The bats have left the bell tower
The victims have been bled
Red velvet lines the black box
The last years of Bela Lugosi's life were not the stuff of glamour, not those of an international star. Dracula made him famous to the point of infamous and it was Dracula that made his life a hell. His hell came to an end in a small apartment on a quiet street across from an elementary school in an at that time less than fashionable Hollywood neighborhood. The mansion in the hills was long gone, the money and the acclaim as well. What was left was a gaunt pale Hungarian looking very like the un-dead after a long battle with a heroin addiction.
The road from the Budapest stage to Harold Way in Hollywood was a long and colorful route filled with the very heights of stardom and the misery of typecasting. There were five wives along this route as well as a son.
Lugosi after years of drug addiction had a very hard time finding work sometimes making personal appearances at horror conventions. Notoriously bad film maker Ed Wood seeing name recognition value in Lugosi used him in several of his low budget movies. This part of Lugosi's life was captured in Tim Burton's bio-pic "Ed Wood" portrayed by Martin Landau. Wood's films were shot on the fly scenes for "Plan 9 From Outer Space" were shot on the street in front of Lugosi's Harold Way apartment.
It was in the Harold Way apartment that Lugosi spent his last days and where he died. He was found dead on the sofa in his living room by his fifth wife Hope. Lugosi died at the age of 73 on August 16, 1956. It was rumored that Lugosi was holding a script written by Wood and that his funeral was paid for by Frank Sinatra these rumors are both false. Lugosi was buried in his Dracula costume.
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