Greetings family and friends! I hope that you enjoy this week's "character" and perhaps have a few memories yourself! Bill

Memorable Character

KELLY ASBURY - FILM MAKER, AUTHOR

I grew up with a bunch dummies....puppets and marionettes.

Listening to Edgar Bergen and Charley McCarthy along with Charlie’s

country cousin Mortimer Snerd was a special treat, and the first TV

show that I can recall watching in late 1940’s was Kukla, Fran and

Ollie featuring the gentle souled globe nosed clown and wacky

misguided single toothed dragon hand puppets brought to life by Burr

Tillstrom and Fran Allison. I never missed Howdy Doody and his

marionette partners including Flub -a-Dub and Phineas T. Bluster.

Paul Winchell and Jerry Mahoney were Saturday morning favorites

along Jimmy Nelson with Danny O’Day. Sunday night’s Ed Sullivan

show was particularly special when Senior Wences and his painted

fist puppet Johnny were on. My Jerry Mahoney ventriloquist dummy,

Howdy Doody marionette, Kukla hand puppet and cardboard puppet

theater were among my favorite toys, and a fantasy was realized

when my third grade teacher encouraged me to perform my first (and

last) puppet show front of our class at Marshall School.

Fading through the years, my interest in puppets, marionettes and

ventriloquist dummies was reawakened in 2003 when I met Kelly

Asbury, author of Dummy Days, America’s favorite Ventriloquists

from Radio and Early TV. The prolific film maker and ventriloquist

dummy collector worked at Walt Disney Feature Animation for twelve

years beginning in 1983 where he contributed storyboards for The

Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast and Pixar’s first feature film Toy

Story, and is the credited Assistant Art Director for Tim Burton’s

Nightmare Before Christmas. Kelly moved to DreamWorks Animation

in 1995 and directed Academy Award nominated Shrek 2 and Spirit:

Stallion of the Cimarron. He authored and illustrated twelve children’s

books as well as Dummy Days that features informative biographies

of classic “vents” Edgar Bergen, Senor Wences, Paul Winchell,

Jimmy Nelson and Shari Lewis. Beginning in 2011 until his passing in

2020 Asbury was called on to contribute story boards for Wreck-it

Ralph and Frozen for Disney, and Smurf’s: The Lost Village for Sony

Pictures Animation. Crossing paths with talented Kelly Asbury and

reading his entertaining and informative back stories of my childhood

hero’s was a reminder of a simpler time when my closest friends truly

were a bunch dummies.

“Say kids, what time is it?” -Bill 3/23