Wasp Woman (1960) (11" x 14") Lobby Card
Roger Corman, tireless producer/director that he was, put out another of his B movies in late 1959. WW is a much more conventional science-gone-wrong story. It also added to a growing sub-genre of science spawned human-animal monster stories. Leo Gordon, who wrote the screenplay, had just given us Alligator People a few months earlier. It co-ran with Return of the Fly, the famous of the human-animal monster sub group. WW amounts to a female version of The Fly but without the transporter technology. Instead, it's the more customary trope of animal juices turn you into that animal.
Shot in less than a week for $50,000, Roger Corman directed this science fiction film about a cosmetic company executive (Susan Cabot) who has found a youth-rejuvenating drug in the royal jelly of wasps. The only side effect is that the taker periodically becomes a wasp and at night slays her victims and devours them.
Synopsis
(never mind that the credits are over a hive of honey bees)
Research scientist Dr. Zinthrop thinks the royal jelly of the queen wasp holds the key to perpetual youth. Hhe promotes his ideas to Janice Starlin, head of a cosmetics company. Starlin Enterprises has been steadily losing revenue since Janice -- the "face" of the company -- has lost her youthful look over the 18 years at the helm. Janice hires Zinthrop. The rest of the staff are suspicious and skeptical. Most think Zinthrop is a con man or a quack. They plot to uncover the scheme. Meanwhile, Janice does get daily injections of the serum Zinthrop developed. After 3 weeks, looks only a few years younger. Zinthrop has a new serum which is even stronger. She tells everyone to plan for a huge new product release that will save the company, etc. etc. Zinthrop is attacked by one of his test animals. The cat reverted from neo-kitten to savage beast with wing buds. Zinthrop, despondent at his failure, is hit by a car. With Zinthrop missing, and impatient with the slow progress, Janice injects herself with the untested new serum. Now she looks remarkably younger. Everyone is amazed. Not long afterward, Janice develops odd headaches. In the lab on night, Cooper snoops right after one of her injections. Now with wasp(ish) head and claws, Wasp Janice attacks and kills Cooper. She also dispatches a night watchman. A few days later, Janice takes the last dose and again becomes Wasp Woman. She kills the nurse assigned to care for Zinthrop. Bill fights with Wasp Janice to save his girlfriend Mary. Zinthrop throws a bottle of acid at WaspJanice, hitting her square in the face. Recoiling in pain, she falls out of a window and dies. The End.
It's interesting how 1959 had three human-animal monster stories. Comparing similarities and differences is food for thought. Perhaps not intentionally, the sub-genre dabbles in the fragile essence of what is humanity, vs. the beastly "nature" side, much as Dr. Jekyll did.
As with most monster movies, there is little or no Cold War analogy. Instead, there is the usual dangers-of-science moral. There is also the hubris of man thinking he (or she) can trump nature -- with the customary fatal results.
Susan Cabot, who does a capable job as the ill-fated woman. She also starred in a couple of Corman's prior films, War of the Satellites ('58) and the peculiar film Saga of the Viking Women and Their Voyage to the Waters of the Great Sea Serpent ('57). WW was her last movie role. Corman movies were no way to grow a career. Michael Marks plays Dr. Zinthrop well enough. His trace of russian accent meshing well with the eccentric scientist role. Audiences had just seen him (briefly) as the night watchman in Return of the Fly. He was also conspicuous as Emil, friend of Mr. Franz the puppet master in Attack of the Puppet People ('58)
Corman's original cut of WW is said to begin with Starlin conducting the business meeting where sagging sales are discussed. This makes the Dr. Zinthrop character a bit of a shot out of left field, but the movie gets going on its own nonetheless. When WW was released for television in 1962, director Jack Hill filmed several minutes of prologue footage. In it, we see Zinthrop as the eccentric researcher employed by a honey company. Instead of working with bees, he has been working with wasps. His honey farm boss is unimpressed with talk of reversing aging. They sell honey. Zinthrop is fired. This prologue sets up Zinthrop and his discovery (as well as need for a patron), so his appearance at Starlin Enterprises is not so much of a non-sequetor.
The poster artist may not have read the script or seen the film. His image of a huge wasp with a woman's head is the opposite of what happens. WaspJanice, like FlyAndre and FlyPhillipe before her, had an insect-ish head and claws, but her own human body. Handily enough, she took to wearing black knit pantsuits as the serum was taking over, so she was dressed for the killer role. The poster does give a refreshing twist on the old abduction trope, even if it's not in the movie. Here, it is a shirtless young man in the clutches of the she-monster, instead of the swooning buxom babe.
