GONZO REVIEW : Hunter Thompson Holds Forth

The crowd that packed Bogart’s in Long Beach on Tuesday awaiting the arrival of journalistic hit man Hunter S. Thompson seemed less the typical rock-club hoppers than a convention of cornered bookmakers.

Most weren’t putting money on whether the celebrated godfather of gonzo journalism would win or place in the first of two rare personal appearances at the club, but simply whether he would show.

“When we got our tickets, the woman on the phone said there was a 50-50 chance that he wouldn’t show up,” said Peter Lipscomb, 31, of Hawthorne.

Even the club’s disc jockey abandoned the typical cheerleader attitude as the evening dragged on, the only visage of Thompson being the one portrayed by Bill Murray in the 1980 film “Where the Buffalo Roam,” which was projected on a movie screen over the stage while ‘60s rock hits blared over the sound system.

“The time is really close. . . . Like there’s much we could really do about it,” the deejay told an increasingly impatient audience, one of whom tossed an empty beer bottle at the small, round table occupying center stage.

As the time neared 11 p.m.--3 hours after the doors opened--the likelihood that Thompson was either in a Mexican jail or taking night target practice at an unidentified shooting range seemed closer to 8-to-1 for, odds that Thompson described as a magic number once he did arrive.

“I bet on Seton Hall (South Orange, N.J.’s long-shot team in the NCAA basketball playoffs) because it was 8-to-1,” he said, “and I only lost by one point.”

An ecstatic cheer went up when he finally took the stage, wearing a New York Yankees cap and a loose-fitting, blue, silk shirt with long sleeves rolled up to the elbows and tails hanging out over his khaki slacks. In a matter of moments, he was taking drags off a cigarette in his signature cigarette holder, alternately munching grapes and sipping drinks poured over ice from a bottle of Chivas Regal brought with him.

All in all, Thompson, who turns 50 in July, fully lived up to the everything-goes mystique he invented for himself in such books as “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas,” his many articles on politics and life for Rolling Stone and a nationally syndicated column that appears periodically in the Herald Examiner.

The only themes that emerged during a largely disjointed evening--resulting as much from the dizzying barrage of questions directed at Thompson as from his own intermittent attention-span--centered on elitism and on the failure of the Democratic party to produce a serious contender for the Presidency in the last three elections.

Responding to a question about his position on gun control, the man who boasted that he owns a handgun more powerful that Dirty Harry’s famed .44 magnum, said: “We get into a tricky area there (of) elitism, which is contrary to the notion of democracy that I have long espoused. . . . I’ve tried to avoid this for years, this notion of elitism. But yeah, some things are right for me that are not right for you. And that’s a quandary I’ve gotten into. The right people should have guns and the wrong people shouldn’t. And that harks back to monarchy.”

It was an odd juxtaposition with his longstanding support of Democratic Party candidates from Jimmy Carter to Gary Hart. But not unexpected, given his staunch individualism.

Minutes before, however, he professed, with apparent sincerity, admiration for one Republican politician: “I would vote for (Howard) Baker. I think he’s the most intelligent political operative in politics today,” said Thompson, who now lives in Woody Creek, Colo. (“ Not Aspen,” he insisted.)

When one young male fan asked if there was any question close to his heart that no one ever asked him about, Thompson paused, reflected and replied: “Yes--Does anybody have a joint? That’s a subject close to my heart.”

And when another member of the crowd tossed up something that appeared to fill the bill, Thompson lit up.

On the heels of that, a woman jokingly asked: “Are the rumors true that you are on this tour to raise money so you can enter the Betty Ford Center?” Thompson one-upped the questioner by saying: “Do you know how much money I could get if I did go to Betty Ford? I’d never have to tour again.”

Not that he ever expressed any fondness for making nightclub appearances. Cautioning the audience at the outset about their behavior, he said, “I went through a hideous experiment in New York in verbal noncommunication in 2 hours on stage in front of a crowd that seemed unruly, drunk and mean.” Which may partially explain why he “postponed” several other Southland speaking engagements after they were booked, including one at the Coach House in San Juan Capistrano.

Topics were thrown like decks of cards at the stage, with no indication of which would stick until he answered one at random.

Thompson, who captured the indulgence of the ‘60s generation by writing about personal drug abuse the way Hemingway wrote about bullfights, bounced from subject to subject with a dexterity that would have awed Roger Rabbit. He bounded from George Bush to the Supreme Court’s recent decision about arrests of drug suspects in airports to scuba diving to the Lakers’ chances of repeating their world championship. (Thompson said he didn’t particularly care about the Lakers fortunes, though he chose a more colorful way of phrasing it.)

The tone of questions and comments ranged from respectful (“What do you think of Garry Trudeau’s characterization of you in Doonesbury?”) to worshipful (“Hunter, you look great!”) to fanatical (“Is it true you were in a hyperbolic (sic) chamber in Florida?”)

The evening progressed--degenerated may be the better word--from a moderately sincere question-answer session to one in which celebrity and fans tried to out-berate each other.

“Can you relate to this audience?” one woman yelled.

Thompson said, “It’s getting harder and harder.”

Near the end of Thompson’s 90-minute talk, one collegiate-looking man shouted, “Isn’t it a Commie tactic to turn incoherent rather than answer a question you don’t like?”

Thompson ignored the query, having moments before responded to a plea for him to reveal what his middle initial stands for by saying, “I wonder if you people are as empty-headed as you seem to be.”

Fear and loathing--and plenty of it--in Long Beach.