DM

Dick Miller has died.  Not exactly a major star, and not that well known to the public, but to a certain set of fans, one of the biggies.

He was a short guy who served in the Navy and worked as a boxer.  Then he came out to Los Angeles in the 1950s and started getting work as a character actor.  He met low-budget mogul Roger Corman and became one of his top names.  Miller's best-known early role was probably Walter Paisley (a name he'd re-use in later films), a beatnik artist who, in Bucket Of Blood, becomes a hit sculptor by killing animals, and then humans, and covering them in clay.

Another major credit for Corman was Fouch in the original Little Shop Of Horrors, an habitue of the flower shop in the title.  The film was shot in two days, mostly on the set left over from Bucket Of Blood, yet the final result turned out to be surprisingly entertaining.  Apparently Corman offered Miller the lead but I guess he was so busy he took a supporting role.

Miller kept working throughout the years in TV and B pictures and whatever he could get.  He keeps popping up in small films such as Beach Ball, The Trip and Hollywood Boulevard.  One of my favorite movies is the Corman-produced Rock 'n' Roll High School, and there's Dick Miller as the police chief.

A new generation of filmmakers grew up watching Miller, and they started hiring him.  So he's in Robert Zemeckis's I Wanna Hold Your Hand and Used Cars.  He was a favorite of old Corman hand Joe Dante and so is in The Howling, Gremlins and other titles.  Another guy who'd worked with Corman, James Cameron, put Miller in The Terminator.

Miller kept working into the 21st century, though he slowed down a bit--no more five or six parts a year.  Apparently his last completed work, Hannukah, has yet to be released.  His character?  Rabbi Walter Paisley.