Instead of the typical naive scientist creating the monster, we have that trope split in two. Zinthrop follows the role of native scientist who hopes to benefit mankind, but he shows restraint. He was willing to call it quits when things went wrong. Janice took up the task of the fatal misstep, pushed by her desire to save her company and her vanity as a woman. She pushed nature over the edge.
Bottom line? WW is a fairly predictable science-gone-wrong tale, but capably acted and directed. There are enough entertaining moments to keep WW watchable. For fans of The Fly, it can be an amusing other-side-of-the-coin.
Roger Corman directed this science fiction/horror film about a woman (Susan Cabot) who teams up with an eccentric scientist (Michael Mark) who has created an anti-aging cream based on extracts from queen wasps
Another Take.
This goofy but entertaining horror cheapie from producer-director Roger Corman and company involves the efforts of a questionable scientist working for cosmetics magnate Susan Cabot, who is developing a new rejuvenating beauty cream derived from an enzyme secreted by wasps, intended to make women look eternally youthful. A vain woman obsessed with restoring her lost beauty, Cabot insists on being the first test subject. The solution proves remarkably effective at first, transforming her into a sultry raven-haired vixen...until she begins to take on the predatory traits of a giant female wasp, setting out on a nocturnal killing spree. Originally double-billed with The Beast from Haunted Cave, this cheesy monster mash inspired the less-amusing Leech Woman and was later remade for 1980s audiences (i.e., with a higher sex-and-gore quotient) as Evil Spawn.
review
Considering the strange and terrible fate of the lead actress -- Susan Cabot apparently lived her own nightmare and was eventually killed by her increasingly browbeaten son -- The Wasp Woman takes on an added poignancy that obviously wasn't intended by the film's cheapskate producer-director, Roger Corman. Here is yet another creature flick hampered by a ludicrous monster costume -- nothing more than a Halloween mask, really -- not quite as bad as it could have been but not very good either. Cabot herself does well enough as the youth-obsessed heroine/villainess and the film does attempt to address both the increasing paranoia regarding aging and science run amok. But the cheesy special effects (if you can call a rubber mask and a couple of claws "special effects") and lack of any kind of budget betray the good intentions. Typical of Corman, the supporting roles are well cast (including the stunning Lynn Cartwright as a Brooklyn-accented secretary) and an attempt to turn modern office life into a sort of Grand Guignol melodrama works at least part of the way.
Wasp Woman (1960) (11" x 14") Lobby Card
Roger Corman, tireless producer/director that he was, put out another of his B movies in late 1959. WW is a much more conventional science-gone-wrong story. It also added to a growing sub-genre of science spawned human-animal monster stories. Leo Gordon, who wrote the screenplay, had just given us Alligator People a few months earlier. It co-ran with Return of the Fly, the famous of the human-animal monster sub group. WW amounts to a female version of The Fly but without the transporter technology. Instead, it's the more customary trope of animal juices turn you into that animal.
Shot in less than a week for $50,000, Roger Corman directed this science fiction film about a cosmetic company executive (Susan Cabot) who has found a youth-rejuvenating drug in the royal jelly of wasps. The only side effect is that the taker periodically becomes a wasp and at night slays her victims and devours them.
Synopsis
(never mind that the credits are over a hive of honey bees)
Research scientist Dr. Zinthrop thinks the royal jelly of the queen wasp holds the key to perpetual youth. Hhe promotes his ideas to Janice Starlin, head of a cosmetics company. Starlin Enterprises has been steadily losing revenue since Janice -- the "face" of the company -- has lost her youthful look over the 18 years at the helm. Janice hires Zinthrop. The rest of the staff are suspicious and skeptical. Most think Zinthrop is a con man or a quack. They plot to uncover the scheme. Meanwhile, Janice does get daily injections of the serum Zinthrop developed. After 3 weeks, looks only a few years younger. Zinthrop has a new serum which is even stronger. She tells everyone to plan for a huge new product release that will save the company, etc. etc. Zinthrop is attacked by one of his test animals. The cat reverted from neo-kitten to savage beast with wing buds. Zinthrop, despondent at his failure, is hit by a car. With Zinthrop missing, and impatient with the slow progress, Janice injects herself with the untested new serum. Now she looks remarkably younger. Everyone is amazed. Not long afterward, Janice develops odd headaches. In the lab on night, Cooper snoops right after one of her injections. Now with wasp(ish) head and claws, Wasp Janice attacks and kills Cooper. She also dispatches a night watchman. A few days later, Janice takes the last dose and again becomes Wasp Woman. She kills the nurse assigned to care for Zinthrop. Bill fights with Wasp Janice to save his girlfriend Mary. Zinthrop throws a bottle of acid at WaspJanice, hitting her square in the face. Recoiling in pain, she falls out of a window and dies. The End.
