Ed Wood

At 54 years old, Ed Wood physical status not available right now. We will update Ed Wood's height, weight, eye color, hair color, build, and measurements.

In 1947, Wood moved to Hollywood, California, where he wrote scripts and directed television pilots, commercials and several forgotten micro-budget westerns, most of which failed to sell. In 1948, Wood wrote, produced, directed, and starred in The Casual Company, a play derived from his own unpublished novel which was based on his service in the United States Marine Corps. It opened at the Village Playhouse to negative reviews on October 25. That same year, he wrote and directed a low-budget western called Crossroads of Laredo with the aid of a young producer he met named Crawford John Thomas. The film was shot silent and was not completed during Wood's lifetime.

In 1949, Wood and Thomas acted together in a play called The Blackguard Returns at the Gateway Theatre (Wood played the Sheriff and Thomas was the villain). Wood joined the Screen Actors Guild in 1951, and worked very briefly as a stuntman among other things. When writing, Wood used a number of different pen names, including Ann Gora (in reference to Angora, his favorite female textile) and Akdov Telmig (the backwards spelling of his favorite drink, the vodka gimlet).

In 1952, Wood was introduced to actor Bela Lugosi by friend and fellow writer-producer Alex Gordon (Wood's roommate at the time who was later involved in creating American International Pictures). Lugosi's son, Bela Lugosi Jr., has been among those who felt Wood exploited the senior Lugosi's stardom, taking advantage of the fading actor when he could not afford to refuse any work. However, most documents and interviews with other Wood associates in Nightmare of Ecstasy suggest that Wood and Lugosi were genuine friends and that Wood helped Lugosi through the worst days of his clinical depression and drug addiction. Lugosi had become dependent on morphine as a way of controlling his debilitating sciatica over the years, and was in a poor mental state caused by his recent divorce.

In 1953, Wood wrote and directed the semi-documentary film Glen or Glenda (originally titled I Changed My Sex!) with producer George Weiss. The film starred Wood (under the alias "Daniel Davis") as a transvestite, his girlfriend Dolores Fuller, Timothy Farrell, Lyle Talbot, Conrad Brooks and Bela Lugosi as the god-like narrator/scientist. Fuller was shocked when she learned soon afterward that Wood actually was a transvestite.

In 1953, Wood wrote and directed a stage show for Lugosi called The Bela Lugosi Review (a take-off on Dracula) that was put on at the Silver Slipper in Las Vegas. When Lugosi appeared on the TV show You Asked For It that same year, he announced that Ed Wood was producing a Dr. Acula TV show for him, but it never materialized. Wood acted as Lugosi's dialogue coach when he guest-starred on The Red Skelton Show in 1954, alongside Lon Chaney Jr. and Vampira (aka Maila Nurmi).

Wood co-produced and directed a crime film, Jail Bait (1954, originally titled The Hidden Face), along with his co-writer/ roommate Alex Gordon, which starred Herbert Rawlinson (as the plastic surgeon), Lyle Talbot, Dolores Fuller, Timothy Farrell, Theodora Thurman and Steve Reeves (in one of his first acting jobs). Bela Lugosi was supposed to play the lead role of the plastic surgeon, but was busy with another project when filming started and had to bow out. His replacement, Herbert Rawlinson, died the day after he filmed his scenes. Distributor Ron Ormond changed the title from The Hidden Face to Jail Bait just before releasing it.

Wood produced and directed the horror film Bride of the Monster (1955, originally titled Bride of the Atom or The Monster of the Marshes), based on an original story idea by Alex Gordon which he had originally called The Atomic Monster. It starred Bela Lugosi as the mad scientist, Swedish wrestler Tor Johnson as mute manservant "Lobo", Paul Marco, Billy Benedict ("Whitey" of The Bowery Boys), Harvey B. Dunn and Loretta King. Soon after the film was completed, Bela Lugosi committed himself to the Norwalk State Hospital for three months, to be treated for drug addiction. The film premiered on May 11, 1955, at the Paramount theater in Hollywood while Lugosi was institutionalized, but a special screening was arranged for him upon his release, pleasing him greatly.

