In Remembrance: Mel Welles

     Mel Welles, the character actor who played the owner of the titular flower shop in the 1960 cult classic Little Shop Of Horrors, has passed away on August 19, 2005 in Norfolk, Virginia. He was 81.

     Born Ira Meltcher in New York City, Welles held a variety of jobs including clinical psychologist, radio deejay and writer before turning to acting. He made his first film appearance in 1953’s Appointment In Honduras.

     A majority of Welles’s film appearances through the 1950s were in small, oft times uncredited, roles in such films as Gun Fury (1953), Jesse James Vs The Dalton (1954), Abbott And Costello Meet The Mummy (1955), Designing Woman (1957), The Brothers Karamazov (1958), High School Confidential! (1958) and Hemingway’s Adventures As A Young Man (1962).

     Welles drew the attention of B-movie mogul Roger Corman, appearing in three of his films – Attack Of The Crab Monsters, The Undead and Rock All Night – in 1957. In 1960, Corman cast Welles in the role of Gravis Mushnik, the owner of the flower shop in the dark comedy Little Shop Of Horrors, for which he received a salary of $1,100.00 for the film’s rushed, two-day production schedule.

     Welles also tried his hand at writing and directing with the 1957 crime drama Code Of Silence. In 1967, he relocated to Europe where he wrote and directed a small number of films including Death Island (1967) and Daughter Of Frankenstein (1971).

     Welles continued acting, making appearances in The Last American Virgin (1982), Chopping Mall (1986) and Wizards Of The Lost Kingdom II (1989). His final film was 2002’s Raising Dead.