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Ray Dennis Steckler, the maverick producer/director/writer/actor/cinematographer (and-and-and) who created such cult flicks as The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living And Became Mixed-up Zombies!!? (1964) and The Thrill Killers (1964), died Wednesday night at age 70. At the beginning of his nearly half-century career, the rebel moviemaker was a fixture at Fairway International, the Burbank-based indie film company established by Arch Hall, Sr.

Steckler began as a camera assistant on Fairway’s caveman-on-the-loose-in-Palm-Springs campfest Eegah (1962) and then directed their next feature Wild Guitar the same year. Using his frequent nom de screen “Cash Flagg,” he also co-starred in the latter as the thuggish henchman of a record company executive (Hall Sr.).

The star of Eegah and Wild Guitar, Arch Hall Jr. knew Steckler from the Fairway days until what was his final public appearance on November 14, 2008: a special Los Angeles County Museum of Art screening of No Subtitles Necessary: Laszlo & Vilmos,...