A wizard changed my life. His name was Cheech. It was 1975. John Carpenter’s DARK STAR had recently premiered at Filmex in Hollywood. For the first time in my life I had witnessed paparazzi and realized they were circling me. Shortly thereafter, Shel Dorf, a founder of the San Diego Comic Con, called and informed me that I was going to be a celebrity guest in July. He didn’t ask me. He told me. So that was that.
When I saw that Vaughn Bode was also going to be a guest I studied up a bit on his work and became excited about meeting him. I’d seen his cartoons in the National Lampoon but soon realized there was much more to appreciate. Then, two weeks before the Comic Con, Shel Dorf called me again. This time it was to inform me that Vaughn Bode had just died at the tender age of 33. I was shocked and saddened, even though I’d never met him. Oh well. Life goes on.
In the midst of the hubbub of the Comic Con, prior to my presentation on DARK STAR, I was approached by David Scroggy who informed me that Vaughn Bode’s brother Vincent wanted to see me in his hotel room. What? Why in the world would he want to see me? I soon came to learn that he was intimate with his brother’s live presentation, known as BODE’S CARTOON CONCERT, and was determined to present it in his brother’s stead. Being an air traffic controller by trade, he had asked around if there were any actors at the Comic Con who might be able to assist him. Someone pointed out that the star of DARK STAR was around. That’s how I wound up in Vincent’s hotel room.
He showed me the binder of cartoons Vaughn would use when bringing his work to life in front of live audiences (including at the Louvre!) and asked me to read some of the characters after he’d demonstrated the sort of voices Vaughn would employ. I launched into it and in no time was cast for the part with only minutes to spare before going on stage.
As Vincent rushed around his room getting dressed I asked if I could use his projector to double-check my slide tray. My presentation would follow right afterward and I wanted to be sure the images were right side up. I held my finger on the button and whipped through the slides as fast as I could as Vincent zipped around the room. At one point he paused to look at a slide and froze in his tracks.
“That’s the movie!” he exclaimed.
“What’s the movie?” I replied in bewilderment.
Vincent explained that the last time he saw his brother alive he’d been following Vincent around in Vincent’s art studio (Vincent being a great artist in his own right) and excitedly telling him about this movie he’s just seen called DARK STAR. He wanted to see it again and take Vincent with him. That was their last conversation. I was speechless.
I asked Vincent if I could wear Vaughn’s star-studded top hat during my DARK STAR presentation. And I did.
But first, Vincent and I rocked the house with our version of BODE’S CARTOON CONCERT; a mere two weeks after Vaughn’s untimely death.
It was not long thereafter that I climbed on board the Bode bus that would alter my life going forward. With the help of Colleen Christian and the advice of Virginia Curtis (who made Mortimor Snerd for Edgar Bergen) I build a “life-size” marionette puppet of Vaughn’s signature character Cheech Wizard, as well as a foam hand puppet of a generic lizard character. I would soon integrate these puppets into the live concerts.
I was still in the Los Angeles area at that time and soon realized that picking up the Bode flag and running with it would require moving north to be with his family. And so it was that I abandoned Hollywood and wound up living in the very same studio in the back of Vincent’s house in Oakland that now contained all the artwork and artifacts of Vaughn’s life. It was total immersion.
In addition to adding puppets to the mix, a band from Canada (songwriter: William Butler) wrote a wonderful ode to Cheech Wizard that I would also incorporate, including one concert at UC Berkeley where the band appeared live. I would begin by placing empty beer cans on the stage next to the podium and then hide in the back of the theater with Cheech in hand. When the lights went out my prerecorded message would begin the show.
“Vaughn Bode was born on July 22nd, 1941. Cheech Wizard was born in 1967. Vaughn Bode died on July 18th, 1975. Vaughn may be gone…but the Cheech lives on!”
With that, a spotlight would hit Cheech and me standing at the back of an aisle as his new theme song would echo throughout the theater.
“Who’s dat? It’s da hat! You better show dat you’re a believer…..”
Throughout the song, I would dance Cheech down the aisle, as he would jump onto women’s laps and attempt to kick guys in the balls.
The audience would erupt with delight as I made my way to the stage. Cheech and I would be in position by the time the song reached its catchy finale with a bad-da-da-da-BUM, at which point, having positioned Cheech amid the beer cans, I would release the airplane controls and let him land on his butt with his legs outspread in a semi-drunken pose. The crowd would go nuts. I had them in the palm of my hand before I opened the book and started the presentation.
If you’re not familiar with Vaughn’s work it is important to point out that he created a unique style of presentation whereby the voice balloons resided in their own graphic territory above the artwork. That allowed for the beautiful display of the artwork on screen without giving away the contents until I performed the lines live. An hour-long presentation that including over 50 characters was a great strain on my voice, not to mention doing all the music and sounds effects as well. I soon abandoned the idea of performing in clubs where people smoke. I never would have survived that.
To say I fell in love with Vaughn’s work is a gross understatement. I was in awe. When this all began for me in 1975 Vaughn’s son Mark was all of 12 years old. I had no idea how his father had groomed him at such a tender age but time would reveal him to be a virtual extension of his father’s hand as he has continued to bring Vaughn’s work to life and gain an international reputation in own right as a graffiti artist and tattooist as well. Talent runs deep in that family.
After performing at comic conventions and universities, including Vaughn’s alma mater, Syracuse University, it eventually became apparent that the concert would not financially sustain me. Having left the womb of Hollywood and moved north I no longer had industry connections and was feeling a bit adrift. I didn’t have a resume and didn’t look forward to writing down a list of jobs. So I created a comic book of my life titled RESUME FUNNIES. I had no idea what to do with it until I read about North Bay director John Korty in Newsweek Magazine. Eventually, I decided to send him a copy. His producer Bill Couturie (a fellow USC Cinema graduate) had heard of me and now held my comic in his hands. That is how I got hired at Korty Films and wound up writing and animating for SESAME STREET for several years until George Lucas entered the picture as Executive Producer of TWICE UPON A TIME. I would spend three years on that project as Supervising Animator and Sequence Director. The rest of my resume flows from there, including work with Pixar, Wildbrain, Levi Strauss, Apple, Google and other Northern California giants.
Were it not for that chance encounter in Vincent Bode’s hotel room and the enduring brilliance of Vaughn Bode’s work my life would have turned out very differently. To this day a little statue of Cheech Wizard sits in the highest position on my desk. Vaughn may be gone, but the Cheech lives on.
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