A question for you hardcore, knowledgeable George Barris followers. I've seen photos of really well done, tasteful Barris cars from back in the day but I have to say that I really dislike the movie and TV cars he created like the Dragula and others. My question is did George continue building sweet looking cars while fulfilling Hollywood contracts, or did he go Hollywood and never look back? Understand, I'm not putting the bad rap on Barris, I'm just trying to satisfy my curiosity.
Quick...I am not an expert on Barris...his shop is just a few miles away from me. I think if you look at most customs built during the mid 60s, you'll see they got increasingly wild and dare I say, garish. Barris TV cars were leaders in that over the top style. I'm thinking that the type of customs we like here...the earlier stuff, was pretty much out of favor by then. In my opinion, muscle cars led to the demise of the customs as we knew them...so customs had to get wilder and wilder to make an impact. Barris built some customs during the mid 60s...but they were based on new cars....the Nordskog Asteroid Corvette, the Sonny and Cher Mustangs, a cool chopped Toronado...there are more I'm sure...
As cars got lower and better looking from the mid fifties and into the sixties the demand for custom cars died. By the early sixties there weren't that many full customs being built. All you needed to do was dechrome and do a wild paint job. It was at this time Barris and others got into building cars for movie studios and TV shows. They had money to spend but they wanted something sensational that would show up well on the screen - nothing subtle or understated. They had been renting existing hot rods and customs since the early to mid fifties but now they started commissioning cars for specific movies and TV shows. This really caught on when they found out a cool car would increase ratings. This was especially true of youth oriented shows like the Munsters. When they featured the Munster coach or Dragula ratings went up. Barris was just the guy to take advantage of this. He was not the only one doing it but he made sure his cars were featured in car magazines with his name on them. That is why he is remembered where others aren't. I don't believe he ever stopped building cars for individual customers. But as the demand dwindled he did more and more show biz work to stay in business.
Depends on what you call sweet looking cars. Was he building customs styled like the 40's and 50's in the 60's, 70's and on? No because there was no demand for them. He did still continue to build cars for individuals many of whom where celebrities.
Sam Barris built tasteful, beautiful cars and George got him the publicity. After Sam died in 1967, George focused on publicity at the expense of good taste. That's kinda simplistic but you get the idea.
The last car Sam worked on was the El Capitola 57 chevy, I believe that was 1962. He then retired. There was a "golden era" of custom cars, just like most things. Start out pure and as time goes on things get more and more "out there"
Simple and not accurate. George was the one who apprenticed with Westergard and worked in body and fender shops before starting the business not Sam. George had a hand in the building a design of a lot of the early cars. The most iconic custom of all time (the Hirohata) is based off of George's design sketches. This notion that all George did was run around publicizing the business is nonsense.
I appreciate the responses. I didn't think to consider that times and tastes were changing. Being a kid in the '60s had my neck straining at any car that was different from the norm. I also forgot that 1959 and 1960 cars from Buick and Pontiac (the two doors, at least) were factory built custom cars. I find it amazing how the simplest of modifications could change a '59 Chevy and early '60s cars to "mild" customs. Drop them, rake them, scallop them, sink the antenna, remove the emblems... it didn't take much. Maybe that's what I was thinking when I asked about George.
There was a tremendous change in cars between 1950 and 1960, or between the postwar era and the sixties. In the late 40s it was "I'll buy one of your dowdy apple crates but I will make a real automobile out of it". The average car was nearly 6 feet high with a flathead six cylinder engine of under 100HP. Ever since the depression car companies had emphasized economy, reliability, comfort, and long life. If you wanted a low, sleek, good looking car with a powerful motor you had to build it yourself. There was only one car with a V8 outside the luxury car show rooms and that was the Ford. Then all of a sudden in the fifties they got hip. There was a bigger change in one decade than in any decade since. Anyone with a steady job could walk into a car dealership, sign some papers and drive out in a tailfinned hardtop with 400 cu in V8, auto trans, air, power steering, power brakes, luxuries a sultan could not have dreamed of a generation earlier. So who needed the speed shop or custom body shop? If you really wanted a one of a kind car, Larry Watson and others could do you a custom paint job and have your car back to you in a day. The movie car and TV car business came along as the custom car biz dwindled away. As Ed Roth put it, Barris could charge $5000 for $500 worth of work and get it because his was the only name they knew. But I have to think that he got the work done fast and gave them what they wanted too or he wouldn't have had the repeat business.
