RIP Art Clokey - Creator of Gumby / Davey & Goliath

[pjpeterson]

An Interview with Art Clokey

Art Clokey, Gumby, Davey and Goliath, etc.

Hippies always got Gumby, says Art Clokey. "They could see he was an honest expression right from my heart," explains Clokey, the soft-spoken, gently effervescent septuagenarian who created the fanciful pea-green funboy in 1953.

"I wasn't trying to exploit children or do formula television. Gumby was an honest attempt to entertain and give kids a little joy.''

And now, 40 years after Gumby was first introduced to America on "The Howdy Doody Show'' (speaking of iconic kidvid bliss), Clokey has brought forth "Gumby: The Movie,'' a G-rated family viewing experience.

Why a feature-length movie at this late date?

Because Gumby is bigger than ever, Clokey, 73, said during a phone conversation from his home in northern California.

"We're reaching a whole new generation,'' Gumby's chummy alter ego proclaimed, referring to the fact that Gumby and his funky stop-animation gang have found new life — and new fans — while airing seven days a week on Nickelodeon, the popular cable network for kids.

But even before Gumby clicked with Nick, there was an earlier cockeyed booster rocket of recognition provided by Eddie Murphy on "Saturday Night Live'' in the early 1980s.

"I'm Gumby, dammit,'' snarled Murphy's cigar-smokin', satiric G-thang.

"It cracked me up,'' said Clokey of Murphy's parody. "Gumby has a sense of humor. He can laugh at himself.''

Besides, self-deprecation is good for business. "It was excellent promotion,'' said Clokey of the "SNL'' marketing windfall. "Eddie Murphy is a great Gumby fan. I saw him once in a Gumby T-shirt.''

In the early years, Clokey stayed away from hyping his little pal with a bunch of crass merchandise. "We didn't want to give the impression we were trying to exploit kids,'' Clokey said. "I was kind of idealistic.''

So when "The Gumby Show'' first aired on NBC between 1957 and 1964, there wasn't a T-shirt or lunch box to be found. But by the time Clokey shrewdly bought back the original 42 episodes from NBC and sold them in syndication in 1966, the Gumby cornucopia of collectibles had begun.

"Some guy said, `Why don't you make a toy?' '' said Clokey.

So kaboom, the first Gumby and Pokey bendable plastic action figures were born in the mid-1960s. Hippies flipped. So did a lot of other Gumby fans. And the bend-it toys are still great sellers.

Plus, you can now find Gumby-head hats, Gumby lunch boxes, Gumby and Pokey T-shirts, and Gumby bubble bath. And there even are talking Gumby and Pokey dolls on the way, as well as a Gumby record with Gumby tunes, inspired by the new movie.

It's not like Clokey (rhymes with Pokey) planned to hatch a pop culture legend.

"We never imagined that would happen in the early years,'' Clokey recalled. "We just thought (Gumby) had run its course. But it kept on going and going and going.''

Clokey, who spent the first dozen years of his life in the Motor City, moved to California with his family in the mid-1930s. But while living with his family in a westside Detroit neighborhood, Clokey received happy Gumby-like inspiration during summer visits to his grandparents' farm in Millington, Mich.

"That was paradise every summer,'' Clokey said of his pastoral visits to the Michigan countryside. "That's why we have barns in the Gumby series.''

But it was in California that Clokey's vivid imagination was further fueled by a newfound fascination with film-making, doing graduate work in cinema at the University of Southern California.

He learned about the stop animation process at USC and created an art film called "Gumbasia,'' which used an eclectic array of colors and clay shapes set to jazz music. It was "Gumbasia'' that served as Gumby's roots.

And the rest, as they say, is bendable green team history.

The Gumby saga now includes 65 half-hour episodes of Little Mr. Positive, a 12-year-old clayboy who is honest, pure and extremely flexible. Honest and pure, sure, but Clokey did reveal that merry pranksters at the UCLA film school once made an underground Gumby porno parody. Tsk, tsk.

And certain countercultural toonheads claim to have seen hallucinogenic entertainment qualities in "The Gumby Show.'' And they might be on the mark. Clokey briefly experimented with LSD in the early '60s, he said, when it was still legal, taking the mind-expanding drug under medical supervision.

"There were some pretty psychedelic scenes in the newer episodes,'' the affable animator confessed. But then, maybe he was just naturally high. "My original subsconscious was in touch with something,'' he observed.

Obviously. And these days, Gumby continues to strike a friendly cultural chord.

He was invited to the annual Easter egg roll at the White House. He's also a symbol of environmental awareness, a green and bendy ecologically astute hepcat. Plus, he's down with the Dead: A six-foot stuffed Gumby in a Grateful Dead T-shirt put in an appearance at a mass Deadhead memorial for the late Jerry Garcia at Golden Gate Park in San Francisco three weeks ago, Clokey said.

The essential thing is, Gumby will always be in tune with Spaceship Earth and its inhabitants.

"He has great faith in the goodness of everything and everybody,'' Clokey said. "He's very trusting.'' And very, very successful.

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Video Interview with Art Clokey:

YouTube - Gumby on acid

[lynn]

Thanks for the post pj...

I didn't know anything about Gumby's creator or his name until the other day...And I didn't watch Gumby either...

I just really like the funny-looking-little-bendable-green guy I have...
-
I've got my Gumby...:)

[pjpeterson]

I'm glad you enjoyed the post. So Sad.

I was a Gumby and Pokey fan on Saturday mornings and a Davey and Goliath fan on Sunday mornings.

I found this too, in case you are interested in more on the subject.

YouTube - Gumby on acid

Now I now why I always loved Gumby and Pokey. They were FAR OUT!!!!

Check out the Gumby and Pokey cartoons on YouTube. Very sweet and amazing clay-mation work for it’s time. No CGI there, just humans moving clay... Wow!

Peace,

Phyllis

Thanks for the post pj...

I didn't know anything about Gumby's creator or his name until the other day...And I didn't watch Gumby either...

I just really like the funny-looking-little-bendable-green guy I have...
-
I've got my Gumby...:)