American film director, set designer
Father of Arianne Ulmer.
Historian/critic/director Peter Bogdanovich praises Ulmers directorial work on low-budget movies like The Naked Dawn and Sette contro la morte , which he considers "classics", adding that "the astonishing thing is that so many of Ulmers movies have a clearly identifiable signature [despite being] accomplished with so little encouragement and so few means... ". Ulmer worked in set design beginning as a teenager for Austrian director Max Reinhardt. He came with Reinhardt to the US in 1923 with the play "The Miracle", which opened on Broadway. He was blackballed from Hollywood work after he had an affair with Shirley Castle (he eventually married her and she became known as Shirley Ulmer ), who at the time was the wife of B-picture producer Max Alexander , a nephew of powerful Universal Pictures president Carl Laemmle. Ulmer spent the bulk of his remaining career languishing at PRC, the lowest rung on the ladder of Hollywoods "Poverty Row" studios. He signed a long-term contract there in October 1943 after directing the "big-budget" (by PRC standards) Jive Junction , becoming the companys #1 director. Ulmer remains the principal reason PRC is mentioned in Hollywood history at all.
Biography in: John Wakeman, editor. "World Film Directors, Volume One, 1890-1945." Pages 1107-1112. New York: The H.W. Wilson Company, 1987.
Many of his films involved pure geometric patterns.
Interviewed in Peter Bogdanovich s "Who the Devil Made It: Conversations With Robert Aldrich , George Cukor , Allan Dwan , Howard Hawks , Alfred Hitchcock , Chuck Jones , Fritz Lang , Joseph H. Lewis , Sidney Lumet , Leo McCarey , Otto Preminger , Don Siegel , Josef von Sternberg , Frank Tashlin , Edgar G. Ulmer , Raoul Walsh." NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 1997.
Despite being the resident "artist" at PRC, after signing his long-term contract with the studio it immediately assigned Ulmer to direct a series of short subjects produced by the R. Wolff Advertising Agency for Coca-Cola. The project took some five months and kept him busy while the studio was involved in a substantial upgrade resulting from its purchase of various bankrupt properties along "Poverty Row".
Ulmers wife Shirley Ulmer discusses the life and career she shared with him in an interview in Tom Weaver s book "I Was a Monster Movie Maker" (McFarland & Co., 2001). Their daughter Arianne Ulmer shares her memories of Ulmer in Weavers "Science Fiction and Fantasy Film Flashbacks" (McFarland & Co., 1998).
While at the poverty row Producers Releasing Corporation (PRC), he became the de facto head of production, overseeing productions by other directors and aiding the president of the company in planning the years production schedule.
Actor Peter Marshall reminisces about the making of Ulmers final film Sette contro la morte in the book "A Sci-Fi Swarm and Horror Horde" (McFarland & Co., 2010) by Tom Weaver.
Ulmers father was a soldier in the Austro-Hungarian army during World War I and was killed in battle in 1916, when Ulmer was just 12 years old.
Cousin of Gustav H. Heimo.
Profiled in John Beltons "American Directors, Vol. 1".
Profiled in Lizzie Francke s "Retrospective".
Spent the first three years of his career in the U.S. (1930-33) as an art director. Began to direct features from late 1933. Except for brief stints at Universal in the mid-30s and United Artists (1946-47), was primarily associated with "Poverty Row" studios, especially PRC.
After his success with The Black Cat for Universal, Fox wanted to borrow Ulmer for a Shirley Temple musical. The director walked out on his contract rather than do it, consigning himself to Poverty Row studios like PRC, where he could choose his own subject matter, for his career.
