Andy Romanoff, featuring special guest Wavy Gravy
An evening with Andy Romanoff, reading from his book, Stories I’ve Been Meaning to Tell You. Joining in conversation and reading from his own work is Andy’s pal since the old days, Wavy Gravy!
This is a young man’s wild stories told with an older man’s wisdom. It speaks to anyone with an interest in the ’60s and ’70s, subcultures (particularly bikers and hippies), and tells the stories of young men and women who hang out on street corners waiting for something to happen. Stories I’ve Been Meaning to Tell You chronicles Andy Romanoff’s screwed-up years, how he survived them, and how he went on to make a meaningful life for himself.
Andy Romanoff’s memoir chronicles his messed-up years and how he survived long enough to transition out of them. Filled with colorful storytelling, Romanoff takes you along for the ride as he makes a meaningful life for himself without turning his back on the person he’d been or the places he’d come from. “Stories I’ve Been Meaning to Tell You” is a wild ride filled with tales of getting thrown out of five high schools; stealing cars and motorcycles; getting tossed in jail; finding his way into the sleazy end of the film business; being there for the invention of Gore Films; spending time with counterculture legends like Ken Kesey, the Hog Farm, and Nick Ray; then slowly learning about love, life, and death as he becomes a reluctant success. Come along with him as he shares eighty years of stories, learning to accept success, friendship, and family while raising hell along the way.
About Andy Romanoff
For half of his life, Andy Romanoff wasn’t looking further ahead than his next meal. After getting thrown out of five high schools and going on to steal motorcycles, scam credit cards, and burn cars for weekend fun, it seemed clear to everyone around him that he was a screwup. He took that reputation and ran with it, working on the first gore film Blood Feast; living with the legendary commune The Hog Farm; and hanging out with pranksters and legends like Nick Ray, Ken Kesey, and Wavy Gravy. As he got older and saw more of life and how it ended, he realized he wanted more for himself than a list of adventures. He pioneered the use of remote-operated cranes in motion pictures working with the likes of Steven Spielberg, Hal Ashby, Billy Fraker, Conrad Hall, and Vilmos Zigmond. He is a member of the Motion Picture Academy, an Associate Member of the American Society of Cinematographers, and a member of the Motion Picture Camera union. He is also a regular contributor to L’oeil de la Photographie, the leading photographic arts publication with 250,000 daily readers, and he writes regularly on Medium. Most importantly, he lives a peaceful life with his wife of forty years and two grown children, who he adores.
About Wavy Gravy
Wavy Gravy is not your ordinary clown. He certainly has had a long run since his earlier days as a poet and stand-up comic, improvisational theater artist, psychedelic bus caravan luminary, and rock concert MC, and often jokes: “if you don’t have a sense of humor, it just isn’t funny anymore.” Yet his reach extends far beyond the comic. He is devoted to “do something good for a change,” and his creative activism on behalf of peace, justice, and good humor is legendary. Along with Jahanara, his wife of over fifty years, he has brought joy and helped to relieve suffering for countless people around the globe, largely through his favorite projects, the Seva Foundation and Camp Winnarainbow. Wavy has been called “clown prince of the counter-culture” by Entertainment Weekly, “a saint in a clown suit” by Bob Weir, and “the illegitimate son of Harpo Marx and Mother Teresa” by Paul Krassner. Now in his 80s, this iconic figure from the 60s refers to himself as a “temple of accumulated error,” yet he’s always ready with a twinkling insight, a fantastic story and a helping hand. About those stories, Ram Dass said, “everything Wavy says is true, although it’s all unbelievable.”