Michael Findlay

From New York City, New York, USA • 1937 - 1977

Michael Findlay (August 27, 1937 – May 16, 1977) was an American filmmaker, producer and screenwriter. Along with his wife Roberta, Findlay created numerous low-budget Z movies in the 1960s and 1970s. They have been described as "the most notorious filmmakers in the annals of sexploitation". In the mid-to-late 1960s, Findlay was prominent among a small group of underground New York filmmakers (including Joseph W. Sarno, Joseph P. Mawra, and Lou Campa) that produced exploitation "roughies" (early slasher films which combined conventional horror or thriller stories with sadomasochistic sex scenes) for the grindhouse market. Sometimes he would direct under the alias Julian Marsh and act in his own films billed as Robert West. His wife Roberta (a.k.a. Anna Riva) was the cinematographer, co-writer, and supporting actress for many of their films together. They also employed the same actors repeatedly, most notably Uta Erickson, and Marie Brent, a.k.a. Janet Banzet. The Findlays were friends with George Weiss, producer of Ed Wood's Glen or Glenda and a series of fetishistic Olga films (Olga's House of Shame, Olga's Girls, et al.). In 1964 Weiss encouraged them to make films in this new subgenre of violent sexploitation. (Via Wikipedia)