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2 articles from 2009

12 January 2009 2:04 AM, PST | DreadCentral.com | See recent Dread Central news »

Psychotronic filmmaker Ray Dennis Steckler lost his battle with heart disease on January 7, 2009 in Las Vegas, Nevada; he was 70 years old. With his passing so goes Cash Flagg, his hoodlum alter ego and star of Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies, The Thrill Killers, Lemon Grove Kids Meet the Monsters and Wild Guitar. We also say farewell to Sven Christian, Wolfgang Schmidt, and Cindy Lou Sutters; other Steckler pseudonyms; there were 12 of them at last count and I am sure we will miss them all.

Steckler started his film career by finishing principal photography on Timothy Carey’s World’s Greatest Sinner. He then went on to capture Arch Hall Jr.’s delinquent delight in 1962's Wild Guitar, and after that he was off and running, shooting films without ever a finished screenplay in hand.

Steckler always did the best he could with what he had, »

- Johnny Butane

9 January 2009 2:07 PM, PST | Fangoria | See recent Fangoria news »

Ray Dennis Steckler, the maverick producer/director/writer/actor/cinematographer (and-and-and) who created such cult flicks as The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living And Became Mixed-up Zombies!!? (1964) and The Thrill Killers (1964), died Wednesday night at age 70. At the beginning of his nearly half-century career, the rebel moviemaker was a fixture at Fairway International, the Burbank-based indie film company established by Arch Hall, Sr.

Steckler began as a camera assistant on Fairway’s caveman-on-the-loose-in-Palm-Springs campfest Eegah (1962) and then directed their next feature Wild Guitar the same year. Using his frequent nom de screen “Cash Flagg,” he also co-starred in the latter as the thuggish henchman of a record company executive (Hall Sr.).

The star of Eegah and Wild Guitar, Arch Hall Jr. knew Steckler from the Fairway days until what was his final public appearance on November 14, 2008: a special Los Angeles County Museum of Art screening of No Subtitles Necessary: Laszlo & Vilmos, »

2 articles from 2009