Typically ancillary early black roles pepper this horror classic. Black slaves bury Egyptian mummy dude Im-Ho-Tep (the distinctly non-Egyptian Boris Karloff) alive, then are speared to death so that they can’t reveal where he’s buried. Noble Johnson is “The Nubian,” the mummy’s obedient servant whose skull cap makes him look like a big phallus — or as they say in Egypt, an obelisk.
