Two days ago, July 15th marked the 55th anniversary of the day in 1969 when Warren Publishing introduced the comics world to Vampirella, the bloodsucker from another planet who was created by Forrest J Ackerman and publisher James Warren, and designed by legendary artists Frank Frazetta and Trina Robbins. (That was the date Vampirella #1 debuted on newsstand magazine racks, in those long-ago days before comic shops.)
That first issue, and the series that followed, was an instant success—undoubtedly due to the spectacular art of Spanish illustrator Jose Gonzalez, who set the gold standard for depicting the swimsuit-wearing vampiress, and the paintings of cover artist Enrique Torres-Prat (aka Enrich)—and Vampirella quickly rose to become Warren Publishing’s most popular character. So it was only a matter of time before the motion-picture industry took notice…
In 1975, Hammer Films—the British studio best known for its series of Dracula movies starring Christopher Lee as the count and Peter Cushing as his nemesis, Professor Van Helsing—announced the forthcoming production of Vampirella: The Movie, to star Barbara Leigh (Junior Bonner, Pretty Maids All in a Row, Terminal Island), with Cushing as her best friend, a faded stage magician named Mordecai Pendragon. To promote the upcoming production both co-stars appeared at the 1975 Famous Monsters Convention in New York City, with Leigh creating a sensation when she walked out for the movie panel in a comics-accurate costume (which can be seen above).
That same night, Cushing and Ackerman (along with Dracula expert Leonard Wolf) appeared on NBC’s late-night talk show The Tomorrow Show, to discuss the horror genre with host Tom Synder. Leigh had also been booked for the episode, but when she showed up at the studio in her Vampi costume, the show’s producers, and Snyder, recoiled in shock and banned her from joining the sit-down discussion.
Unfortunately, that’s as far as the production got. Shortly after the convention, the whole thing fell apart and Leigh lost her chance at headlining stardom, while Cushing moved on to attaining sci-fi immortality by playing the sinister Grand Moff Tarkin in 1977’s mega-hit Star Wars (later known as Episode 4: A New Hope). A couple attempts were made to revive the project—including one in which genre actress Caroline Munro (Dracula A.D. 1972, The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, The Spy Who Loved Me) was approached (she declined)—and by the late 1970s any hope of a Vampirella movie was ended.
Having read it, I can say that, in all honesty, the script by screenwriter Christopher Wicking (Blood from the Mummy’s Tomb, To the Devil a Daughter) is…pretty awful. It’s a mishmash of plotlines taken from the comics, combined with a main plot that ends up making no sense whatsoever. The only positive aspect of it was that the relationship between Vampirella and Pendragon is accurately translated from the series; it would have been wonderful to see how Cushing played with the character.
That’s not the full tale, however, but for the full, in-depth behind-the-scenes story of the Vampirella film’s failure, and a full plot overview of the screenplay, there’s only one place you can find them:
From the Stars…a Vampiress: An Unauthorized Guide to Vampirella’s Classic Horror Adventures is Steven A. Roman’s (that’s me!) nonfiction history of the queen of the comic book bad girls. In its pages you’ll find a breakdown of every Vampirella story that appeared during her Warren Publishing days from July 1969 to December 1982 (plus a list of the modern-day books that reprinted them); a checklist of every Warren Era appearance she made; a look at the six-book novelization series written by sci-fi and pulp-adventure author Ron Goulart and published by Warner Books in the 1970s; an examination of the awful 1996 movie that starred Talisa Soto as Vampi and featured a scenery-gulping performance from rock-god Roger Daltrey (lead singer of the legendary band The Who) as Dracula; and, of course, a pretty extensive look at the history of Hammer Films’ Vampirella movie. Plus little-seen photos and other material pulled straight from the vaults of the Ackermonster by the Official Vampirella Historian, Sean Fernald, who also wrote the foreword.
From the Stars…a Vampiress: An Unauthorized Guide to Vampirella’s Classic Horror Adventures is available in print and digital formats. Visit its product page for ordering information.