It's interesting how 1959 had three human-animal monster stories. Comparing similarities and differences is food for thought. Perhaps not intentionally, the sub-genre dabbles in the fragile essence of what is humanity, vs. the beastly "nature" side, much as Dr. Jekyll did.
As with most monster movies, there is little or no Cold War analogy. Instead, there is the usual dangers-of-science moral. There is also the hubris of man thinking he (or she) can trump nature -- with the customary fatal results.
Susan Cabot, who does a capable job as the ill-fated woman. She also starred in a couple of Corman's prior films, War of the Satellites ('58) and the peculiar film Saga of the Viking Women and Their Voyage to the Waters of the Great Sea Serpent ('57). WW was her last movie role. Corman movies were no way to grow a career. Michael Marks plays Dr. Zinthrop well enough. His trace of russian accent meshing well with the eccentric scientist role. Audiences had just seen him (briefly) as the night watchman in Return of the Fly. He was also conspicuous as Emil, friend of Mr. Franz the puppet master in Attack of the Puppet People ('58)
Corman's original cut of WW is said to begin with Starlin conducting the business meeting where sagging sales are discussed. This makes the Dr. Zinthrop character a bit of a shot out of left field, but the movie gets going on its own nonetheless. When WW was released for television in 1962, director Jack Hill filmed several minutes of prologue footage. In it, we see Zinthrop as the eccentric researcher employed by a honey company. Instead of working with bees, he has been working with wasps. His honey farm boss is unimpressed with talk of reversing aging. They sell honey. Zinthrop is fired. This prologue sets up Zinthrop and his discovery (as well as need for a patron), so his appearance at Starlin Enterprises is not so much of a non-sequetor.
The poster artist may not have read the script or seen the film. His image of a huge wasp with a woman's head is the opposite of what happens. WaspJanice, like FlyAndre and FlyPhillipe before her, had an insect-ish head and claws, but her own human body. Handily enough, she took to wearing black knit pantsuits as the serum was taking over, so she was dressed for the killer role. The poster does give a refreshing twist on the old abduction trope, even if it's not in the movie. Here, it is a shirtless young man in the clutches of the she-monster, instead of the swooning buxom babe.
Instead of the typical naive scientist creating the monster, we have that trope split in two. Zinthrop follows the role of native scientist who hopes to benefit mankind, but he shows restraint. He was willing to call it quits when things went wrong. Janice took up the task of the fatal misstep, pushed by her desire to save her company and her vanity as a woman. She pushed nature over the edge.
Bottom line? WW is a fairly predictable science-gone-wrong tale, but capably acted and directed. There are enough entertaining moments to keep WW watchable. For fans of The Fly, it can be an amusing other-side-of-the-coin.
Roger Corman directed this science fiction/horror film about a woman (Susan Cabot) who teams up with an eccentric scientist (Michael Mark) who has created an anti-aging cream based on extracts from queen wasps
Another Take.
This goofy but entertaining horror cheapie from producer-director Roger Corman and company involves the efforts of a questionable scientist working for cosmetics magnate Susan Cabot, who is developing a new rejuvenating beauty cream derived from an enzyme secreted by wasps, intended to make women look eternally youthful. A vain woman obsessed with restoring her lost beauty, Cabot insists on being the first test subject. The solution proves remarkably effective at first, transforming her into a sultry raven-haired vixen...until she begins to take on the predatory traits of a giant female wasp, setting out on a nocturnal killing spree. Originally double-billed with The Beast from Haunted Cave, this cheesy monster mash inspired the less-amusing Leech Woman and was later remade for 1980s audiences (i.e., with a higher sex-and-gore quotient) as Evil Spawn.
review
Considering the strange and terrible fate of the lead actress -- Susan Cabot apparently lived her own nightmare and was eventually killed by her increasingly browbeaten son -- The Wasp Woman takes on an added poignancy that obviously wasn't intended by the film's cheapskate producer-director, Roger Corman. Here is yet another creature flick hampered by a ludicrous monster costume -- nothing more than a Halloween mask, really -- not quite as bad as it could have been but not very good either. Cabot herself does well enough as the youth-obsessed heroine/villainess and the film does attempt to address both the increasing paranoia regarding aging and science run amok. But the cheesy special effects (if you can call a rubber mask and a couple of claws "special effects") and lack of any kind of budget betray the good intentions. Typical of Corman, the supporting roles are well cast (including the stunning Lynn Cartwright as a Brooklyn-accented secretary) and an attempt to turn modern office life into a sort of Grand Guignol melodrama works at least part of the way.