Wavy Gravy gets tasty tribute in new movie
http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKTRE6B90MO20101210
By Frank Scheck
Fri Dec 10, 2010
NEW YORK (Hollywood Reporter) - Best known today as a Ben & Jerry's
ice cream flavor, Wavy Gravy is a minor but ubiquitous 1960s
counter-cultural figure who is still going strong at 74.
While Michelle Esrick's "Saint Misbehavin': The Wavy Gravy Movie" is
not a particularly deep portrait of its iconoclastic subject, this
loving documentary should be of interest to baby boomers with long memories.
Wavy, born Hugh Romney. began his career in the cafes and clubs of
Greenwich Village in the early '60s, performing poetry and stand-up
comedy and opening shows for such musicians as John Coltrane,
Thelonious Monk and Peter, Paul & Mary, among many others. He briefly
roomed with the young Bob Dylan, who supposedly wrote the lyrics for
"A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall" on Wavy's typewriter in 1962.
He soon found his way, like many others of his generation, to
California, where he joined up with Ken Kesey's Merry Pranksters to
form a commune known as the Hog Farm.
Eventually foregoing his artistic aspirations in favor of social
activism, he became a constant figure at anti-war protests, donning a
clown outfit to avoid further beatings by the police. Given his
current moniker by B.B. King, he is perhaps best known for his role
as the MC at the Woodstock music festival.
Since then, in between conducting satirical campaigns for president,
he has been active in charitable causes, including organizing benefit
concerts featuring his all-star gallery of friends and founding a
performing arts camp for children dubbed Camp Winnarainbow.
Loaded with laudatory comments by such contemporaries as Ram Dass,
Odetta, Bonnie Raitt and Jackson Browne among many others, the film,
co-executive produced by D.A. Pennebaker, makes enough use of
archival footage and period songs to warm the hearts of '60s nostalgists.
While Wavy himself does not prove particularly illuminating in his
comments here, his longtime (45 years) wife Jahanara helps fill in
the gaps, as does his son Jordan, whose name was initially Howdy
Do-Good Gravy Tomahawk Truckstop Romney (no wonder that he changed it).
As freewheeling and irreverent as the man himself, "Saint
Misbehavin'" is that rare documentary whose flaws seem appropriate
for its subject matter.
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