In 1956, Wood wrote the screenplay (uncredited) for the film The Violent Years (originally titled Teenage Girl Gang), which was directed by William M. Morgan, starring Playboy model Jean Moorhead, Timothy Farrell, and serial star I. Stanford Jolley (as a judge).

Wood began filming a juvenile delinquency film called Rock and Roll Hell (a.k.a. Hellborn) in 1956, but producer George Weiss pulled the plug on the project after only ten minutes of footage had been completed. Wood's friend Conrad Brooks purchased the footage from Weiss, and some scenes were later incorporated as stock footage into Wood's later Night of the Ghouls (1959). (The entire ten minutes of footage was later released complete on VHS in 1993, as Hellborn.)

In late 1956, Wood co-produced, wrote, and directed his science fiction opus Plan 9 from Outer Space (his screenplay was originally titled Grave Robbers from Outer Space), which featured Bela Lugosi in a small role. (Lugosi actually died in August 1956 before production even began but Wood inserted some footage into the film that he had previously shot of Lugosi in 1955–1956). The film also starred Tor Johnson, Vampira (Maila Nurmi), Tom Mason (who doubled for Lugosi in some scenes), and the Amazing Criswell as the film's narrator. Plan 9 premiered on March 15, 1957, at the Carlton Theatre in Hollywood, and later went into general release in July 1959 (retitled Plan Nine from Outer Space) in Texas and a number of other Southern states. It was finally sold to late night television in 1961, thereby finding its audience over the years. It became Wood's best-known film and received a cult following in 1980 when Michael Medved declared this film "the worst film ever made" in his book The Golden Turkey Awards.

In 1957 Wood wrote and directed a pilot for a suspense-horror TV series to be called Portraits in Terror that ultimately failed to sell. The pilot, entitled Final Curtain, sees an old and world-weary actor wandering in an empty theatre, imagining ghosts and a living mannequin haunting the backstage area, until a la The Twilight Zone, he realizes that he himself is dead. The episode has no dialogue, and Dudley Manlove narrates the thoughts of Duke Moore as the actor. Bela Lugosi would've starred in this short film had he lived. Parts of the unsold pilot were later recycled for use in Wood's Night of the Ghouls (1959). The episode was thought to be lost until a complete print was located circa 2010. It was remastered and given its first ever cinema showing in a theater in February 2012. Today it is widely available online and on DVD.

In 1958, Wood wrote, produced, and directed Night of the Ghouls (originally titled Revenge of the Dead), starring Kenne Duncan, Tor Johnson (reprising his role as "Lobo" from Bride of the Monster), Criswell, Duke Moore, and Valda Hansen. The film premiered at the Vista Theatre in Hollywood on a double bill with the Lana Turner movie "Imitation of Life" on March 17, 1959, and then promptly vanished from circulation. For many years, it was thought to be a lost film, but distribution of the film was held up for 25 years because Wood hadn't paid the lab bill. Video producer Wade Williams paid the bill and released the film on videocassette in 1984, copyrighting the film in his name.

In 1958, Wood also wrote the screenplay for The Bride and the Beast (1958), which was directed by Adrian Weiss. Wood's screenplay was based on Adrian Weiss' plot.

Wood also wrote the screenplay (as "Peter LaRoche") for a 1959 "nudie cutie" film called Revenge of the Virgins, which was directed by Peter Perry Jr.

Wood wrote and directed the exploitation film The Sinister Urge (1960), starring Kenne Duncan, Duke Moore, Dino Fantini, Harvey B. Dunn and Carl Anthony. Filmed in just five days, this is the last mainstream film Wood directed, although it has grindhouse elements. The film contains an "eerily prescient" scene, in which Carl Anthony's character states, "I look at this slush, and I try to remember, at one time, I made good movies". The scenes of the teenagers at the pizzeria had been previously shot in 1956 for Wood's unfinished juvenile delinquency film, Rock and Roll Hell (a.k.a. Hellborn), which Wood never completed.

