Mel Welles
Biography
Mel Welles was an American actor who also worked as a voice artist and a film director. Raised in Mount Carmel, Pennsylvania, in a family with roots in Yiddish theater, he did stage work before heading to Hollywood and making his first film, Appointment in Honduras, in 1953. He became best known for his collaborations with Roger Corman, as flower shop owner Gravis Mushnick in The Little Shop of Horrors (1960). Moving to Europe in the early 1960s, he acted, produced and directed, often uncredited, in cult horror films such as Maneater of Hydra (1967) and Lady Frankenstein (1971). Fluent in five languages, he set up a dubbing business that handled, by his own count, more than 800 European films. He later returned to the U.S. for screen work, voice acting and teaching, and helped adapt the Japanese series Spectreman. His best known work was the beat poem High School Drag, which he wrote for High School Confidential (1958).
81years old at death
- Born New York City
- Died
- Star sign: AquariusThe sign runs January 20 to February 18
Movie Career
- Films
- 13
- Career span
- 31 years1955 to 1986
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Languages
Welles spoke five languages, which proved helpful when he started a dubbing company. By his own estimate, that company dubbed over 800 films made in Europe.
Beyond film
Welles took the stage in 1998 as Mushnik in a community theater staging of Little Shop of Horrors, the part he had created in Roger Corman's original film. He had never done the musical before.
Behind the camera
Welles wrote the beat poem High School Drag for the 1958 film High School Confidential, where Phillipa Fallon performed it.
Mel Welles movies on Netflix
Best known for
The films on Netflix they are best known for, with the part played in each.
Most often with
Roger Corman directed three of these films, Charles B. Griffith two. Dick Miller appears in four of them, more than any other actor. Pick a number on the chart or a name in the list to see the films they share.
Films together
Dick Miller's page
Charles B. Griffith's page
Beach Dickerson's page
Gene Barry's page
Pamela Duncan's page
Richard Garland's page
All films by Roger Corman
Online
Official profiles and reference pages.