CONRAD BROOKS

7 Dec

(3 January 1931 - 6 December 2017)

The American actor, writer, producer and director Conrad Brooks, who has died aged 86, was born Conrad Biedrzycki to Polish immigrant parents. His first Hollywood film was a Bowery Boys comedy, Jalopy, in 1953. While there he met the cheapest director on the lot, Ed Wood, who became legendary for making bad bad films. Brooks had three roles in Wood’s Glen or Glenda?, about a transsexual and a pseudo hermaphrodite, starring Bela Lugosi. From then on it was downhill all the way with Ed Wood in films such as Plan 9 from Outer Space (also with Lugosi) and many other Z-grade movies that never reached the UK. Brooks wrote, acted, directed and produced some of these films, which had enticing titles such as Blood Slaves of the Vampire Wolf, Bikini Drive-In, Baby Ghost, Toad Warrior, Shotgun Boulevard, Rollergator and I Woke Up Early the Day I Died. Most of his films went straight to video. However, Brooks occasionally appeared in the odd decent film such as Tim Burton’s biopic Ed Wood and an episode of the BBC TV series Dalziel and Pascoe. He worked continuously (except for a break in the 1960s and 1970s) right up until his death, clocking up nearly a hundred films. Yet to be released are Revenge of the Devil Bat, Darkness Waits and Abaddon.

MICHAEL DARVELL

Michael Darvell

Michael Darvell trained as a librarian at Watford and in Surrey before joining Ealing Libraries where he became Music Librarian for the borough. He edited Masthead, the magazine of the University of North London School of Librarianship, The Surrealist, the staff magazine of Surrey County Library, and contributed to the Assistant Librarian and London Librarian professional journals. A freelance film reviewer since 1970, he has written for Film, Films Illustrated, Film Review, Movie Maker and Radio Times, as well as editing Montage, the London film societies magazine, for ten years. A change of career saw him joining What’s On in London as Features Editor and he eventually stepped into the shoes of the late F. Maurice Speed (founding father of Film Review annual) as the magazine’s Editor. From 2007 to 2015, he was co-editor of the Film Review annual with Mansel Stimpson. As well as writing about films, Michael has reviewed theatre for The Stage newspaper, and has written about music theatre and cabaret for the Classical Source and Musical Theatre Review websites. He is also a former restaurant critic for the ViewLondon website. Michael has been a member of the London Film Critics’ Circle since 2005.

CONRAD BROOKS

SUZANNA LEIGH

SHASHI KAPOOR