ideas. Peter Lauer directed the film and cowrote the screenplay with Bob Mittenthal. Lauer and Mittenthal also produced the film with the help of Douglas Greiff and Albie Hecht. The film stars Jase Blankfort, Trey Rogers, Frank Langella, Larc Spies, Anne Lange, Marc John Jefferies, Allison Siko, Jessica Brooks Grant, Sheri Drach, Gary Perez, Steve Mellor, Davida Williams, Bernadette Quigley, Charlotte Mittenthal, Andrea Taylor, Tom Stechschulte, Jim Gaffigan, Mary Gordon Murray, and Rob Newton.
Plot
Andrew (Jase Blankfort) and his older brother Carl (Trey Rogers) enjoy listening to ghost stories that the local undertaker (Frank Langella) tells them. One night he tells the tale of a local farmer whose wife gave birth to Siamese twins, one being good natured while the other was clearly evil. The farmer, ashamed of them, kept the twins locked in their room. Eventually the twins got sick and died together, so the farmer sawed them in half and buried the good twin in a cemetery and the bad twin in a shallow grave near the house. Later, Carl and his friends decide to hold a séance in the cemetery where the good twin is buried, but they unintentionally awaken the bad twin instead. Gradually, he possesses nearly everyone in town and it is up to young Andrew to stop him.
Cry Baby Lane never had an official poster. This is a custom poster that I created for the film.