BRITISH HORROR COLLECTION - JUDY MATHESON, Amanda - LUST FOR A VAMPIRE Hand-Signed Autograph Card JM1 - Unstoppable Cards  2016.

After drama school, Judy Matheson began her career in 1967 with the Bristol Old Vic Theatre Company with which she toured the United States, including a season on Broadway, followed by Europe and Israel, in three of Shakespeare's plays, the highlight of which was Sir Tyrone Guthrie's production of Measure for Measure.

Her early television work was in several Granada TV productions, including The Shooting War, directed by Michael Apted, and Spindoe, directed by Mike Newell.

In 1971 she starred opposite Freddie Jones in Charles Wood's experimental drama The Emergence of Anthony Purdy Esq directed by Patrick Dromgoole for Harlech Television It was chosen that year as ITV's entry in the Monte Carlo TV Festival though it was not widely networked. Nancy Banks-Smith, The Guardian 's TV critic, said it was 'largely incomprehensible to anyone east of Somerset.'

Her first film was The Chairman [The Most Dangerous Man in the World],with Gregory Peck. She was chosen to star in the Spanish film The Exquisite Cadaver ('Las Crueles) with Capucine, directed by Vicente Aranda, in 1969, which was showcased as the Spanish entry at the San Sebastian Film Festival . In the 1970s, she appeared in the Hammer Horror films Lust for a Vampire and Twins of Evil. Her other films include Pete Walker's The Flesh and Blood Show, The House that Vanished ( AKA Scream and Die) directed by Jose Larraz, Crucible of Terror, Confessions of a Window Cleaner, and Percy's Progress.

On television she appeared in Coronation Street, Blake's 7, Z Cars (lead female role, twice), The Professionals, The Adventurer, The Sweeney, Harriet's Back in Town, Citizen Smith, Dead of Night,and for several months she starred in Crossroads, playing Sandy's girlfriend and Hugh Mortimer's secretary, Vicky Lambert. She played the poet Shelley's lover, Jane Williams, opposite Robert Powell in the BBC's film of the life of Shelley directed by Alan Bridges.

Her stage work includes starring opposite Richard O'Sullivan in a British tour of the comedy Boeing-Boeing with Yootha Joyce & Sally Thomsett, Ray Cooney's Chase Me Comrade, Stage Struck by Simon Gray, Hugh & Margaret William's The Flip Side, Funny Peculiar by Mike Scott and Alan Ayckbourn's Bedroom Farce.

In 1981 she became a TV continuity announcer for TVS (ITV for the South of England) and in 1990 she was part of the launch team for British Satellite Broadcasting, later to become BSkyB She also worked as a continuity announcer for Carlton Television and London Weekend Television.

She does occasional voice-over and narration work, and sometimes attends film conventions and Hammer Film events, as a guest. She has recently taken part, with fellow Hammer actress Caroline Munro, in a short spoof horror film 'Frankula' produced by The Misty Moon Film Society, of which she is an Honorary Patron.

Filmography

Television appearances



Lust For a Vampire (also known as Love for a Vampire or To Love a Vampire (the latter title was used on American television)) is a 1971 British Hammer Horror film directed by Jimmy Sangster, starring Yutte Stensgaard, Michael Johnston and Barbara Jefford. It was given an R rating in the United States for some violence, gore, strong adult content, and nudity. It is the second film in the so-called Karnstein Trilogy loosely based on the J. Sheridan Le Fanu novella Carmilla. It was preceded by The Vampire Lovers (1970) and followed by Twins of Evil (1971). The three films do not form a chronological development, but use the Karnstein family as the source of the vampiric threat and were somewhat daring for the time in explicitly depicting lesbian themes.

Production of Lust For a Vampire began not long after the release of The Vampire Lovers.

The film has a cult following although some Hammer Horror fans have accused it of being overly camp and silly. Its most noted scene shows Yutte Stensgaard drenched in blood and partially covered by blood-soaked rags, although the filmed scene is not as explicit as that shown in a promotional still.

Other notable actors in the film are Ralph Bates, Harvey Hall (who has a different role in each film of this series), David Healy and popular radio DJ Mike Raven as Count Karnstein. Karnstein's voice, however, is dubbed by an uncredited Valentine Dyall.

Synopsis

In 1830, at a finishing school in Styria, Mircalla arrives as a new student. A visiting author, Richard Lestrange, instantly falls in love with her; but Mircalla is a vampire—Carmilla Karnstein—who has been resurrected by her vampiric family. As students in the school, inhabitants of the nearby village and those who suspect Mircalla is responsible start to die, suspicion turns toward the Karnsteins and their ominous castle.

Cast

Production

Jimmy Sangster replaced Terence Fisher as director at very short notice. Partially due to censorship restraints from the British Board of Film Classification, this film and the next one, Twins of Evil, had increasingly less overt lesbian elements in the story than did The Vampire Lovers. Carmilla, for example, in this film falls in love with a man. Ingrid Pitt was offered the lead but turned it down. Peter Cushing was supposed to have appeared in the film but bowed out to care for his sick wife. Cushing was replaced by Ralph Bates, who described Lust for a Vampire as "one of the worst films ever made". Bates had earlier appeared in Taste the Blood of Dracula with Madeline Smith, who starred in the previous Karnstein film, The Vampire Lovers. The song "Strange Love" was recorded for the film by Tracy, a teen singer from Wembley, produced as a 45" by Bob Barratt.