The Little Shop of Horrors is a 1960 American comedy horror film directed and produced by Roger Corman, from a screenplay by Charles B. Griffith. The film is a farce about a florist's assistant who cultivates a plant that feeds on human blood. It stars Jonathan Haze, Jackie Joseph, Mel Welles, and Dick Miller, who had all worked for Corman on previous films. Produced under the title The Passionate People Eater, the film employs an original style of humor, combining dark comedy with farce and incorporating Jewish humor and elements of spoof. The Little Shop of Horrors was shot on a budget of $28,000 (). Interiors were shot in two days, by utilizing sets that had been left standing from A Bucket of Blood.
The film was released in October 1960 by Filmgroup as a double feature with Filmgroup's Last Woman on Earth (1960).Bill Warren, Keep Watching The Skies! American Science Fiction Movies of the 1950s, Vol. 2, 1958-1962 (New York: McFarland & Co, 1986), pg. 752-753. The film slowly gained a cult following through word of mouth when it was later distributed as the B movie in a double feature with Mario Bava's Black Sunday (1960).
The film's popularity increased with local television broadcasts, and the presence of a young Jack Nicholson, whose small role in the film has been prominently promoted on its home video releases. The film was the basis for an Off-Broadway musical, Little Shop of Horrors, which in turn was adapted into a 1986 feature film. The musical enjoyed a 2003 Broadway debut and a 2019 off-Broadway revival, among other productions.
Plot
Florist shop owner Gravis Mushnick has two employees, Audrey Fulquard and Seymour Krelborn. Located on skid row, Mushnick's rundown shop gets little business. When Seymour fouls up a floral arrangement for dentist Dr. Farb, Mushnick fires him. Hoping to change his mind, Seymour talks about a plant he has grown from seeds he got from a "Japanese gardener over on Central Avenue". Seymour names the plant "Audrey Jr.", which delights Audrey.
When finally shown the plant, Mushnick is unimpressed. Seymour suggests that Audrey Jr.'s uniqueness might attract people to see it, and Mushnick gives him one week to revive the plant. The usual plant food does not nourish it, but when Seymour accidentally pricks his finger, he discovers that the plant craves blood. Fed on Seymour's blood, Audrey Jr. begins to grow. The shop's revenues increase when customers are lured in to see the plant. Mushnick gives Seymour a raise and tells him to refer to him as "Dad".
The plant develops the ability to speak and demands that Seymour feed it. Now anemic, Seymour walks along a railroad track. Throwing a rock to vent his frustration, he inadvertently knocks out a drunken man who falls on the track and is run over by a train. He tries to dispose of the body by burying it in a yard but is nearly caught each time. Guilt-ridden, Seymour feeds the mutilated body parts to Audrey Jr. Meanwhile, Mushnick returns to the shop to get cash and secretly observes Seymour feeding the plant. Mushnick considers telling the police but hesitates after seeing the line of customers at his shop the next day.
Seymour eventually arrives too, suffering from a toothache. Mushnick confronts him about Audrey Jr.'s eating habits without explicitly revealing what he knows about the plant. Seymour grows increasingly distressed as he realizes that Mushnick knows the truth. After finishing his rant, Mushnick sends Seymour to Farb, who wants to kill him in retaliation for his ruined flowers. Defending himself, Seymour kills Farb. Although horrified, Seymour feeds Farb's body to Audrey Jr. The disappearances of the two men attract the attention of Sergeant Joe Fink and his assistant Officer Frank Stoolie.
Audrey Jr. grows several feet tall and is budding. A representative of the Society of Silent Flower Observers of Southern California announces that Seymour will receive a trophy and that she will return to the shop when the plant's buds open. While Seymour and Audrey go on a date, Mushnick stays at the shop to prevent Audrey Jr. from harming more people.
While alone in his shop, Mushnick is accosted by Kloy Haddock, a robber who pretended to be a customer earlier that day. Haddock believes that the huge crowds he observed at the shop indicate the presence of a lot of money. After Mushnick tricks Haddock into thinking that the money is inside Audrey Jr., the plant eats Haddock.
When forced to jeopardize his relationship with Audrey to keep her from discovering Audrey Jr.'s nature, Seymour confronts the plant, planning to no longer do its bidding. The plant then hypnotizes Seymour and commands him to bring it more food. He wanders the night streets and knocks out a prostitute, whom he takes to Audrey Jr.
Lacking clues about the disappearances, Fink and Stoolie attend a sunset celebration at the shop during which Seymour is to be presented with the trophy and Audrey Jr.'s buds are expected to bloom. As the attendees watch, four buds open; inside each flower is the face of one of Audrey Jr.'s victims. Fink and Stoolie realize that Seymour is the murderer.
Seymour flees from the shop with the officers in pursuit. He loses them and makes his way back to the now-empty shop, where he blames Audrey Jr. for ruining his life. The plant instead asks to be fed. Seymour grabs a kitchen knife and climbs into Audrey Jr.'s maw with the intention of killing it. Later that evening, Audrey Jr. begins to wither and die. One final bloom opens to reveal Seymour's face, who shouts "I didn't mean it!" before wilting.
