By Lee Pfeiffer
Harry Alan Towers, the legendary British producer of low-budget, high-profit B movies, has died at age 88. Towers had a long career and had remained active in the film business. He was working on his autobiography when he died. Towers was a master at selling low-budget movies with one major star in order to broaden international appeal. He worked many times with Sir Christopher Lee, and their collaborative efforts included the highly popular Fu Manchu films of the 1960s. Towers also dabbled in B spy movies and horror films with kinky sexual angles. In the 1990s, he also brought Michael Caine back to the role of Harry Palmer in a series of made-for-cable TV movies. He is survived by his wife, actress Maria Rohm.
(Cinema Retro writer John Exshaw covers the making of the Fu Manchu films in Cinema Retro issue #15, coming this fall. The story includes exclusive comments from Sir Christopher Lee).