Chuck Russo's caricature lampoons the legendary comic's distinct features and led to contacts between the two.
By BETH N. GRAY
Published July 30, 2003
[Times photo: Daniel Wallace]
Chuck Russo, who does art under the name El Rosso, made this caricature of Bob Hope in 1974. The next year, he took the statue to Lakeland, where Hope was performing. He says Hope liked it.
MASARYKTOWN - Bob Hope and El Rosso shared a sense of humor. While the legendary entertainer expressed his wit verbally, the local artist has molded his whimsy into character statues.
Hope was one of many celebrities and dignitaries Rosso caricatured, then later struck up a friendship with.
Chuck Russo, artistically known as El Rosso, on Tuesday recounted his personal memories of the much-loved and laughed-at Hope, who died Sunday at the age of 100.
Hope, ever self-effacing, of course chuckled delightedly at Russo's rendition of him.
Hidden behind a tower of boxes and an eclectic variety of new and used goods at Russo's Hardware, 1424 S Broad St., temporarily stands the artist's sculpture of Hope. He's dressed in forest green golf garb, a U.S. flag dominating the shirt front, and black, oversized clownlike shoes - no spikes; a putter the size of a hockey stick is tucked under his arm and, on his deeply pink face, is an 8-inch nose that could make a snow skier sweat.
"You try to exaggerate the dominant feature," Russo explained. "Everybody exaggerated his nose."
Russo, now 82 and in his 35th year of sculpting, created the Hope character in 1974. Returning from a show in 1975, the artist carried the 50-pound, foam-based work from his van into a Lakeland hall where Hope was set to perform.
"They were rehearsing," Russo said. "I carried it down through all the empty seats and set it in front of what was, I guess you'd call it, a bandstand."
On Hope's seeing his own caricature, the entertainer cut the music.
"He said he'd sue me," Russo recalls with a smile, noting the comment was in jest.
Hope posed with Russo and the sculpture for a photo, and so did Hope's co-star, Frances Langford.
The photos are displayed at Russo's Hardware, which opened in 1958 and is now operated by Russo's son. Russo creates his art upstairs, over the store, where he maintains a kind of personal museum of some 50 statues of the rich, famous and political. The Hope character normally resides there.
Even before the artist embarked on his Bob Hope rendition, he had struck up a correspondence with Hope's wife, Dolores.
"I guess I was going to do the statue, and I asked for some photographs," he recalls.
After Bob Hope laughed with Russo over his work, the entertainer sent a case of about a dozen coffee mugs to the artist. Inscribed in gold, they said, "Thanks for the Memories."
He has kept one, giving the others to his children.
Russo later refined the sculpture, adding hair in the nostrils and ears. Meeting Hope in Tampa after that, the model acknowledged the refinement contributed "character," Russo said.
The Hope-Russo correspondence continued. A blue-edged note card clipped to a poster at the hardware store counter reads: "Dear Chuck El Rosso, Thank you for the wonderful expression of your thoughtfulness in sending a photo of your Bob Hope character and you wishing Bob a happy 99th birthday. We appreciate your kindness and send best regards. Dolores and Bob."
Russo said he received a similar missive several weeks ago.
What will become of the Hope sculpture?
"I would sell it for a price, maybe $40,000 or $50,000," Russo said reluctantly, "but it would break up the collection."
He would prefer to keep the collection of the illustrious caricatures - Richard Nixon, Bill Clinton, Whoopi Goldberg, Michael Jackson, Dolly Parton and more - intact for what he envisions as a Laugh Museum.
He has shopped the idea around St. Petersburg, Tampa, Atlanta, Los Angeles and Washington, D.C.
"No bites," he lamented.
Busch Gardens, the now-closed Cypress Gardens and Weeki Wachee Springs have rented some of his works for special events.
Russo is no amateur. He studied for two years at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh, and two more at Carnegie Tech, also in Pittsburgh. His works show talent, technique and, well, humor.
Not all of Russo's caricature models have appreciated his artfully crafted dodges, the artist admitted. But Hope, he said, did.
