Sid Haig, Star of Ron Zombie's "House of 1,000 Corpses" and "The Devil's Rejects"

The character actor Sid Haig, who describes himself as "tall, bald and nearly always bearded," was born Sidney Eddie Mosesian on July 14, 1939 in Frenso, California. Haig specialized in playing heavies in low-budget exploitation movies in the 1970s and '80s, occasionally appearing in bit parts in big-budget action films such as Diamonds Are Forever (1971), in which he told Sean Connery's James Bond "I got a brother."

Bond was undercover, transferring a cache of diamonds to Las Vegas inside the corpse of his "brother" and had been picked up by a hearse full of black-suited mobsters -- The Slumber Brothers -- who had hatted up to escort him to the mortuary.

"Small world," responded the ever-droll Connery/Bond to Haig's revelation.

And it IS a small world, as Quentin Tarantino revived Haig's moribund movie career by casting him as the judge in Jackie Brown (1998), an in-joke as Haig had co-starred with Jackie Brown star Pam Grier in six movies, including such blaxploitation classics as Coffey (1973) and Foxy Brown (1974). Jackie Brown resurrected both their careers, with Haig achieving cult film super-star status as Captain Spaulding in Ron Zombie's House of 1,000 Corpses (2003) and its 2005 sequel, The Devil's Rejects.

An Actor's Beginnings

The 6' 4" Sid Haig left the Armenian community of Fresno behind when he moved to southern California to attend the Pasadena Playhouse in the years 1959-61. His roommate at acting school was Stuart Margolin, who would establish himself as a character actor on TV in The Rockford Files (1974) and in such films as Kelly's Heroes (1970), The Stone Killer (1973) and Blake Edwards' S.O.B. (1981).

Sid Haig's own journey to becoming an actor was serendipitous, as his parents decided that dancing lessons would help their rapidly growing son re-learn some of the coordination he had lost after a growth spurt. By the age of seven, Haig was a professional, dancing on a children's Christmas show and subsequently acquiring other professional acting gigs.

His parents bought him a drum set when he began displaying a musical inclination, and Haig became a professional in that field too, making money as a paid musician. Signed to recording contract at the age of 19, Haig and his band the T-Birds cut a successful single, "Full House," in 1958.

However, he was still infected by the "acting bug," having been encouraged by the head of his high school drama department to pursue an acting career. The teacher's friend, the movie star Dennis Morgan, also encouraged Sid to become an actor and suggested that he attend acting school in southern California. Sid took the advice and enrolled in the Pasadena Playhouse, one of the premier acting schools in the country.

"When I went to school - Pasadena Playhouse - we were taught that the obligation of the actor is twofold; to entertain - and to educate," Haig said in an interview.

After acting school, Sid Haig appeared in a 30-minute student film, The Host, directed by U.C.L.A. film school student Jack Hill, who who later cast Haig in eight more of his movies, including Coffey and Foxy Brown, between 1968 & 1974).

Professional Actor

Sid Haig's professional career properly began in 1960, and he made his movie debut in 1962's The Firebrand , a Poverty Row Western released by 20th Cenutry Fox starring Kent Taylor and Chubby Johnson. Haig eventually racked up appearances in over 50 films, including the near-classics Point Blank and T.H.X. 138 as well as such notorious bombs as Che! and C.C. & Company. He also racked up over 350 television credits, including appearances in such memorable series as Batman, Charlie's Angels, Get Smart, Gunsmoke, Here's Lucy, The Man from U.N.C.L.E., Mission: Impossible, The Rockford Files (reunited with old roomie Stuart Margolin), and the original Star Trek.

One of the iconic roles of Sid Haig's early career was as the demented, regressive Ralph in Jack Hill's kitsch horror classic Spider Baby, in which he appeared in support of horror movie legend Lon Chaney, Jr.

In 1992, Haig's career stalled when he decided to resist his type-casting by Holywood. He had just appeared in the live-action Rocky & Bullwinkle spin-off Boris and Natasha and was dissatisfied with his career. At the time, he told the press, "I'll never play another stupid 'heavy' again, and I don't care if that means that I never work, ever."

Renaissance

Sid Haig went through a five-year acting drought until Quentin Tarantino cast him in a bit part in Jackie Brown. His career definitely was helped by the re-release of Spider Baby, first in a late-night showing at a Los Angeles theater and then on tape. As an aficianado of trash cinema, Tarantino likely came across Spider Baby, reintroducing him to Sid Hig and reminding the director of all of Haig's turns in the blaxploitation cinema of the '70s.

In the wake of Jackie Brown, Sid Haig finally achieved recognition as an actor after 40 years by playing the demonic Captain Spaulding in Ron Zombie's House of 1,000 Corpses and The Devil's Rejects. The character of Captain Spaulding is evocative of Spider Baby's Ralph, his first great role.

Sid Haig also teaches acting, passing along his love of the craft.

"I teach an acting class for teenagers in the summer," he told an interviewer. "I have for the past fourteen years. I don't encourage them to go to college: you want to be an actor? Be an actor. If you have to starve to do it, starve to do it. But if you're not passionate about what you want to do, you won't be good at it."