Old New York – Page 9 – Boy Outa Brooklyn

What’s my motivation?

Rajneesh aka Osho — **“Please to be giving me a stack of $100 bills this high.”**

Method Acting teachers are seen as gurus and they embrace this mantle: “I am the great Father Figure, Witch-Doctor, Shrink, the Font of All Wisdom, the Repository of All Knowledge, the Giver of Pleasure and Pain.” No surprise their schools become personality cults. No surprise these cults are especially attractive to young women who have little self-esteem and big “Daddy” issues. The Guru demands that the student emotes at all times. The student is not having a successful scene if the student is not having a nervous breakdown – even if the scene is from Mary Poppins. Simply put – “If you ain’t crying, you ain’t acting.”

Julie Andrews as Mary Poppins — **Oh, daddy, take my money and then take me.**

One Guru held his entire class captive for two days because one student had not prepared a scene. Two days. No food. No phone calls. No talking. Limited toilet breaks. Very limited. Meanwhile, across town, a revered female Guru sent her students out to pick up strangers in bars and have sex with them – in the midst of the AIDS epidemic. And, people fought to get into these classes.

Boy Outa Brooklyn a murder memoir by Jack Antonio
Image: The smiling face of Steeplechase Park, Coney Island, Brooklyn — Available as a paperback and eBook
amazon.com
amazon.co.uk
And as an eBook here https://books2read.com/The-Boy-Outa-Brooklyn

Acting Teacher Expose

Paperback cover of Teacher's Pet by Mark Clements — **Another “method” of opening actor’s orifices**

In the 1980s, after a young actress accused her acting teacher of raping her, the dam burst. Former students from as far back as the 1950s reported similar attacks by Professor Pervowitz. He had been an acclaimed teacher and a predatory sadist for decades. He had run weekly ads in The Village Voice. Taught major stars. And, you had to hand it to Pervowitz, he had a psychologically brilliant M.O. He would tell the actor or actress in his sights that they were a genius. But, to prevent jealousy, their “genius” had to remain secret from the other students. Pervowitz was willing to give the budding genius private coaching… ssshhh… to open you up… ssshhh… you are a genius but you are emotionally blocked. I know how to unblock you… ssshhh… now take your clothes off, kneel at my feet and masturbate while repeating – I am your bitch-slut-cunt.”

And, they did it. Many geniuses did it. Male and female did it they – for decades.

Paperback cover of The Professor and the Co-Ed — The hunter and the prey.
But, which is which?

Boy Outa Brooklyn a murder memoir by Jack Antonio
Image: the smiling face of Steeplechase Park in Coney Island, Brooklyn — Available as a paperback and eBook amazon.com
amazon.co.uk
And as an eBook here
https://books2read.com/The-Boy-Outa-Brooklyn

Obsessive Compulsive Memory Disorder

Vintage ad for memory improvement — **What’s past is prologue**

I have Obsessive Compulsive Memory Disorder. I can’t escape the past. I don’t want to escape the past. I am drawn to it. I want to live in it. I do live in it. An edge of cobblestone peeking through the pavement, an ancient painted sign flaking on the side of a building, a patch of wallpaper revealed by the swing of the wrecker’s ball propels me back to the New York of Boss Tweed, Babe Ruth or the Mad Bomber. I can stare into snowy Green-Wood Cemetery at night meditating on the tombstones and conjure a horse-drawn Currier and Ives sleigh with harness bells jangling. I see the horses’ frozen breath flaring from their nostrils; hear their hooves striking the frozen Brooklyn earth. It is 1845 and I am there.

Currier and Ives painting of a horse drawn sleigh ride. — **That’s me at the reins.**

Stoop of Horror

Vintage horror comic book cover as read on the stoops of Brooklyn. — **Classic stoop reading material**

A few years after my exposure to photographs of kinky sex, I become addicted to visual depictions of violence. Every Thursday night I get my twenty-five cents allowance and hot-foot it to Rocco’s Candy Store to buy the latest comic books. I have no interest in sissy stuff like Archie or Richie Rich. I crave Tales from the Crypt and Vault of Horror. Actually, what I really crave are the skin mags on the top shelves. I crane my neck to see them until Rocco suggests that I leave his establishment, “Get da fuck outa here kid before I tell ya muddah.” I then hunker down on a stoop under a streetlight and read. So strong is my desire to escape the din and dysfunction in my home that I sit on the stoop even on winter nights.