Cast
Jonathan Haze as Seymour Krelborn Jackie Joseph as Audrey Fulquard Mel Welles as Gravis Mushnick Dick Miller as Burson Fouch Myrtle Vail as Winifred Krelboined Sandra De Bear (credited as Tammy Windsor) as Shirley Plump Toby Michaels as Barbara Fridl Leola Wendorff as Mrs. Siddie Shiva Lynn Storey as Mrs. Hortense Feuchtwanger Wally Campo as Sergeant Joe Fink / narrator Jack Warford as Officer Frank Stoolie Meri Welles (as Merri Welles) as Leonora Clyde John Herman Shaner (as John Shaner) as Dr. Phoebus Farb Jack Nicholson as Wilbur Force Dodie Drake as waitress Charles B. Griffith as voice of Audrey Jr. / screaming patient / Kloy Haddock (uncredited) Jack Griffith as Agony Lush (uncredited) Robert Coogan as tramp (uncredited)
Development The Little Shop of Horrors was developed when director Roger Corman was given temporary access to sets that had been left standing from his previous film, A Bucket of Blood. Corman decided to use the sets in a film made in the last two days before the sets were torn down.
Corman initially planned to develop a story involving a private investigator. In the story's initial version, the character that eventually became Audrey would have been referred to as "Oriole Plove." Actress Nancy Kulp was a leading candidate for the part. The characters that eventually became Seymour and Winifred Krelborn were named "Irish Eye" and "Iris Eye". Actor Mel Welles was scheduled to play a character named "Draco Cardala," Jonathan Haze was scheduled to play "Archie Aroma," and Jack Nicholson would have played a character named "Jocko".
Charles B. Griffith wanted to write a horror-themed comedy film. According to Mel Welles, Corman was not impressed by the box office performance of A Bucket of Blood, and had to be persuaded to direct another comedy. However, Corman later claimed he was interested because of A Bucket of Blood and said the development process was similar to that of the earlier film, when he and Griffith were inspired by visiting various coffee houses:
We tried a similar approach for The Little Shop of Horrors, dropping in and out of various downtown dives. We ended up at a place where Sally Kellerman (before she became a star) was working as a waitress, and as Chuck and I vied with each other, trying to top each other's sardonic or subversive ideas, appealing to Sally as a referee, she sat down at the table with us, and the three of us worked out the rest of the story together.
The first screenplay Griffith wrote was Cardula, a Dracula-themed story involving a vampire music critic. After Corman rejected the idea, Griffith says he wrote a screenplay titled Gluttony, in which the protagonist was "a salad chef in a restaurant who would wind up cooking customers and stuff like that, you know? We couldn't do that though because of the code at the time. So I said, 'How about a man-eating plant?' and Roger said, 'Okay.' By that time, we were both drunk."
Jackie Joseph later recalled "at first they told me it was a detective movie; then, while I was flying back [to make the movie], I think they wrote a whole new movie, more in the horror genre. I think over a weekend they rewrote it."Tom Weaveer, Jackie Joseph interview, B Monster accessed 18 April 2014
The screenplay was written under the title The Passionate People Eater. Welles stated, "The reason that The Little Shop of Horrors worked is because it was a love project. It was our love project." The film's concept may have been inspired by "Green Thoughts", a 1932 story by John Collier about a man-eating plant.Fowler, Christopher. "Forgotten authors No. 34: John Collier" . The Independent, May 24, 2009. Retrieved November 15, 2010 Hollywood writer Dennis McDougal suggests that Griffith may have been influenced by Arthur C. Clarke's 1956 science fiction short story "The Reluctant Orchid" (which was in turn inspired by the 1894 H. G. Wells story "The Flowering of the Strange Orchid").
Officers Fink and Stoolie were inspired by Dragnet characters Joe Friday and Frank Smith. The film opens up in a similar format to a Dragnet episode.
Production
The film was partially cast with stock actors that Corman had used in previous films. Writer Charles B. Griffith portrays several small roles. Griffith's father appears as a dental patient, and his grandmother, Myrtle Vail, appears as Seymour's hypochondriac mother. Dick Miller, who had starred as the protagonist of A Bucket of Blood was offered the role of Seymour, but turned it down, instead taking the smaller role of Burson Fouch. Production at the Bucket of Blood sets was compressed into three days of cast rehearsals, immediately followed by two days and one night of principal photography.
It had been rumored that the film's shooting schedule was based on a bet that Corman could not complete a film within that time. However, this claim has been denied by Mel Welles. According to Joseph, Corman shot the film quickly in order to beat changing industry rules that would have prevented producers from "buying out" an actor's performance in perpetuity. On January 1, 1960, new rules were to go into effect requiring producers to pay all actors residuals for all future releases of their work. This meant that Corman's B-movie business model would be permanently changed and he would not be able to produce low-budget films in the same way. Before these rules went into effect, Corman decided to shoot one last film and scheduled it for the last week in December 1959.
Interiors were shot with three cameras in wide, lingering master shots in single takes. Welles states that Corman "had two camera crews on the set—that's why the picture, from a cinematic standpoint, is really not very well done. The two camera crews were pointed in opposite directions so that we got both angles, and then other shots were 'picked up' to use in between, to make it flow. It was a pretty fixed set and it was done sort of like a sitcom is done today, so it wasn't very difficult."