Cassandra Peterson was born in Manhattan, Kansas, and raised in Colorado Springs, Colorado. In 1981, she auditioned for the part of "horror hostess" on a local Los Angeles station. That show, Movie Macabre , and her newly created character, Elvira, became an overnight sensation and gained national syndication. Peterson also co-wrote, produced, and starred in two feature length films: Elvira, Mistress of the Dark and Elvira's Haunted Hills . In 2021, she published her memoir, Yours Cruelly, Elvira , which became a New York Times bestseller. She has spent four decades solidifying her unique brand and building it into an internationally recognized pop culture icon synonymous with Halloween and the horror genre.