Ah, alone in my study at last. All I need are my pipe and slippers.

Attack of the Killer Dwarf

Souvenir postcard from Steeplechase Park in Coney Island, Brooklyn. — Steeplechase Park in Coney Island, Brooklyn
Better than Disneyland

I am seven and in Coney Island’s Steeplechase Park – a magical relic of a Victorian amusement park. I’m lost in a dark hallway and I’m ascared. I must have taken a wrong turn getting off the Shoot-the-Chute.

Shoot-the-chute at Steeplechase Park in Coney Island, Brooklyn

I open a door and I’m in the employees’ locker room. Right before me sits a dwarf-clown in whiteface but only halfway into his Pagliacci costume. Baggy clown-pants below. Guinea T-shirt on top. He is smoking and reading The Daily News. He sports a popular tattoo – a black panther climbing up his forearm and drawing drops of red blood with its claws. The dwarf-clown gives me a genuinely malevolent look – not one of those stagey, evil dwarf-clown looks so popular in modern horror-movies. This dwarf-clown hates being a dwarf. Hates being a clown. Hates being the same size as this seven-year-old punk standing before him. Hates me. “Get the fuck outahere,” he rasps.

I get the fuck outathere.

The Viking Giant

Johann K. Petursson, The Icelandic Giant. — **Johann K. Petursson and his lunch.**

That same year, I see the freak show at Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus held in the old Madison Square Garden where Joe Louis, Sugar Ray Robinson, Jake LaMotta, Rocky Graziano and Rocky Marciano fight. It’s where Emile Griffith from the Virgin Islands kills the Cuban Benny “Kid” Paret. At the weigh-in, Benny calls Emile a “maricon” – that’s spic-talk for faggot. In Round 12, Paret is out on his feet but trapped in a corner and held up by the ropes. The homosexual Griffith shows no mercy. Remember what I told you about our dusky brothers not liking each other? Remember what I told you about boxing promoters feasting on that hatred? The Garden reeks of that bloody history. And, with the circus in town, it reeks of lion piss and elephant dung. (Henry Miller, like me a Brooklyn boy, wanted an English language that reeked of lion piss and elephant dung. I doubt Henry ever smelled them in combination. The stench stung my eyeballs and melted the enamel from my teeth!)

The Ringling freak show features sword-swallowers, snake-handlers, fire-eaters, bullwhip-crackers, knife-throwers, fat men, skinny men, rubber men, a family of albino midgets and the star of the show – Johann K. Petursson, the Icelandic Giant – the Tallest Man in the World. Johann is no sissy giant, no puny, pituitary-gland pussy he. Johann is a true giant – 8’ 8” tall and brawny with a bear pelt draped over his shoulder.

Johann wears a tall Viking helmet with horns as tribute to his forebears and to make himself look even taller. My father buys me one of Johann’s green plastic rings as souvenir. The giant places it on his finger for a moment as consecration. I can fit all five of my five-year-old fingers inside it. I still have that ring.

Johann K. Petursson souvenir ring as sold at Coney Island and Ringling Brothers Barnum & Bailey Circus. — **The Sacred Relic**

Freak-O-Rama

Vintage freak show banner depicting two-headed baby as seen at Coney Island — **Facsimile = an ancient, dusty, wax model floating in a filthy jar filled with formaldehyde**

Coney Island is where I see my first freak show. I am five and my father holds me up to see the stage. Outside the tent, a painted banner depicts a ferocious man with a head shaped like a ten-foot-wide light bulb. But, inside the tent, the meek, sickly man on-stage has only a slightly swollen head. He drives a nail up his nose to try and compensate for his disappointing deformity. My father explains that the man has a disease and the show is a gyp. There is also a woman on-stage who has dry, scaly skin. Outside she is depicted crawling through a swamp on all fours – a woman’s head on the body of an alligator. But, inside – no such luck. Another gyp.

