Russell Albion Meyer was born in San Leandro, California, to Lydia Lucinda (Hauck), a nurse, and William Arthur Meyer, a police officer, who divorced during his childhood. His parents were both of German descent. Meyer began winning prizes at
15 with his amateur films. He spent World War II in Europe as a combat
cameraman. After the war, he became a professional photographer,
shooting some of the earliest Playboy centerfolds. He made his film
directorial debut with
Der unmoralische Mr. Teas (1959),
the first nudie (softcore sex) film to make a profit over a million
dollars, which led to a string of self-financed films that gradually
became more bizarre, violent, and cartoonish. In the mid-1960s, he
established his style with his Gothic period, a quartet of
black-and-white films: Lorna - Zuviel für einen Mann (1964),
Im Garten der Lust (1965),
Motorpsycho - Wie wilde Hengste (1965), and
Die Satansweiber von Tittfield (1965)
that many consider to be his best work. After the blockbusting
Vixen - Ohne Gnade Schätzchen (1968), he was hired by
20th-Century Fox to make studio pictures. The first of these,
Blumen ohne Duft (1970),
was an enormous hit, but after the lukewarm reception of the
uncharacteristically serious
The Seven Minutes (1971),
Meyer returned to the sex-and-violence films that made his name,
culminating in the delirious
Im tiefen Tal der Superhexen (1979).
He spent the 1980s working on various autobiographies, both in film
(Breast of Russ Meyer) and print ("A Clean Breast").
