Stephanie Rothman

Writer/director Stephanie Rothman was one of the few female filmmakers who specialized in low-budget drive-in exploitation fare in the '60s and '70s. Her movies are distinguished by gutsy, strong-willed and sympathetic women main characters and a radical libertarian feminist point of view. Stephanie was born on November 9, 1936 in Paterson, New Jersey (made famous by Lou Costello, who mentioned it in every one of his movies). She was the first lady to be awarded the Directors Guild of America fellowship. Rothman served as an associate producer on Queen of Blood (1966), Beach Ball (1965) and Voyage to the Prehistoric Planet (1965). She co-wrote and co-directed the fright flick Blood Bath (1966) and made her solo directorial debut with the frothy "Beach Party"-type romp It's a Bikini World (1967). Stephanie made two features for Roger Corman's New World Pictures: the excellent The Student Nurses (1970) -- which was the first and best of the popular nurse comedy cycle -- and the offbeat and inspired horror bloodsucker outing The Velvet Vampire (1971). Rothman then went to work for Dimension Pictures, in which she and her writer/producer husband Charles S. Swartz had a minority share, where she made the charming Group Marriage (1972), the delightful The Working Girls (1974) and the gritty Terminal Island (1973) (an early vehicle for Tom Selleck. Moreover, she wrote the story for the enjoyable fantasy adventure Beyond Atlantis (1973) and penned the screenplay for the amusingly inane Starhops (1978). In 2007 Stephanie was honored with a retrospective on her work at the Vienna International Film Festival.