Times Square Baptism

The classic stripper - Lily Christine aka - "The Cat Girl" — **Sex-education instructor in 1950s Brooklyn**

When we climbed out of the Times Square subway station, I was mesmerized. I’d been to Coney Island plenty, but this was something else again, something electrifying. It was the lights – up and down and all around, lights neon, fluorescent and incandescent, lights all moving, all colors and all ablaze – even in daylight; lights that outshined the sun. The billboards were alive – a gigantic man blew smoke rings while Mister Peanut tipped his hat. I didn’t know it then but I had been rubbing shoulders with Diane Arbus and Bettie Page, both working in that 1956 Times Square world – a world of bustling strangers. A world of men in hats. Women with handbags. A world that smelled of Howard Johnson, Orange Julius, Nedick’s, popcorn and pussy. I was six and I could smell it; six and I could feel it; six and I could taste it. Times Square was a dirty dangerous place. And, I loved it.

Mr. Peanut neon sign in Times Square, New York — **My mentor – Mr. Peanut**

Elvis blasted from the music stores and frigid winds blasted from the air-conditioned theater lobbies. I passed a newsstand and an excited man shouted “Extra!” I passed a doorway and a crazy man shouted “Cocksucker!” I heard the shuffle, scuffle and beat of the footfalls. I heard the horns, hollers and bleats of the cabbies – “Ya got wheels! Use ’em, Mac!” I saw my first “Street Corner Messiah.” He wore a sandwich board and was very worried about God. I was transfixed by him. I wanted to ask him why he was so worried but I was pulled away.

Ripley's Believe It or Not Odditorium in Times Square, New York — **A history lesson in Times Square**

It was the bestest birthday party ever. We saw the Torture Chamber in Ripley’s Believe It or Not“ Odditorium.” Then we visited Hubert’s Museum – a freak show in a 42^nd Street basement. It was even spookier and sexier than Ripley’s! We gaped at Hubert’s Cowboy Giant, midget, flea circus and Congo Witch Doctor. We gawped at Princess Sahloo and her sluggish snake. I determined that I would live in Hubert’s Museum as barker, caretaker and flea-wrangler. I would befriend the Witch Doctor, play pinochle with the midget and milk the snake.

Hubert's Museum and freak show on 42nd street in New York — **Oh, for a time machine!**

Where the elite meet to eat!

Bowery Bum with bloody nose — **Habitué of many a bar & grill.**

During Prohibition, Mayor LaGuardia cracked down on saloons and forced them to serve food to combat drunkenness. Since then every New York bar has had a “grill,” if you count a broken hot plate with old newspapers piled on top of it and stored next to the eternally out-of-order toilet as a “grill.” I’d never heard of anyone in Brooklyn eating (or peeing) in a bar & grill – except in the Gallo Brothers Bar & Grill. It had an excellent Italian kitchen. But, only the wives and girlfriends of the local Mafia were allowed to enjoy it. One of these broads was driven there in a limo every night even though she lived all of three blocks away. Did I see Jimmy Durante drinking in Gallo’s one day? Maybe it was just a man with a big honker who shouted out to me, “Stop gawkin’ at me ya little bastid and go fuck your mother.”

Crazy Joey Gallo

My neighborhood’s Chinese laundry sat beside the “Ladies Entrance” to the Gallo Brothers Bar & Grill. The Gallo boys were notorious Mafia “wise guys” who ran a bookie parlor hidden behind a door at the back of the laundry. History does not relate if the Chinaman got a piece of the action or had no choice. On Thanksgiving, the Gallos distributed turkeys and booze to neighborhood numbskulls, which bought their undying loyalty – “Hey, leave dem alone. Dem Gallo boys is good boys.”

In 1972, Crazy Joey Gallo was assassinated in Umberto’s Clam House in Little Italy and Bob Dylan wrote a song about him. (Tourists still gawk outside Umberto’sunaware that the original joint where Joey got whacked is blocks away.)