EDWARD D. WOOD JR. (1924–1978)

B-MOVIE ICON

Often dubbed the worst filmmaker in movie history, Edward D. Wood Jr. was a novelist and low-budget genre filmmaker whose films exude a kitsch value that transcends their quality.

Most people know of Wood because of Johnny Depp’s portrayal of him in Tim Burton’s lovingly made biopic. Shot in black-and-white, Ed Wood (1994) captures the wonder of a man with little creative talent who desperately wants to enter the movies. It is a romantic film that looks upon its subject fondly, gently mocking his films but never as cruel as the notices the filmmaker received when Glen or Glenda (1953), Jail Bait (1954) and the infamous Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959) were initially released.

Burton’s film ends before Wood’s early death, of a heart attack, at the age of 54. He was still living in Hollywood, but by the 1970s he existed in a state of extreme poverty and alcoholism and was heavily dependent on his friends’ support. Although his death passed unnoticed, subsequent appraisals of his life, including Rudolph Grey’s 1992 biography upon which Burton’s film is based, championed Wood’s pioneering spirit; his films may have been less than artful, but his resilience in continuing to make them was something to behold.

Wood was born in Poughkeepsie, New York, and from an early age was obsessed with cinema. He collected memorabilia of the stars that cinemas would discard after a film’s run and became an usher at a local cinema. His passion was westerns, along with the horror and monster movies that were popular at the time. With the United States’ entry into World War II, he was drafted into the army and fought in the Battle of Tarawa, where he lost his front teeth and was shot in the leg.

In 1947, Wood moved to Hollywood and began life as a screenwriter. He wrote a poorly reviewed play of his experiences in the war and wrote, produced, directed and starred in his feature debut Glen or Glenda. Semi-documentary in form, the film’s admittedly crass portrayal of a crossdresser, loosely based on transwoman Christine Jorgensen, was informed by Wood’s own experience. His mother, Lillian, had wanted a daughter and dressed him in girl’s clothes when he was young. As a result, cross-dressing was natural to Wood, and the film was uncharacteristically empathetic to its LGBT theme. The voiceover that narrates the action was supplied by Bela Lugosi, the original screen Dracula, whom Wood had long admired. They became friends and Lugosi appeared in a number of the director’s key productions. Most notably, he was the alien vampire in Plan 9 from Outer Space. The recipient of the accolade ‘Worst Film Ever’ at the Golden Turkey Awards, Wood’s ineptly made sci-fi romp remains his best-known film. Although his subsequent work showed little improvement, Wood’s name and some of his films live on through an array of references in popular culture, from song titles and lyrics to remakes of his films and scripts, and even a musical, Dreamer (2017), about his life.

“ONE IS ALWAYS CONSIDERED MAD WHEN ONE PERFECTS SOMETHING THAT OTHERS CANNOT GRASP.”