BEACH BLANKET BASKETBALL : Every Day, Players Gather from All Over the City to Show Off Their Moves on the Venice Courts of Cool

IT’S A POSTCARD DAY AT VENICE BEACH. BLUE SKY, ocean breeze, ranting lunatics. A crew shooting a marketing video for lava-lava skirts from Tonga makes its way to the basketball courts next to Muscle Beach. A woman waving the brightly colored fabric as if it were a flag interrupts a half-court game and asks the guys if they’d like to model the product for the camera. Play stops as they wrap the tropical wear around their bodies and over their pants, their Air Jordans sticking out at the bottom. If Gauguin had painted basketball players, they might look like this. Six big black guys wearing flowered skirts, slamming the hell out of the ball.

Advertisers know that basketball in Venice is one of the hippest shows in town. The game at Ocean Front Walk next to the weight pit and the paddle ball courts has been a part of the local scene since the 1950s. The playground was remodeled and expanded to three full courts by the L.A. Department of Recreation and Parks in 1989, and hundreds of people of every size and shape come by to play or watch each week. Today, a roller-skater tends the world’s biggest boombox blasting the latest rap hits. Hardly anyone notices. It’s just the soundtrack for another day at the courts.

“Hey, Rasta, what are you doin’ with those dreadlocks?” a regular calls out to one of the locals. “Everybody knows you’re from St. Louis.” You could be from anywhere and still fit in here. At Venice Beach a giraffe could get in a game if it could dunk the ball. If Venice is the capital of laissez faire, then the basketball courts are its senate. There are other outdoor basketball games in the city where the quality of play may be better, but nowhere are the participants as colorful or diverse. True, neighborhood violence and racial tensions occasionally seep into the games, but this is one of the few spots where people whose paths would otherwise never cross can get together to enjoy each other and the beauty of the city. Great cities have great public spaces where people can meet; Los Angeles has the basketball courts in Venice.

This is not just a neighborhood game. Like any cultural site, the Venice games draw visitors from all over. Players drive from the San Fernando Valley and South Bay to get into a game, and many come from farther than that. Old-timers tend to play on weekend mornings, and the younger hotshots come out in the afternoon, but Saturdays and Sundays are so crowded that many regulars skip them altogether. Mark Shields came to Venice Beach, like many of the players, by way of a big Eastern city, looking for an urban experience among the palm trees. “We were just out there shooting in the dark one night and found out that we were all pretty close together--Chicago, Detroit, Kansas City. Guys from New York come out here and they can’t believe it. It’s like a dream.”

“Look out there at that beach, that’s reality,” rhapsodizes one regular. “You got the palm trees and the beach--it’s beautiful, man. And the girls. There’s some beautiful girls around here.”

It is not only the natural beauty that draws crowds to the Venice courts but also the reputation of the place. Chris Beard, a waiter and aspiring writer who recently arrived from New York, says he heard about the games while playing on West 4th Street in Manhattan, probably the best-known street game in the country. “The Venice Beach game is legend in New York,” Beard says. “Everyone said when you come out here, you’ve got to go to Venice.”

What Beard found was a lot different than what he was accustomed to in New York. In Venice, players are sometimes more interested in looking good than in winning: They all want to be stars, even if they don’t know the fundamentals. “And it’s a more closed community in New York. Here it’s more democratic. I never played anywhere where so many people don’t speak English,” says Beard, who once spent 15 minutes trying to explain the local rules to a big Greek kid. The game at Venice has a definite international flavor, and visiting talent from Spain, Yugoslavia or Sweden is a regular part of the scene. One veteran recalls the day a Hasidic Jew showed up at the court, took off his yarmulke and prayer shawl and aired out his game.

The spectators, who crowd around the stands near the full-court game, are an important part of the scene, too. The other two courts are divided into four half-court games, three players on each team, which go pretty much unnoticed. One local arrives early, opens a beach chair, lights a cigar and settles down with the sports page for a day at the courts. Tourists come and pick up the jargon and then take it home with them. “I wouldn’t be selling you no woof ticket,” a player says, assuring me that he’s not full of hot air. A spirited game is known as a good run, and if someone hits a few tough shots off the backboard, “The bank is open, the bank is open.”

For tourists, the game is one more roadside attraction. Many of the visitors who sit in the bleachers with their video cameras and chili dogs first saw Venice on European television and have come to check it out. This is what America is all about to them: an oddball collection of intensely competitive individuals and a carnival atmosphere by the beach. “It’s so weird--these people are taking pictures of me like I’m something great,” Beard says. “I feel like someone’s going to put me on the cover of Boy’s Life.”

There is something purifying about being outdoors by the beach that one doesn’t get in a gym or a playground, and that helps create the scene. But it is the cast of characters that makes it a one-of-a-kind place. “You just see ‘em playing basketball,” says one regular, “but there’s a story behind every one.”

JERRY WEISS IS A HERO TO MANY OF THE GUYS, BECAUSE OF HIS AGE and his spirit. At 68, he is the oldest player. “Jerry’s the story. He’s an inspiration. He did physical labor all his life and has these powerful forearms. I get upset when people get on his case for slowing the game down,” says his friend and frequent teammate Barry Cowan, himself a 16-year veteran of the courts.

Weiss always wanted to be an athlete, but growing up in Upstate New York during the Depression, he had no time or money for such frivolity. By the time he was 19, he was in the Army and had forgotten about sports. He moved to Los Angeles in the early ‘50s, and after banging his head against the wall as a truck driver for a few years, he managed to scrape together $500 to start his own business.

