Ed Wood Wednesdays, week 281: Johnny Legend remembers Tor Johnson (1982)

In 1982, Fangoria ran a heartfelt tribute to the departed Swedish wrestler.

Now that we have books about Bela Lugosi, Vampira, and Criswell, Tor Johnson (1903-1971) is arguably the most famous person in Ed Wood's acting stable not to have a biography on the market. Perhaps someday that will change. The Swedish-born wrestler, born Karl Erik Tore Johansson in Stockholm at the beginning of the previous century, is best-known to cult movie fans for his roles in three of Ed's most-seen movies: Bride of the Monster (1955), Plan 9 from Outer Space (1957), and Night of the Ghouls (1959). But this was neither the beginning nor quite the end of the Swede's lengthy career.

Bob Hope (left) with Tor.

For the sake of the story, Tim Burton's Ed Wood (1994) pretends that Eddie himself discovered Tor at a wrestling match in Los Angeles in the mid-1950s and cast the large, baldheaded man in his first-ever movie role. But, in truth, Johnson started getting film work in the 1930s shortly after he moved to America. His movie and (eventually) television career continued to the 1960s. We may associate Tor with low-budget sci-fi and horror movies—and he did several of those—but his filmography is surprisingly diverse, ranging from comedies to crime thrillers. He worked alongside such legends as Bob Hope, Jerry Lewis, Tony Curtis, Eddie Cantor, William Powell, Abbott & Costello and more!

With his shaved head, imposing physique, and heavy Swedish accent, Tor was an unmistakable presence onscreen. But his outsized, boisterous personality made him just as memorable offscreen. Rudolph Grey's Nightmare of Ecstasy: The Life and Art of Edward D. Wood, Jr. (1992) includes numerous, colorful anecdotes about the wrestler-turned-actor—the massive meals he ate, the toilet seats he broke, etc. He seems like a jovial, fun-loving guy. But there are some potentially upsetting details about Tor in the book as well, including a quote from actor Tony Cardoza who says that the wrestler hired the services of an underaged prostitute while touring India. In some interviews that Grey left on the cutting room floor, Plan 9 actress Mona McKinnon remembers Tor becoming intoxicated at a party and carrying her away against her will.

So who was this man? Until someone pens Super Swedish Angel: The Tor Johnson Story, what we have are various newspaper and magazine articles about Tor that have appeared over the years. A very intriguing example is "I Remember Tor," originally published in issue #22 of Fangoria from October 1982. In it, the late wrestling manager, musician, and film producer Johnny Legend (1948-2026) shares his memories of Tor, who had been deceased for over a decade but whose films were just then coming back into vogue thanks to The Golden Turkey Awards (1980).

Legend talks about growing up in the 1950s, a time of horror comics at the newsstand and lurid, low-budget monster movies at the drive-in. The author says he vowed to see every sci-fi and horror film that played near his home (no small feat). A turning point came when a San Fernando, CA movie theater only ten minutes from his home initiated an all-horror-all-the-time policy. That was how Legend came to see Boris Petroff's The Unearthly (1957), featuring Tor Johnson as Lobo. At one very memorable screening in 1959, the wrestler himself made a brief, unscheduled personal appearance, driving the audience into a frenzy.

Tor and the coffin in The Unearthly.

By 1961, still only an adolescent, Legend was corresponding with the likes of sci-fi creature designer Paul Blaisdell and Famous Monsters of Filmland publisher Forrest J. Ackerman. In fact, Uncle Forry invited Johnny and his friend to the notorious Ackermansion to meet some B-movie luminaries and show off a homemade creature head they'd built. One of the guests at this affair was Tor Johnson, but the wrestler-actor was too besieged by fans for Legend to spend any quality time with him. One noteworthy aspect of the story is that, even back then, Legend was familiar with Night of the Ghouls because of the coverage it had received in horror fan magazines. He knew that the film had been made but had failed to achieve distribution for some mysterious reason.

A year later, Tor made another trip to San Fernando, this time to visit his son, police officer Karl Johnson, another key member of Ed Wood's social circle. You'll remember Karl as kindly Farmer Calder in Plan 9. Johnny finally got to ask Tor about his mysterious cameo at that movie theater in 1959. Turns out Tor knew the owner and thought the kids at the theater would get a kick out of it. And even Tor was unsure of the fate of Night of the Ghouls. The wrestler's final screen credits came in 1961, so he was essentially retired by this point in his life.

Tor Johnson and Johnny Legend continued to cross paths over the years. Johnny even went to high school with one of the wrestler's relatives, "an Amazon-sized blonde named Annika Johannson." Apparently, some members of this family kept their traditional Swedish surname while others Americanized it to Johnson. By 1965, Tor was living a few miles away from Johnny and spent some of his time just hanging out at an "open-air junk store." Eventually, young Johnny learned Tor's address: 15129 Lakewood St. in Sylmar. Yes, this is the legendary house featured so prominently in Plan 9. 

Young Johnny and his pals began to make occasional visits to the modest Lakewood homestead, where they'd commiserate with the wrestler and his wife Greta. Legend reports that Tor was nonchalant in discussing his wrestling and movie careers and was aware of the many continuity errors and other technical shortcomings of Plan 9. While we all know of Tor Johnson's ravenous appetite and smorgasbord-style meals that he and Greta would serve their guests, this article is perhaps the first I've seen to mention Tor's love of sherbet. Another great detail: Tor wound up with the prop coffin used in The Unearthly, which he then gifted to Legend. As the 1960s wore on, though, Legend's long hair and shabby clothes began to make Greta uncomfortable and the visits ceased.

Toward the end of the decade, Johnny Legend had one last run-in with Tor Johnson. According to Johnny, Tor was selling Christmas trees in a parking lot at the intersection of Hubbard and Glenoaks in San Fernando. They talked over old times before parting ways. In the 1970s, Johnny moved away from San Fernando and lost touch with the Johnsons. He only learned the news of the wrestler's death when he ran into Forry Ackerman at the Chinese Theatre in Hollywood. Legend then reported the sad news to his friends: "No more sherbet."

What truly emerges from this article is the fondness that Johnny Legend felt for Tor Johnson. Especially poignant is this passage:

"At the guarantee of sounding cliche, Tor was sweet, gentle and quite unassuming considering his formidable presence. He possessed a wry, understated wit usually reflected in a few brief words and a wink of the eye. Tor was not given to prolonged, soul-searching conversations, rather he preferred to sit back with a pleasant smile watching the world go by."

Almost makes you want to time travel back to the 1960s so you could visit Tor's house on Lakewood and enjoy a bowl of sherbet, huh?