Also in 1960, Wood wrote the screenplay for The Peeper, which he intended as a direct sequel to his 1960 film The Sinister Urge, but it was never produced.

Wood also contributed to the plot of Jane Mann's 1961 screenplay Anatomy of a Psycho. The film was directed by Mann's husband Boris Petroff.

In 1963, Wood wrote the screenplay for Shotgun Wedding (an exploitation film directed by Boris Petroff about hillbillies marrying child brides in the Ozarks). Wood wrote the screenplay from a story idea by Jane Mann.

Wood's 1965 transitional film Orgy of the Dead (originally titled Nudie Ghoulies) combined the horror and grindhouse skin-flick genres. Wood handled various production details while Stephen C. Apostolof directed under the pseudonym A. C. Stephen. The film begins with a recreation of the opening scene from Night of the Ghouls. Criswell, wearing one of Lugosi's old capes, rises from his coffin to deliver an introduction taken almost word-for-word from the previous film. Set in a misty graveyard, the Lord of the Dead (Criswell) and his sexy consort, the Black Ghoul (a Vampira look-alike), preside over a series of macabre performances by topless dancers from beyond the grave (recruited by Wood from local strip clubs). The film also features a Wolf Man and a Mummy. Together, Wood and Apostolof went on to make a string of sexploitation films up to 1977. Wood co-wrote the screenplays with Apostolof and occasionally even acted in some of the films.

In 1969, Wood appeared in The Photographer (a.k.a. Love Feast or Pretty Models All in a Row), the first of two films produced by a Marine buddy, Joseph F. Robertson, with Wood portraying a photographer using his position to engage in sexual antics with his models.

Wood had a smaller role in Robertson's second film, Mrs. Stone's Thing (1970), as a transvestite who spends his time at a party trying on lingerie in a bedroom.

Venus Flytrap (1970) aka The Revenge of Dr. X, a US/Japanese co-production, was based on an unproduced Ed Wood screenplay from the 1950s. The film was produced and directed by Sci-Fi pulp writer Norman Earl Thomson. The film involves a mad scientist who uses lightning to transform plants into man-eating monsters. Wood did not participate in the actual making of the movie.

In 1970, Wood wrote and directed his own pornographic film, Take It Out in Trade, starring Duke Moore and Nona Carver. Wood played a transvestite named Alecia in the film.

In 1970, Wood produced a 45 rpm record which featured Tor Johnson on one side, reading The Day The Mummy Returned, and Criswell reading The Final Curtain on the other. It has never been determined whether or not the record was actually released, but a bunch of them were definitely produced.

In 1971, he produced, wrote and directed Necromania (subtitled A Tale of Weird Love) under the pseudonym "Don Miller". The film was an early entry to the new subgenre of hardcore pornographic films. Thought lost for years, it resurfaced in edited form on Mike Vraney's Something Weird imprint in the late 1980s, and was re-released later on DVD by Fleshbot Films in 2005. In the Rudolph Grey biography Nightmare of Ecstasy, Maila Nurmi ("Vampira") said she declined Wood's offer to do a nude scene sitting in a coffin for Necromania, claiming she was recovering from a stroke at the time.

From 1971 to 1972, Wood directed an unknown number of short X-Rated films produced by the Swedish Erotica film company. These were short 12-minute loops that were silent films with subtitles. Ed was paid $100.00 for every ten loops he subtitled.

Wood's friends Kenne Duncan and Tor Johnson both passed away during this period. (Ed Wood was named executor of Kenne Duncan's estate, and following Duncan's death, Wood held a small memorial funeral for him with his wife and some friends in his backyard around the swimming pool where they eulogized the departed Western film star.) Wood's friend Duke Moore died in 1976.

