Allison Hayes

Acting

Allison Hayes

Born 1930-03-06 · Charleston, West Virginia, USA

Born Mary Jane Hayes in Charleston, West Virginia, she was in the class of 1948 at Calvin Coolidge High School. Hayes won the title of Miss District of Columbia. She went on to represent D.C. in the 1949 Miss America pageant. Although she did not win the competition, it provided her with the opportunity to work in local television before moving to Hollywood to work for Universal Pictures in 1954. Taking the name Allison Hayes, she played small roles in a handful of films at Universal for a couple of years. In 1955 she filed a lawsuit against the studio over injuries she sustained while filming her second picture, SIGN OF THE PAGAN. Universal released Hayes from her contract, and she was subsequently signed by Columbia Pictures. After appearing in a handful of Columbia films including COUNT THREE AND PRAY, MOHAWK, and WOLF DOG, Hayes was given in the lead role in ATTACK OF THE 50 FOOT WOMAN (1958). The film would eventually gain a cult following and become the performance for which she is best known. However, it did not escalate Hayes's career at the time. For several years she remained consistently employed in movies and on television (including an extended stint on the soap opera "General Hospital" and several appearances on her friend Raymond Burr's "Perry Mason" series). By the mid-1960s, though, Allison Hayes's career was all but over and she was beset by health problems. She would later admit that the pain of her illness led her to contemplate suicide, and that her symptoms were not taken seriously by doctors. After reading about metal poisoning in factory workers and recognizing the similarity of the symptoms described to her own, she hired a toxicologist to test a calcium supplement she'd been using for an extended time. The tests revealed that the pills contained an extreme amount of lead, and that Hayes was likely suffering from lead poisoning. She mounted a campaign to pressure the Food and Drug Administration into banning the supplement, but her condition deteriorated to the point of total incapacity. In 1976 she was diagnosed with leukemia, and began regular cancer treatment. Allison Hayes died February 26, 1977 at the UCSD Medical Center in La Jolla, California, just short of her 47th birthday. In a letter that arrived after her death, the FDA informed her of amendments being made to the laws governing the importation of nutritional supplements, largely as a result of her advocacy.

Acting credits

The Movie Orgy poster
6.8

Clips from assorted television programs, B-movies, commercials, music performances, newsreels, bloopers, satirical short films and promotional and government films of the 1950s and 1960s are intercut together to tell a single story of various creatures and societal ills attacking American cities.

The Movie Orgy

1968

Tickle Me poster
6.0

A singing rodeo rider takes a job at an all-female dude ranch, where he gets involved with a physical trainer and a treasure hunt for gold in a ghost town, leading to a showdown with kidnappers.

Tickle Me

1965

Attack of the 50 Foot Woman poster
4.8

When an abused wife grows to giant size because of an alien encounter and an aborted murder attempt, she goes after her cheating husband with revenge on her mind.

Attack of the 50 Foot Woman

1958

Sign of the Pagan poster
6.0

Roman centurion Marcian is captured by Attila the Hun en route to Constantinople, but escapes. On arrival, he finds the eastern Roman emperor Theodosius plotting with Attila to look the other way while the latter marches against Rome. But Marcian gains the favor of Pulcheria, lovely sister of Theodosius, who favors a united Empire.

Sign of the Pagan

1954

Double Jeopardy poster
5.2

Marc Hill is the attorney for Emmet Devrey, a real estate developer with a past, who is being blackmailed by his former partner Sam Baggett. When Sam's unfaithful wife Marge cooks up a scheme with her used car salesman lover Jeff Calder to bilk both Devrey and her alcoholic husband, Sam is killed and Devrey is accused of the crime. Mark is called to prove his employers innocence.

Double Jeopardy

1955

Gunslinger poster
4.3

After her husband is gunned down, Rose Hood takes his place as sheriff of a small Western town.

Gunslinger

1956

The Undead poster
4.5

Two psychics place a prostitute under hypnosis in order to learn about her past-life experiences. When they unwittingly send her back in time, she finds herself in the Middle Ages, suspected of being a witch and on the verge of being executed.

