Mary Woronov was born in Brooklyn on December 8, 1946. She was educated at Cornell University. She began as an aspiring artist but temporarily abandoned that talent when she hooked up with Andy Warhol’s Factory and he featured her as a “superstar� in several of his independently-produced films such as her role as Hanoi Hanna in The Chelsea Girls (1966).

After winning acclaim on Broadway with In the Boom Boom Room (1974) she made the transition to slightly more mainstream films, via Roger Corman productions such as Death Race 2000 (1975). Woronov was memorable in Paul Bartel’s Eating Raoul (1982) and Scenes from the Class Struggle in Beverly Hills (1988). Both Bartel and Roger Corman gave her roles in their independents, thereby making her a cult favorite. When she made Eating Raoul she had had enough experience acting in horror films that she was excellent both as its leading lady and director. It was about killing people and selling the bodies to be made into dog food, and then finally killing the manufacturer of the dog food and saying “We’re having a friend for dinner.� Critics either praised the film or said it couldn’t have been worse. One critic said: “Sags a little here and there, but overall a bright, original and hilarious satire.� A sequel was titled Chopping Mall and that says enough to make it either entice or repulse a moviegoer.

Another film in which Mary can be said to have had an appropriate and impressive role is Rock ‘n’ Roll High School (1979) in which she played Miss Evelyn Tagar, the wicked principal of the California-located Vince Lombardi High School (a sort of “our Miss Brooks� Eve Arden — only evil). For instance she gave student Riff Randell (played by P.J. Soles, a female) “detention for life!� for punching her. In the grand finale students take over the high school, turn Vince Lombardi’s picture to the wall, rename it Rock ‘n‘ Roll High and then blow the institution to smithereens.

Woronov’s other films were mostly in the horror category with such titles as Mortuary Academy, The Movie House Massacre; Silent Night, Bloody Night and Terrorvision. A non-horror film part was the cameo role of a welfare person in Dick Tracy (1990). Mary Woronov is also an accomplished artist with her work being exhibited in New York and London.

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