BAD SANTA - BY DAN KAPELOVITZ
DECEMBER 17, 2004
My phone rings at 10:30
A.M. "Where are you?" whines the voice on
the other end. "You were supposed to be here at 8
o’clock."
The voice belongs to David Hart, a.k.a. David Nkrumah Unger Liebe Hart, the infamous producer of the truly bizarre public-access puppet show once known as The Junior Christian Science Bible Lesson Show. (Hart has since removed the word science from the title to appease Christian Scientists.)
I’ve known the deeply religious puppet master for years, and every few months or so, I forget what a pain in the ass it is to get suckered into driving him somewhere. On this morning, I agreed to chauffeur Hart around town so he could earn some cash painting Christmas decorations on store windows.
The disheveled 49-year-old puppeteer throws a toolbox and a ratty suitcase into my car, both filled with paint cans and brushes.
"I haven’t had a girl since 1994," Hart informs me on the way to Little Armenia. I’ve heard this a thousand times. He’s even written a song about his decade of celibacy, appropriately titled "I Haven’t Had a Girl Since 1994." Hart’s abstinence is not for lack of trying; he hands out cards with his phone number to any woman he finds attractive. For a time, he was banned from the La Brea Tar Pits because female passers-by complained he was sexually harassing them. He went to court over the issue: "The judge said that as long as I didn’t touch any of the women or rub up against them, it wasn’t sexual harassment."
Our first stop is an insurance agency, where David asks the receptionist if he may speak to the manager and then offers to draw a portrait of her.
The manager gets off the phone and says, "No paint this year — it ruined our windows last year." David explains that the paints are water-soluble, but to no avail.
Next, he tries a gift shop, a grocery store, a motel, a Chinese restaurant, a pizza joint, a few gas stations and an International House of Pancakes. They all turn him down.
Hart swears that he had all of these jobs lined up. "It’s like The Twilight Zone. Either the managers aren’t in, or they changed their minds. The same thing I go through with women I go through with businesses."
Dejected, Hart calls the Religious Science 24-hour prayer line, the no-cost alternative to the Christian Science church, which charges $20 for spiritual guidance. David explains to me that the Church of Religious Science is a spinoff of the Christian Science church.
"I’m trying to get work doing Christmas decorations, and everyone’s turning me down," Hart tells the spiritual-hot-line operator, who then prays for David for approximately three minutes.
David says he just received a call from a pizzeria near the La Brea Tar Pits that desperately wants Christmas decorations. But when we arrive minutes later, the man doesn’t know what David’s talking about.
We walk over to the Screen Actors Guild. A young woman exits the building who in no way resembles Sally Field. "You’re very beautiful," says David. "You look just like Sally Field." She walks past us.
SAG headquarters is also a no-go.
Undeterred, we head to Culver City. Finally, the owner of a homebrewing company is kind enough to hire David. David negotiates a fee of $125. Our prayer-line prayers have been answered. But, as they say, "Be careful what you pray for; you just might get it."
It takes David more than two hours to paint a few windows. The entire time he bitches about the model-train store across the street where he is no longer welcome. He claims he is banned because he refused to become a born-again Christian. Hart begs me to go over there and confront the guy. When I refuse, he blames Bush’s presidential victory on people like me who won’t fight against conservative Christians.
David’s interminable bickering is briefly interrupted when a female jogger, wearing loose-fitting short-shorts, runs past. David considers approaching her but, in a rare moment of restraint, says, "I can’t mix business with pleasure. She’ll say that some guy on the sidewalk harassed her."
David’s paintings are actually pretty impressive. He depicts a snowman, a Christmas tree, candy canes, snowflakes, and Santa Claus drinking a beer, rendered in glorious splashes of red, white, blue, green, black, orange and yellow.
"My artwork is unique because no one else paints Santa with blond hair, and all of my characters have mittens with three fingers," says the artist. "Also, I’m the only one who does blue snowmen."
I ask David why he placed umlauts over all of the vowels of the words Häppy Hölïdäys.
"Because I’m part German," he responds.
Hart finally finishes his masterpiece, but not before the sun’s gone down. Hart’s patron seems genuinely pleased and even offers an extra 25 bucks.
