Some questions in life don’t deserve answers. Like, why do birds suddenly appear? Or why did Jim Wynorski, patron saint of cleavage-driven direct-to-video schlock, get a slot on Showtime in 1995? This is the man who never met a low-cut top or rubber monster suit he couldn’t exploit—and here he was, playing in Roger Corman’s sandbox, handed the keys to a late-night TV remake of The Wasp Woman. It’s the cinematic equivalent of letting your neighborhood pizza delivery guy perform brain surgery because “he’s enthusiastic and he once read a book.”
And yet, here it is. The Wasp Woman, also known by the far more honest title Forbidden Beauty—though I’d suggest Hot Chick, Bug Mask—buzzed onto Showtime, stung audiences into regret, and fluttered awkwardly into VHS obscurity. But at least it gave us Jennifer Rubin, who, yes, is hot. If you’re going to watch a movie where a woman slowly transforms into a wasp with breasts (yes, that’s a real Wynorski quote), Rubin is the only reason your eyeballs don’t file for divorce halfway through.
The Setup: Botox, but with Stingers
The plot, inherited from the 1959 Roger Corman cheapie, is already ridiculous, and Wynorski slaps it with a fresh coat of direct-to-video desperation. Janice Starlin (Jennifer Rubin) is a former model turned cosmetics mogul. Problem is, she’s now over forty, which in movie-land means she might as well be a mummy in shoulder pads. Investors want a younger face, and Janice—desperate to cling to youth like Wynorski clings to VHS shelf space—consults Dr. Eric Zinthorp (Daniel J. Travanti). His big idea? Wasp hormones. Inject enough wasp juice into your face and presto, you’re twenty-five again.
And wouldn’t you know it, it works! For about ten minutes. Then the side effects kick in. Shocker: turning yourself into a hormone cocktail shaken up in a bug lab has consequences. Janice starts morphing into a giant, rubber-suited wasp woman, complete with wings, claws, and apparently cup size upgrades (Wynorski’s words, not mine).
The Cast: God Bless Jennifer Rubin
Jennifer Rubin does her best with the material, and by “material,” I mean the world’s tightest wardrobe and a script that treats dialogue like filler between cleavage shots. Rubin, forever remembered as the troubled dream girl from A Nightmare on Elm Street 3, at least gives Janice some dignity before Wynorski straps her into a foam latex mask and tells her to flap around like an insect doing burlesque.
Doug Wert plays Alec, the bland love interest who exists solely to react with either mild confusion or soft-core intensity. Daniel J. Travanti as Dr. Zinthorp looks like he wandered in from another movie, realized too late that his agent had tricked him, and decided to earn the paycheck anyway.
The rest of the cast? You’ve seen them all before—Melissa Brasselle, Maria Ford, Jay Richardson—Wynorski’s stable of B-movie regulars who know how to scream, strip, or die on cue.
The Wynorski Touch: Rubber, Noise, and No Shame
Wynorski has two filmmaking modes: breasts and beasts. If you’re lucky, you get both at once. Here, he finally hit the jackpot: a twelve-foot wasp puppet with breasts. You can almost hear him giggling on set, “This is cinema, baby!”
But let’s be clear: the effects are bargain bin even by ’90s Showtime standards. The “giant wasp” looks like something abandoned at a Spirit Halloween clearance sale. The transformation scenes rely on rubber masks that wouldn’t scare a toddler at Chuck E. Cheese. And the death scenes? Imagine ketchup bottles exploding during a wasp attack choreographed by someone who’s never actually seen a wasp.
The real horror, though, is the sound mix. Jennifer Rubin herself said she couldn’t hear herself think on set because of the constant noise. You watch a scene, hear dialogue buried under industrial fans, and wonder if Wynorski was trying to drown out his actors so nobody noticed how bad the lines were.
Rubin vs. Wynorski: Clash of the Hive
Rubin has been brutally honest about the production, calling Wynorski “despicable,” “a pig,” and “the worst set I’ve ever been on.” When the star of your movie says that working with you made her nostalgic for Freddy Krueger, you’ve failed as a director and as a human being.
And yet—despite hating every second—Rubin still looks stunning, still manages to act circles around her co-stars, and still emerges as the only reason to watch. Forget the wasp costume, forget the laserdisc release, forget the promise of “bigger crazier effects.” The movie’s only actual special effect is Jennifer Rubin’s ability to make a Wynorski production tolerable.
Showtime, What Were You Thinking?
That’s the real sting here. This wasn’t some late-night Cinemax sleazefest or a dusty VHS rotting in a rental store’s “Horror” section. This was on Showtime—Showtime! The network that at the time was trying to compete with HBO, carving out its reputation with edgy original programming. And in walks Jim Wynorski, buzzing like a mosquito at a nudist colony, and somehow convinces Roger Corman to let him remake The Wasp Woman.
It’s baffling. You expect Showtime originals to be bad in that mid-budget, made-for-TV way. What you don’t expect is Wynorski’s brand of carnival sleaze, with dialogue that sounds like it was written by someone drunk on bug spray.
The “Special Effects”
Wynorski bragged about the 12-foot-long wasp puppet, calling it “astounding.” If by astounding he meant “astoundingly cheap,” then yes. Its wings flap like a broken ceiling fan, its claws wobble, and when it attacks, it looks like the crew just shoved it toward the camera on a dolly.
There’s also a sequence where Rubin’s Wasp Woman form stalks her victims in dim hallways, flapping like a moth stuck in a lampshade. You can practically hear the crew whispering off-screen, “Don’t let the rubber rip!”
Forbidden Beauty, Forbidden Dignity
The alternate title Forbidden Beauty is more accurate, because watching this movie feels like witnessing something forbidden—like you shouldn’t be here, but you can’t look away. Rubin is beautiful, yes. But the movie around her is ugly, cheap, and sleazy in that special Wynorski way.
There’s no suspense, no atmosphere, no real horror. Just cleavage shots, rubber monsters, and the faint smell of VHS rental store carpeting.
Final Thoughts: Stung and Numb
The Wasp Woman (1995) isn’t scary, it isn’t sexy, and it isn’t even fun in the ironic “so bad it’s good” way. It’s just bad. The only joy comes from Jennifer Rubin’s screen presence—proof that sometimes beauty really can survive the ugliest circumstances.
But the real horror isn’t the rubber wasp puppet or the cheap gore. It’s the fact that Jim Wynorski somehow conned Showtime into giving him a platform. How did this happen? Was Roger Corman cashing in favors? Did a Showtime exec lose a bet? Or maybe the real Wasp Woman hypnotized them all into saying “yes.”
Whatever the reason, the result is a stinger straight to the brain: painful, embarrassing, but mercifully short.
