Maila Nurmi
| Maila Nurmi | |
|---|---|
Nurmi in Plan 9 from Outer Space
|
|
| Born |
Maila Elizabeth Syrjäniemi December 11, 1922 Petsamo, Finland |
| Died | January 10, 2008 (aged 85) Los Angeles, California, United States |
| Resting place | Hollywood Forever Cemetery |
| Other names | Maila Syrjaniemi Nurmi Maila Elizabeth Nurmimioni Vampira |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Spouse(s) |
Dean Riesner (m. 1949) John Brinkley (m. 1958) Fabrizio Mioni (m. 1961) |
Maila Nurmi (December 11, 1922 – January 10, 2008) was a Finnish-American actress who created the campy 1950s character Vampira. She portrayed Vampira as TV's first horror host and in the Ed Wood cult film Plan 9 from Outer Space. She is billed as Vampira in the 1959 movie The Beat Generation where she plays a beatnik poet.
Born as Maila Elizabeth Syrjäniemi, she claimed to be the niece of the Finnish athlete Paavo Nurmi, who began setting long-distance running world records in 1921, the year before her birth. She purportedly moved to the United States with her family when she was two years old and grew up in Ashtabula, Ohio, home to the largest Finnish-American community in the state. She and her family may have lived in Ashtabula until 1939, when they moved to Oregon. However, according to Dana Gould who said he saw her birth certificate she was actually born in Gloucester, Massachusetts. She graduated from high school in Astoria, Oregon, before arriving in Los Angeles. She modeled for Alberto Vargas, Bernard of Hollywood, and Man Ray, gaining a foothold in the film industry with an uncredited role in Victor Saville's 1947 film, If Winter Comes.
She was reportedly fired by Mae West from the cast of West's Broadway play, Catherine Was Great, in 1944 because West feared she was being upstaged. On Broadway, she gained much attention after appearing in the horror-themed midnight show Spook Scandals, in which she screamed, fainted, lay in a coffin and seductively lurked about a mock cemetery. She also worked as a showgirl for the Earl Carroll Theatre and as a high-kicking chorus line dancer at the Florentine Gardens along with stripper Lili St. Cyr. In the 1950s she supported herself mainly by posing for pin-up photos in men's magazines such as Famous Models, Gala and Glamorous Models. Before landing her role as 'Vampira', she was working as a hat-check girl in a cloakroom on Hollywood's Sunset Strip.
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