TURA SANTANA-

Tura Satana (July 10, 1938 – February 4, 2011) was a Japanese-born American actress and former exotic dancer. She was best known for her role as "Varla" in Russ Meyer's 1965 cult film, Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!.

During her early career, Satana appeared on television shows such as Burke's Law, The Greatest Show On Earth, Hawaiian Eye, and The Man From U.N.C.L.E.. She also appeared as a dancer in Who's Been Sleeping in My Bed? with Dean Martin and Elizabeth Montgomery. That same year, she had a cameo as a Parisian prostitute in the musical Irma La Douce with Jack Lemmon and Shirley Maclaine.
After starring in Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!, Satana worked mainly with cult film director Ted V. Mikels in such films as The Astro-Zombies (1968), The Doll Squad (1974) and Mark of the Astro-Zombies (2002). She has also appeared as herself in various documentaries and TV shows including The Incredibly Strange Film Show (1988), A & E's documentary called "Cleavage"(2003),Strip de velours (2005) and Sugar Boxx (2007) which is currently in post production and co-stars fellow Russ Meyer alumna Kitten Natividad.

Satana's most noted screen role was as "Varla" in the 1965 film Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!--a very aggressive and sexual female character for which she did all of her own stunts and fight scenes. Renowned film critic Richard Corliss called her performance "...the most honest, maybe the one honest portrayal in the Meyer canon and certainly the scariest."

Originally titled The Leather Girls, the film is an ode to female violence, based on a concept created by Russ Meyer and screenwriter Jack Moran. Both felt at her first audition that Satana was "definitely Varla." The film was shot on location in the desert outside Los Angeles during days above 100 degrees and freezing nights, with Satana clashing regularly with teenage co-star Susan Bernard, because of Susan's mother disrupting the set. Meyer said she "was extremely capable. She knew how to handle herself. Don't fuck with her! And if you fuck with her, do it well! She might turn on you!"
She was fully responsible for adding key elements to the visual style and energy of the production, including her costume, makeup, usage of martial arts, dialogue and the use of spinning tires in the death scene of the main male character.

Meyer cited the extreme tension on the set caused by Satana as the primary reasons for the film's lasting fame. "She and I made the movie," said Meyer.

After making Ted V. Mikels' The Doll Squad in 1973, Satana was shot by a former lover. She later found employment in a hospital, a position she kept for four years. She had studied nursing at Firmin Deloos Hospital. She was then briefly employed as a dispatcher for the Los Angeles Police Department. In 1981, her back was broken in a car accident. She spent the next two years in and out of hospitals, having two major operations and approximately fifteen others.

Satana dated Elvis Presley but turned down his marriage proposal, though she did keep the ring.

Satana died on February 4, 2011, in Reno, Nevada, United States. Her long-time manager, Siouxzan Perry, stated the cause of death as having been heart failure.