The Wasp Woman (1959)
“A beautiful woman by day — a murderous queen wasp by night.”
Streamed free from the Internet Archive · no signup, no cost — this film is in the public domain.
Synopsis
Janice Starlin, the aging founder of a major cosmetics company, watches her sales decline as customers notice she has lost her youthful looks. She bankrolls a reclusive scientist who has extracted a rejuvenating enzyme from queen-wasp royal jelly, insisting on becoming his test subject. Impatient with the slow results, she secretly injects herself with extra doses and sheds twenty years in a weekend — but the miracle has a price: she periodically transforms into a murderous wasp-like creature.
Cast
About the Director
Roger Corman — Roger Corman, the prolific "King of the B-movies," made 'The Wasp Woman' the first film he both financed and directed for his own company, The Filmgroup, shooting it in under two weeks on roughly a $50,000 budget. He even appears uncredited as a hospital doctor.
Why It’s Free: The Public-Domain Story
'The Wasp Woman' is in the public domain because its copyright was never renewed. Under the law in force in 1959, films required a renewal filing after their initial term to stay protected; when that renewal was not made, the film lapsed into the public domain.
Behind the Scenes
Corman suggested a wasp-derived serum to screenwriter Leo Gordon because it "sounded more exciting" than ordinary bee royal jelly. The film was the third release from Corman's Filmgroup and premiered on June 10, 1959, as a double feature with 'Beast from Haunted Cave.' For its 1962 television syndication, a young Jack Hill shot an added prologue to pad the running time from the theatrical 66 minutes to about 73.
Did You Know?
- The poster shows a creature with a woman's head on a wasp's body — the exact reverse of the wasp-headed woman seen in the film.
- Composer Fred Katz reportedly sold Corman the same score as "new" music repeatedly; it turns up in several films, including 'The Little Shop of Horrors.'
- Corman himself appears uncredited as a hospital doctor.
- It was riffed live by Cinematic Titanic, the "MST3K" alumni troupe, in 2008.
Reception & Legacy
Reviews were mixed-to-tepid — Variety found it polished but slow, while the Los Angeles Times praised Susan Cabot's nuanced lead. It remains a fondly regarded slice of late-1950s drive-in science fiction, was remade for Corman's TV series in 1995, and continues to circulate widely as a cult-favorite public-domain title.
Teenagers from Outer Space
Glen or Glenda
The Last Woman on Earth
The Phantom Planet