BENNY AND LARRY (BENNY)

Benny & Larry (Benny)

There was three tiers in the Union when I came along. The first tier was hands that came out of vaudeville, like Benny Miller. The second tier missed vaudeville but worked some burlesque and saw the jobs for hands in theaters consisting mainly of changing bulbs and repairing seats, like Larry Kasper. They also saw the advent of touring plays and musicals, which they worked. The third tier, to which I belonged saw all hell break loose with touring shows getting bigger and bigger, and touring rock concerts becoming gigantic. Rapid advancement in the technical part of show business, like sound in those rock concerts, and computers in all departments. I was blessed by the fact I worked with all three tiers and learned their methods.

BENNY MILLER

Benny was a legend and Bill K saw to it Benny’s legend was passed on to those who never got to work with Benny.

Benny’s overalls: Benny would put on a new pair of bib overalls in early summer and that would be his attire until the next summer. Bib overalls have a multitude of pockets and Benny managed to fill each pocket. Bill quipped that when Benny died, it took six months to probate his overalls. Bill said if you needed something chances are Benny had it. Ask him for a piece of chalk and Benny he would ask you, ‘What color’.

Benny had a garage filled with things he couldn’t fit in his overall. The garage had shelves of cubby holes, each with a bread loaf pan of the same size nails, screws, nuts, bolts, etc. Shelves of larger pans with theatrical needs such as stage pegs, fastening hasps, bent nails for holding the hasps together etc. Pegs which held spools of trick line, bolts of muslin, ropes of various sizes, electrical cords, etc. On the walls were telescopic stage braces and lengths of 1×3 slats used to make stage flats. A virtual theatrical hardware store.

Several times hardware dealer tried to buy this inventory. ‘No’ Benny said, each time,’That belongs to my union. When they need something, its theirs for the asking. When they need a place to store, my garage is theirs for the storage.’

Benny never married; but rumor had it, many of the night cleaning ladies in the theater, were happy to be in his harem.

Benny had a sister, his only family outside of his union brothers, who he liked very much. His sister had asthma. Benny came up with an idea that would help asthma sufferers while they watched a movie. Ozone in the theater’s duct work. This was before AC so nothing was coming through the ducts during the asthma season. Once this was proven to work, Benny would then make portable machines to be used in the home. Benny didn’t plan to get rich off this scheme. He just wanted to help his sister and other sufferers.

He spent weeks working in the ducts, string DC conductors, leaving gaps between them so the current would leap to the next conductor, creating ozone which would then drift in to the theater.

(Neither Bill nor myself pretended to understand Benny’s concept but we just went along with it in the story. Why question and ruin a good laugh.)

Benny never got to test it though because just before he was almost finished, he saw on the Pathe News Of The World short that ran before a movie, how ozone was presenting a grave danger to our planet and its people. It didn’t take very long to tear it all down and Benny stored everything in his garage.

One day, Benny confided to Bill, that he was working on an engine that would run on air. That’ll be the engine that will bring man to the moon.

‘Well, Benny,’ Bill said, ‘One big problem. Once you get up so high there’s no more air.’

Not to be deterred, Benny just took off his fedora and scratched his head, and replied, ‘Well, I still got some details to work out yet.’

Benny was an excellent carpenter. He was put in charge of a crew to build a temporary extension on the stage at the Prom Ballroom because the upcoming band was too big for just the normal stage.

The promoter came by and asked for the bill. Benny said to wait and he get it. Then he pulled out his hammer from the overall’s hammer loop and crawled under the stage. A noise of of hammering and nail pulling and some grunts from Benny, but soon Benny came out dragging a two by four. He handed the two by four to the promoter and told him the bill was right there on the wood. And it was. The facts started at the top and ran almost to the bottom.

The promoter accepted them and paid the bill. ‘Guess I better transpose this to paper,’ he said, ‘I don’t think the IRS will accept this piece of wood to show a legit business expense.’

When Benny died, he left everything to his sister with the proviso, she would never charge the union for any of his collection that they might need. And she would accept anything the union might bring over to store.

Like I said, Benny Miller stories were legend and I wish I could remember more of them. The ones I told were ones I wrote down when I first heard them from Bill when we worked together in the booth at the Guthrie. Bill was on sound. I was on lights. And there were a great many different stage mangers that Bill made laugh with his stories like his Benny Miller tales. And ever time he told one, I had to laugh even though I had heard it several times before.

Next up

Larry the Grouchy

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