Mel Welles

From Wikipedia the free encyclopedia Mel Welles February 17 1924 August 18 2005 was an American film actor His bestremembered role may be that of hapless flower shop owner Gravis Mushnik in the 1960 lowbudget Roger Corman dark comedy The Little Shop of Horrors which featured Jack Nicholson as a masochistic dental patient Not much is known of Welles early life except that he was born Ira Meltcher in New York City He graduated from Mt Carmel High School in 1940 He went on to receive a Bachelor of Arts degree from Penn State University a Master of Arts degree from West Virginia University and a PhD in psychology from Columbia University Welles held a number of jobs during his lifetime at one time or another he worked as a clinical psychologist radio DJ television actor writer and film director He did some stage work before traveling to Hollywood where in 1953 he appeared in his first film Appointment in Honduras His favorite role The Little Shop of Horrors was also his last in the US for many years In the early 1960s he left the United States to act produce and direct primarily in European film productions including the cult horror films Maneater of Hydra 1967 and Lady Frankenstein 1971 His fluency in five languages proved to be most helpful He also served as a film consultant Later he returned to the US appearing in a number of films doing voice work and teaching voice acting Probably his most widely seen work in the late 1970s was his English adaptation of the Japanese television show Spectreman which was seen on UHF and cable across the United States While he shares writing credit with two other people its clear that most of the English voice work and the offbeat humor is his In 1998 Welles took to the stage in a community theater production of Little Shop of Horrors musical as Mushnik the role he created in the original Roger Corman film Welles had never performed in the musical and was happy to be asked to do the role which he described as a mitzvah for Scotts Valley Performing Arts Jonathan Haze who played Seymour in the original film attended the opening and Welles also received a visit from Martin P Robinson the designer of the Audrey II plant puppets used in the offBroadway production Robinson is also famous for his puppetry on Sesame Street Welles was working on a horror screenplay tentatively titled House of a Hundred Horrors at the time of his death Description above from the Wikipedia article Mel Welles licensed under CCBYSA full list of contributors on Wikipedia