In the 1950s, Wood directed several low-budget science fiction, crime and horror films that later became cult classics, notably Glen or Glenda (1953), Jail Bait (1954), Bride of the Monster (1955), Plan 9 from Outer Space (1957) and Night of the Ghouls (1959).

[1] In the 1960s and 1970s, he moved towards sexploitation and pornographic films such as The Sinister Urge (1960), Orgy of the Dead (1965) and Necromania (1971), and wrote over 80 lurid pulp crime and sex novels.

[7] One of his first pieces of footage showed the airship Hindenburg passing over the Hudson River at Poughkeepsie, shortly before its disastrous crash at Lakehurst, New Jersey.

Wood had false teeth that he would slip out from his mouth when he wanted to make his wife Kathy laugh, showing her a big toothless grin.

[12] In 1947, Wood moved to Hollywood, California, where he wrote scripts and directed television pilots, commercials[13] and several forgotten micro-budget westerns, most of which failed to sell.

In 1948, Wood wrote, produced, directed, and starred in The Casual Company, a play derived from his own unpublished novel which was based on his service in the United States Marine Corps.

[14] That same year, he wrote and directed a low-budget western called Crossroads of Laredo with the aid of a young producer he met named Crawford John Thomas.

[18] The film starred Wood (under the alias "Daniel Davis") as a transvestite, his girlfriend Dolores Fuller, Timothy Farrell, Lyle Talbot, Conrad Brooks and Bela Lugosi as the narrator/scientist.

Wood acted as Lugosi's dialogue coach when he guest-starred on The Red Skelton Show in 1954, alongside Lon Chaney Jr. and Vampira (aka Maila Nurmi).

[20] Wood co-produced and directed a crime film, Jail Bait (1954, originally titled The Hidden Face), along with his co-writer/roommate Alex Gordon, which starred Herbert Rawlinson (as the plastic surgeon), Lyle Talbot, Dolores Fuller, Timothy Farrell, Theodora Thurman and Steve Reeves (in one of his first acting jobs).

[23] It starred Bela Lugosi as the mad scientist, Swedish wrestler Tor Johnson as mute manservant "Lobo", Paul Marco, Billy Benedict ("Whitey" of The Bowery Boys), Harvey B. Dunn and Loretta King.

The pilot, entitled Final Curtain, sees an old and world-weary actor wandering in an empty theatre, imagining ghosts and a living mannequin haunting the backstage area, until he realizes that he himself is dead.

In 1958, Wood wrote, produced, and directed Night of the Ghouls (originally titled Revenge of the Dead), starring Kenne Duncan, Tor Johnson (reprising his role as "Lobo" from Bride of the Monster), Criswell, Duke Moore, and Valda Hansen.

[27] The film premiered at the Vista Theatre in Hollywood on a double bill with the Lana Turner movie Imitation of Life on March 17, 1959, and then promptly vanished from circulation.

The film contains an "eerily prescient"[31] scene, in which Carl Anthony's character states, "I look at this slush, and I try to remember, at one time, I made good movies".

[30] In 1963, Wood wrote the screenplay for Shotgun Wedding (an exploitation film directed by Boris Petroff about hillbillies marrying child brides in the Ozarks).

Set in a misty graveyard, the Lord of the Dead (Criswell) and his sexy consort, the Black Ghoul (a Vampira look-alike), preside over a series of macabre performances by topless dancers from beyond the grave (recruited by Wood from local strip clubs).

In 1969, Wood adapted his own novel Mama's Diary written under the pseudonym Dick Trent into Operation Red Light for Jacques Descent Production.

Thought lost for years, it resurfaced in edited form on Mike Vraney's Something Weird imprint in the late 1980s and was re-released later on DVD by Fleshbot Films in 2005.

In the Rudolph Grey biography Nightmare of Ecstasy, Maila Nurmi ("Vampira") said she declined Wood's offer to do a nude scene sitting in a coffin for Necromania, claiming she was recovering from a stroke at the time.

Beginning in 1963 up until his death, Wood wrote at least 80 lurid crime and sex novels in addition to hundreds of short stories and non-fiction pieces for magazines and daily newspapers.

His novels include Black Lace Drag (1963) (reissued in 1965 as Killer in Drag), Orgy of the Dead (1965), Parisian Passions (1966), Watts the Difference (1966), Side-Show Siren (1966), Drag Trade (1967), Watts After (1967), Devil Girls (1967), It Takes One to Know One (1967), Death of a Transvestite (1967), Suburbia Confidential (1967), Night Time Lez (1968), The Perverts (1968), Bye Bye Broadie (1968), Raped in the Grass (1968), Sex, Shrouds and Caskets (1968), Love of the Dead (1968), The Sexecutives (1968), Young, Black and Gay (1968), Hell Chicks (1968), The Gay Underworld (1968), Carnival Piece (1969), Toni, Black Tigress (1969), Mama's Diary (1969), To Make a Homo (1969), Mary-Go-Round (1969), The Sexual Woman (1971), The Only House (1972), A Study of Fetishes and Fantasies (1973), Tales for a Sexy Night Part 1 and 2 (1973), Sex Star (1973), Death of a Transvestite Hooker (1974).

[41] Wood's list of unrealized film projects also included scripts called Piranhas (1957), Trial by Terror (1958), The Peeper (a proposed 1960 sequel to The Sinister Urge), Silent Night (1961), Joaquin Murieta (a 1965 biopic about the infamous bandit of the Old West), Mice on a Cold Cellar Floor (1973), Epitaph for the Town Drunk (1973), To Kill a Saturday Night (1973, which was set to star John Carradine), The Teachers (1973), The Basketballers (1973), The Airline Hostesses (1973), I Awoke Early the Day I Died (1974, a rewrite of Wood's 1961 Silent Night), Heads, No Tails (1974, a take-off on Sweeney Todd), and Shoot Seven (1977, Wood's proposed musical based on the St. Valentine's Day Massacre).

Fuller relocated to New York City where she embarked on a successful songwriting career, writing for famous singers like Elvis Presley and Nat King Cole.

The couple moved into the small North Hollywood apartment of their friend, actor Peter Coe, located at 5635 Laurel Canyon Boulevard.

After hearing no movement in the bedroom for twenty minutes, O'Hara sent a female friend to check on Wood, who discovered him dead on the bed from a heart attack.

[66] Paul Marco, O'Hara, David DeMering and The Amazing Criswell attended Wood's makeshift memorial service which was held at Peter Coe's apartment following the cremation.

[67] At the time of his death, Wood's name and career had become so obscure that most local Los Angeles newspapers, including the entertainment magazine Variety, did not run an obituary about him.

[68] In 1994, director Tim Burton released the biopic Ed Wood, starring Johnny Depp in the title role and Martin Landau, who won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal of Bela Lugosi.

[2] Wood's 1971 film Necromania was also believed lost for years, until an edited version resurfaced at a yard sale in 1992, followed in 2001 by a complete, unedited print.