Regina Carrol(1943-1992)

The buxom, lively and attractive blonde bombshell named Regina Carrol was a dancer, singer and actress who achieved her greatest enduring cult popularity by appearing in a handful of entertainingly trashy drive-in exploitation feature films directed by her filmmaker husband Al Adamson. She was born Regina Gelfan on May 2, 1943 in Boston, Massachusetts. Carrol began doing auditions for plays when she was 5. She performed in stage productions of "West Side Story," "The Children's Hour," "Wish You Were Here" and "Daddy Long Legs." Carrol's mother died of cancer when she was 15. Carrol worked as a dancer in Las Vegas, Nevada and toured Europe with her night club act. In addition, she hosted her own TV interview series called "The Regina Carrol Show" and wrote an entertainment column for the newspaper "The Las Vegas Panorama." She was discovered and convinced to go into films by actor Steve Cochran. Carrol made appearances on the TV series "The Dinah Shore Show," "Route 66" and "The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet." She made her film debut as a dancer in "The Beat Generation" and had uncredited small parts in "The Glass Bottom Boat," "The Slender Thread," the delightful Elvis Presley romp "Viva Las Vegas" (she dated Elvis for a short time while making this film), "Two Rode Together" and "From the Terrace." Carrol then gave a memorably wild performance as the crazed biker mama Gina in the splendidly sleazy Satan's Sadists (1969) (she was billed as "the freak-out girl" in the advertisements for this film). Other notable film roles of hers at this time include the daffy Lori in the amusing Blazing Stewardesses (1975), the feisty cowgirl Claire in the gritty revenge Western Jessi's Girls (1975), and the melancholy lounge singer Valerie in the nifty blaxploitation film Black Heat (1976) (she sings the forlorn ballad "No More Mail Until Tomorrow" in this film). Carrol ended her career performing cabaret on stage and died of cancer at the tragically young age of 49 on November 4, 1992.