Throughout the 1970s, Wood worked with his friend Stephen C. Apostolof, usually co-writing scripts with him, but also serving as an assistant director and an associate producer. (Together they had made Wood's Orgy of the Dead back in 1965.) Wood's last known on-screen appearance (a dual role) was in Apostolof's 1974 film Fugitive Girls (a.k.a. Five Loose Women), in which he played both a gas station attendant called "Pops" and a sheriff on the fugitive women's trail.

At the time of his death, Wood was working on a biographical screenplay based on the last years of actor Bela Lugosi to be called Lugosi Post Mortem, which was supposed to star actor Peter Coe as Lugosi and Karl Johnson as his father Tor Johnson. The nearly completed script was left behind the last time Wood was evicted and is presumed to have been discarded in the trash. Wood was also working on a screenplay for a film called Venus De Milo, a mystery that would explain the famous statue's missing arms.

Technically, Wood's last acting job was in the 1978 Stephen Apostolof film Hot Ice. Ed Wood played a janitor in the film, but his scene was cut out at the last minute due to his drunkenness on the set. Wood died soon after this film was made in 1978, at age 54. (Ironically his demise coincided with the end of the soft-core porn industry circa 1978. Apostolof himself stopped making films as well at this time.)

Beginning in 1963 up until his death, Wood wrote at least 80 lurid crime and sex novels in addition to hundreds of short stories and non-fiction pieces for magazines and daily newspapers.

His novels include Black Lace Drag (1963) (reissued in 1965 as Killer in Drag), Orgy of the Dead (1965), Parisian Passions (1966), Watts the Difference (1966), Side-Show Siren (1966), Drag Trade (1967), Watts After (1967), Devil Girls (1967), It Takes One to Know One (1967), Death of a Transvestite (1967), Suburbia Confidential (1967), Night Time Lez (1968), The Perverts (1968), Bye Bye Broadie (1968), Raped in the Grass (1968), Sex, Shrouds and Caskets (1968), Love of the Dead (1968), The Sexecutives (1968), Young, Black and Gay (1968), Hell Chicks (1968), The Gay Underworld (1968), Carnival Piece (1969), Toni, Black Tigress (1969), Mama's Diary (1969), To Make a Homo (1969), Mary-Go-Round (1969), The Sexual Woman (1971), The Only House (1972), A Study of Fetishes and Fantasies (1973), Tales for a Sexy Night Part 1 and 2 (1973), Sex Star (1973), Death of a Transvestite Hooker (1974). Forced Entry (1974), and TV Lust (1977).

In 1965, Wood wrote the quasi-memoir Hollywood Rat Race, which was only published years later in 1998. In it, Wood advises new writers to "just keep on writing. Even if your story gets worse, you'll get better", and also recounts tales of dubious authenticity, such as how he and Bela Lugosi entered the world of nightclub cabaret.

Thirty-two short stories known to be written by Wood (he sometimes wrote under pseudonyms such as "Ann Gora" and "Dr. T.K. Peters") are collected in an anthology Blood Splatters Quickly, published by OR Books in 2014.

Wood's list of unrealized film projects also included scripts called Piranhas (1957), Trial by Terror (1958), The Peeper (a proposed 1960 sequel to The Sinister Urge), Silent Night (1961), Joaquin Murieta (a 1965 biopic about the infamous bandit of the Old West), Mice on a Cold Cellar Floor (1973), Epitaph for the Town Drunk (1973), To Kill a Saturday Night (1973, which was set to star John Carradine), The Teachers (1973), The Basketballers (1973), The Airline Hostesses (1973), I Awoke Early the Day I Died (1974, a rewrite of Wood's 1961 Silent Night), Heads, No Tails (1974, a take-off on Sweeney Todd), and Shoot Seven (1977, Wood's proposed musical based on the St. Valentine's Day Massacre).

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