The voice belongs to David Hart, a.k.a. David Nkrumah Unger Liebe Hart, the infamous producer of the truly bizarre public-access puppet show once known as The Junior Christian Science Bible Lesson Show. (Hart has since removed the word science from the title to appease Christian Scientists.)
I’ve known the deeply religious puppet master for years, and every few months or so, I forget what a pain in the ass it is to get suckered into driving him somewhere. On this morning, I agreed to chauffeur Hart around town so he could earn some cash painting Christmas decorations on store windows.
The disheveled 49-year-old puppeteer throws a toolbox and a ratty suitcase into my car, both filled with paint cans and brushes.
"I haven’t had a girl since 1994," Hart informs me on the way to Little Armenia. I’ve heard this a thousand times. He’s even written a song about his decade of celibacy, appropriately titled "I Haven’t Had a Girl Since 1994." Hart’s abstinence is not for lack of trying; he hands out cards with his phone number to any woman he finds attractive. For a time, he was banned from the La Brea Tar Pits because female passers-by complained he was sexually harassing them. He went to court over the issue: "The judge said that as long as I didn’t touch any of the women or rub up against them, it wasn’t sexual harassment."
Our first stop is an insurance agency, where David asks the receptionist if he may speak to the manager and then offers to draw a portrait of her.
The manager gets off the phone and says, "No paint this year — it ruined our windows last year." David explains that the paints are water-soluble, but to no avail.
Next, he tries a gift shop, a grocery store, a motel, a Chinese restaurant, a pizza joint, a few gas stations and an International House of Pancakes. They all turn him down.
Hart swears that he had all of these jobs lined up. "It’s like The Twilight Zone. Either the managers aren’t in, or they changed their minds. The same thing I go through with women I go through with businesses."
Dejected, Hart calls the Religious Science 24-hour prayer line, the no-cost alternative to the Christian Science church, which charges $20 for spiritual guidance. David explains to me that the Church of Religious Science is a spinoff of the Christian Science church.
"I’m trying to get work doing Christmas decorations, and everyone’s turning me down," Hart tells the spiritual-hot-line operator, who then prays for David for approximately three minutes.
David says he just received a call from a pizzeria near the La Brea Tar Pits that desperately wants Christmas decorations. But when we arrive minutes later, the man doesn’t know what David’s talking about.
We walk over to the Screen Actors Guild. A young woman exits the building who in no way resembles Sally Field. "You’re very beautiful," says David. "You look just like Sally Field." She walks past us.
SAG headquarters is also a no-go.
Undeterred, we head to Culver City. Finally, the owner of a homebrewing company is kind enough to hire David. David negotiates a fee of $125. Our prayer-line prayers have been answered. But, as they say, "Be careful what you pray for; you just might get it."
It takes David more than two hours to paint a few windows. The entire time he bitches about the model-train store across the street where he is no longer welcome. He claims he is banned because he refused to become a born-again Christian. Hart begs me to go over there and confront the guy. When I refuse, he blames Bush’s presidential victory on people like me who won’t fight against conservative Christians.
David’s interminable bickering is briefly interrupted when a female jogger, wearing loose-fitting short-shorts, runs past. David considers approaching her but, in a rare moment of restraint, says, "I can’t mix business with pleasure. She’ll say that some guy on the sidewalk harassed her."
David’s paintings are actually pretty impressive. He depicts a snowman, a Christmas tree, candy canes, snowflakes, and Santa Claus drinking a beer, rendered in glorious splashes of red, white, blue, green, black, orange and yellow.
"My artwork is unique because no one else paints Santa with blond hair, and all of my characters have mittens with three fingers," says the artist. "Also, I’m the only one who does blue snowmen."
I ask David why he placed umlauts over all of the vowels of the words Häppy Hölïdäys.
"Because I’m part German," he responds.
Hart finally finishes his masterpiece, but not before the sun’s gone down. Hart’s patron seems genuinely pleased and even offers an extra 25 bucks.
Posted: Fri - December 17, 2004 at 11:22 PM
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Published On: Jun 28, 2005 11:22 PM
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Published On: Jun 28, 2005 11:22 PM