Producer Charles Swartz dead at 66

Writer and producer of the immortal It's a Bikini World (1967), Charles Swartz died Saturday in Los Angeles. The cause was pneumonia; Swartz had been battling brain cancer for several months.

He was a former head of the Entertainment Technology Center at USC.

Born and raised in Dallas, he started as a story executive and associate producer at Warner Bros. Television and later became head of production at Roger Corman's New World Pictures. He was also a co-founder of Dimension Pictures.

Other low-budget flicks that Swartz produced or executive produced included The Student Nurses (1970), The Velvet Vampire (aka Cemetery Girls, The Devil Is a Woman, The Waking Hour and Through the Looking Glass; 1971), Sweet Sugar (aka Captive Women 3, Chaingang Girls, Hellfire on Ice and She Devils in Chains; 1973), Terminal Island (aka Knuckle-Men; 1973), Beyond Atlantis (aka Sea Creatures; 1973) and The Working Girls (aka Elvira Naked; 1974).

He was a writer for Group Marriage (1973), and was a production executive for 1971's Gas-s-s-s... or, It May Become Necessary to Destroy the World in Order to Save It -- which had early appearances by Talia Shire, Ben Vereen and Cindy Williams.

Charles Swartz is survived by his wife since 1963, writer-director Stephanie Rothman, who wrote for several of his films. Donations may be made to Save the Redwoods League or the Los Angeles Regional Food Bank.