Alan Ormsby

Writer, director and make-up effects artist Alan Ormsby was born on December 14, 1943. He was a drama student at the University of Florida, where he met future director Bob Clark. The pair first collaborated on a tongue-in-cheek low-budget zombie horror flick, Children Shouldn't Play with Dead Things (1972). Ormsby not only co-wrote the script and did the effectively ghoulish zombie make-up, but also gave a deliciously hammy performance as the arrogant and obnoxious theater group leader Alan. Ormsby's then-wife Anya Liffey portrayed another group member; the couple later divorced in 1981.

Ormsby and Clark followed this film with Dead of Night (1974) (aka Deathdream), which was a supremely potent and unnerving Vietnam-era variant on the classic short story "The Monkey's Paw." Next up for Ormsby was the excellent Deranged (1974), which he co-wrote, co-directed and handled make-up effects chores on along with a then-unknown Tom Savini (Savini also worked with Ormsby on the make-up effects for Deathdream). Deranged (1974) was a macabre and blackly humorous rural psycho item inspired by the notorious exploits of serial killer Ed Gein. Other movies Ormsby has penned screenplays for are the delightful teen coming-of-age winner My Bodyguard (1980), Paul Schrader's sexy and stylish Cat People (1982) remake, the uproariously raunchy Porky's II: The Next Day (1983), and the exciting action opus The Substitute (1996).

Ormsby did the genuinely creepy zombie make-up for the spooky Nazi horror doozy Shock Waves (1977) and wrote Movie Monsters, a book on makeup effects, in 1976. He created the popular doll Hugo: Man of a Thousand Faces, which was featured in both The Uncle Floyd Show (1974) and The Pee-Wee Herman Show (1981). He co-wrote and directed the entertaining film-within-a-film segments for the hugely enjoyable slasher send-up Popcorn (1991). He is currently married to actress Hilarie Thompson and has two sons.