The Undead

1957

The Prodigal poster
4.6

A wealthy young Hebrew traveling in Damascus renounces his faith after he is seduced by an alluring pagan priestess and cheated of his fortune by the High Priest as well.

The Prodigal

1955

Who's Been Sleeping in My Bed? poster
6.1

TV star Jason Steel reluctantly becomes the sounding board for his best friends' bored wives, and must fend off their advances while managing his own fragile relationship.

Who's Been Sleeping in My Bed?

1963

The Purple Mask poster
5.8

France, 1803: 11 years after the Revolution, a royalist underground is led by a new 'Scarlet Pimpernel', the Purple Mask, who rescues nobles in distress and kidnaps Napoleon's officials for ransom, aided by the spy services of a group of lovely models headed by Laurette (really the Duc de Latour's daughter). But even she doesn't know the Purple Mask's real identity as foppish dancing master Rene...

The Purple Mask

1955

So This Is Paris poster
9.0

Three sailors on leave head for Paris with one thing on their minds.

So This Is Paris

1954

The Crawling Hand poster
3.2

After an astronaut space capsule is detonated in orbit, with the astronaut begging to be killed, a teenager couple finds a severed arm on a remote beach. The boy takes the arm home, where it becomes animate and the alien force which animates it soon possesses his mind as well.

The Crawling Hand

1963

The Steel Jungle poster
5.6

The tale of a young bookie, married to a beautiful woman who goes to jail, and becomes involved with hoodlums.

The Steel Jungle

1956

Zombies of Mora Tau poster
5.5

A fortune hunter leads a search for diamonds guarded by undead sailors off the coast of Africa.

Zombies of Mora Tau

1957

The Unearthly poster
4.0

A mad doctor uses patients at his isolated psychiatric institute as subjects in his attempts to create longevity by surgically installing an artificial gland in their skulls.

The Unearthly

1957

The Hypnotic Eye poster
5.8

A mysterious hypnotist is suspected by the police of being responsible for a wave of young, attractive women committing various forms of self-mutilation.

The Hypnotic Eye

1960

Chicago Syndicate poster
6.0

An ex-military accountant is recruited by the FBI to infiltrate the mob in Chicago in an attempt to break open the rackets. To complicate his job, two women stand in his way, each with their own agenda.

Chicago Syndicate

1955

Mohawk poster
5.6

An artist working in a remote army post is juggling the storekeeper's daughter, his fiancée newly arrived from the east, and the Indian Chief's daughter. But when a vengeful settler manages to get the army and the braves at each other's throats his troubles really begin.

Mohawk

1956

Hong Kong Confidential poster
5.9

An undercover U.S. agent searches for an Arab ruler's son kidnapped by communists in Hong Kong.

Hong Kong Confidential

1958

Count Three and Pray poster
4.7

A pastor with a shady past moves into a rural town just after the Civil War.

Count Three and Pray

1955

Pier 5, Havana poster
5.1

A Yank comes to Havana in search of an old friend who disappeared during the Cuban Revolution, and discovers a group of Batista sympathizers plotting to overturn Castro.

Pier 5, Havana

1959

Francis Joins the WACS poster
6.1

Peter Stirling (with his old friend the talking mule) is recalled to active duty...in the WACs!

Francis Joins the WACS

1954

The Disembodied poster
4.8

When men on a photo safari stumble into a misanthropic doctor’s remote camp with a wounded comrade, the doctor's restless wife supplements her usual pursuit (voodoo, especially as a way to off her husband) with a new one: seduction. As men lose their hearts (sometimes literally) to the alluring voodoo priestess, she embarks on a killing spree that turns the jungle blood red.

The Disembodied

1957

A Lust to Kill poster
7.3

A cowboy escapes from jail with the help of his girlfriend, and goes after the men he believes are responsible for his brother being shot down by lawmen.

A Lust to Kill

1958