What??? And after all these years I always thought Peter Tork built it. Seriously though, there is no comparison between Barris’s Ala Kart or Emperor, or Jeffries Manta Ray, those and many others are timeless designs. The film industry stuff was done to please the whims of the guys that thought they know what people want to see, not for an enthusiast’s critical eye.
I worked at the Barris shop on a movie as technical adviser in the mid-1970s. By that time he was doing nothing but movie cars and all of them were just warmed-over crap, flashy for the cameras and built with parts promoted from various aftermarket suppliers. I remember thinking how sad it was that such a creative man would have been lured away from using his real talent by the lure of easy studio money. I still feel that way.
I haven't seen it mentioned yet about the fact that George was a prolific photographer and that he quickly discovered a previously underutilized niche as a master promoter of customized cars. It eventually became all about the fame and the fortune. Not knocking him. To each his own. I'm not gonna get into any pissing matches with the experts on here that never lived within a thousand miles of Lynwood California, or ever competed against Barris in local (Los Angeles) car shows in the early sixties. That's what I remember, but what do I know, other than having been there ...
I'd have to agree with Missysdad there. But as was said before you did what brought the money in and not many guys were having tasteful customs built in that time frame. In the 30's 40's and 50's guys did as Rusty O'Toole said in post 10. Bought a rather bulky looking car and had it customize to turn it into a slick and sleek car. Those are the customs or Kustoms that the majority of HAMB custom fans relish to this day. Sleek, low and no added fru fru. Many of those were daily driven by the owners and maybe never seen in an organized indoor show. They got photographed where hot rod and custom folk gathered. Late 50's and into the sixties an 70's the show car customs all seemed to have to have the extra stuff stuck on them to garner show points You seldom if ever saw one of the on the street.
While George may have been "trained and did drawings" but it was Sam that did the real beautiful work that came out of the shop. He grew more tired of George's showboating on the cheap and writing, good example is the '27 roadster seen in the shaggy Dog movie. beautiful and simple. George two goofy head rests, wheels, quad headlights. and metal flake paint. A good friend of mine was the Barris painter during Sam's tenure and has a vast amount of stories of Sam's creating and George's glory pursuits. Sadly he is now 84 and suffering from Alzheimer's. I wish I had taken notes while he was still lucid. In '67 Sam had had it and returned to Sacramento as an insurance adjuster.
Deucemac , because of where you live, I believe that I may know who you are quoting. He and I are friends of Junior, but he has known Junior longer. When someone starts talking about George , I call Junior and let him set them straight. George was a promoter, photographer ( his daughter often talks about all the pictures he took everywhere, but he also worked on the cars.
He photographed Marilyn Monroe numerous times. I wonder what the circumstances were that that relationship developed.
I went out in November to see Junior and went up to Tehachapi and spent the day with him and his lovely wife. He still had a lot of great stories to tell and was more than to share all he could. They are truly great people!! You are right though I wish I had gotten to know him earlier.
I have to throw this out there. Some folks may think that Sam was just the worker bee of the two, who got things done. Let's look at his '49 Mercury, and his '50 Buick. I would bet he had a pretty good hand in choosing what mods were done to those two cars. Meanwhile, George did the sketches that became the Hirohata Merc. In that early fifties timeframe, it is hard to say which one was the more creative, two of those cars are absolutely gorgeous. As the decade wore on, things evolved in the custom car world, and not all things were for the better. But back to those early days at Barris Kustoms, I think custom car admirers today think of George as an icon, while custom car builders think of Sam as a hero. For a time, together, they dazzled the custom car world.
I don’t have anything to contribute on the past of both Sam and George. I can tell you that their influence lives on. As a shop teacher I work with many teenagers. Today I demonstrated how to shave a door handle. They asked if I was going to install the remote openers they are familure with. I said no and demonstrated how a solinoid worked and howto hide the activation button. The earliest known example that I could give them was what the Barris duo did with Mercs. Then I explained who they were. Not surprising they are familiar with the TV cars. One even stated the original Batmobile was his dream car. I grew up with their TV cars and the kid in me still loves them. Reguardless of George and his self promotion he and his brother continue to influence today.
Even artists have mortgages and bills to pay. If one source of income dries up you have to find another. If it wasn't for the movie cars Barris might have had to shut his doors and go into some other business. I have to think, if anyone had come along with the dough to commission something really cool he would have been happy to do it. You guys who were there, do you remember any cool cars being done in the midst of the movie crap?
Gotta admit these are cool! But just for the record George did not build the Monkees car. That was Dean Jeffries.
For all the George Barris was just a promoter/photographer guys: https://www.customcarchronicle.com/cc-builders/barris-kustom-shop/george-barris-at-work/
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