Dolores Fuller(1923-2011)
- Actress
- Writer
- Composer
Dolores Fuller first got the idea that she wanted to get into the
picture business at the age of ten, when she was an extra in the motel
sequence of
It Happened One Night (1934).
She acted in school plays, modeled and landed a few jobs on TV. In the
early 1950s, she and her actress-friend,
Mona McKinnon, went to a casting call
where they met producer-director
Edward D. Wood Jr., who became
Fuller's boyfriend. Wood's real-life passion for wearing women's
clothes was focused upon in the filmmaker's semi-autobiographical
Glen or Glenda (1953), in which
Wood starred as a cross-dresser and Fuller played his girlfriend.
Fuller also appeared in Wood's
Jail Bait (1954) and
Bride of the Monster (1955)
before his drinking caused a split. Fuller turned songwriter, wrote
tunes for a number of movies (including
Elvis Presley's
Blue Hawaii (1961) and
Kid Galahad (1962)), founded her own
record company (Dee Dee Records) and helped to launch the careers of
Johnny Rivers and
Tanya Tucker. Fuller is vocal in her
dislike of the way she was depicted by
Sarah Jessica Parker in director
Tim Burton's
Ed Wood (1994).