In those days, when he came to Venice, it wasn’t to play basketball but to take his family to the beach and get a 25-cent hamburger at Frank’s hamburger stand. He remembers Venice as a neighborhood full of elderly Jews, synagogues and kosher butchers.

Eventually, Weiss learned the real estate business and became successful buying and renovating houses. In the ‘60s, there was little time to come to Venice or to think about playing ball. But by 1969, he was smoking up to four packs a day and realized that he either had to do something to change his life “or lay down and die.” He started throwing a ball around on the Venice courts but after three or four shots would be out of energy. He began watching his diet and put up a basket at home; gradually his wind and shot came back. At 47, he became a regular on the half-court and now comes out three times a week--”four if I’m a glutton.”

“I was too intense; basketball lightened me up. It made me feel different about life. When I walk on the court, I feel good. As long as I’m out here, I’m doing well.”

Then there are what Cowan calls the “NVMs”--no visible means of support. Some of the court residents seem to have little else to do in life but shoot hoops. At noon on a weekday, there’s always a core group of regulars present, though the faces may change over the years. “Same wine, different bottle,” cracks one old-timer. The big mystery is how they support themselves.

Willie Banks is one of the NVMs. A compact and powerful man in his early 30s, he is known more for his lung power than the excellence of his game. Banks and his running partner, Ed Reed, are named by almost anyone you ask as the two players who are here all the time. Banks is a seasonal construction worker, a precarious profession at best these days. He played football at Manual Arts High School and didn’t take up basketball until he was in the Army. His game relies more on intimidation than finesse. He can be heard regularly on the full court blowing off steam when he’s not taking care of his 2-year-old daughter on the sidelines.

“If they closed this down, I don’t know what I’d do,” Banks says. “It’s the only place I can get a game seven days a week except when it’s raining, and sometimes even in the rain. I know coming down here keeps me out of trouble. Instead of doing drugs, I come down here.”

Smitty, a nonstop talker who is about 40, rides a bus from his home downtown just to come to the beach and play some ball. His left foot is twisted at an angle because of an old injury, but he still plays a respectable half-court game, hobbling on his one good leg, dragging the bad foot behind him. “I ain’t gettin’ paid. I just come out for the fun of it.” He does, however, ask me if I can put in a good word for him and help him get a job at The Times. When I assure him that I wouldn’t be of much help, he pulls out a pocket Bible and tries to convert one of the other guys, one who has obviously heard the rap before and walks away. “Don’t you believe in God?” Smitty wants to know.

Mark Shields, whose physique has earned him the nickname “Heavy D.,” after the rap singer, tries to keep his professional and personal lives separate, but a few years ago, when he was working as a mental health counselor, he would see a lot of his clients hanging out at the courts. These days, Shields works for AIDS Project L.A., and everyone knows what he does now that he’s started giving out condoms at the courts. “They like that because condoms are expensive. They come to me like a drug dealer for their supply,” he says.

Most of Shields’ social life in his adopted home centers on the courts. The Sidewalk Cafe on Ocean Front Walk is the official hangout for Shields and his friends. “It took a while, but we took over that place. It’s not a bar without us,” says Joe Metcalf, another regular. Early one evening, Shields polishes off a second serving of fish and chips while he waits for his crew to assemble for an outing to the Greek Theatre to see Hall and Oates. “Whatta you wearin’?” one of the guys stops by and wants to know.

Along with the NVMs, the courts are populated by actors, writers, producers, lawyers, waiters and students. Former college ballplayers are not uncommon and, once in a while in the off-season, a pro will turn up to hone his game. Several years ago, when Michael Cage was still with the Clippers, he came to work on his outside shot. Apparently surprised by the rough-and-tumble schoolyard style, he joked that he should have brought Benoit Benjamin with him. Other professionals who have turned up include the Clippers’ Bo Kimble and Gary Grant and boxer Sugar Ray Leonard. Magic Johnson didn’t play but visited the courts to film a commercial several years ago.

Even Hollywood has visited the courts. An upcoming film from 20th Century Fox, “White Men Can’t Jump,” chronicles the friendships of the game. Several scenes take place at the Venice Beach courts, although the actual basketball footage was shot several blocks north on a set built on Ocean Front Walk. Director Ron Shelton (“Bull Durham,” “Blaze”) scouted the courts and selected four regulars to play bit parts as ballplayers. To rehearse and get into shape, the entire cast was put through a rigorous four-week training camp. As a result of Metcalf’s experience on the movie, he has been bitten by the acting bug. Lately, he’s been auditioning for commercials and trying to find an agent.

Ron Beals is one of those street-smart men made wiser by years on the courts. A starting guard for Loyola University of Chicago from 1957 through 1960, he is the elder statesman and arbiter of the courts. Lean and wiry at 59, he still knows a thing or two about giving a subtle elbow to an opponent when he’s driving to the hoop. Beals loves his basketball, but doesn’t think the city is doing all it could here. He would like to see a summer league so kids could learn some basic skills, as well as greater supervision of the waiting lists for the next game to cut down on arguments. “It’s a rainbow down here. Not only the people, but how they play.”

PLAYGROUND BASKETball is a far cry from the game you see on television. As one regular described it, the full-court game in Venice is to basketball what street fighting is to boxing. It is not a team sport but a one-man game played by five people. Teams are picked only because that’s how the rules say the game is played. No one likes to give up the ball because the man with the ball is the only one the girls watch. The result is a game dominated by offense; players are more concerned with making a flashy dunk than blocking a shot. Many of the performers have never played in front of a crowd, and game time is an opportunity to hog the spotlight. “It’s a wasteland out here now,” Beals says. “A lot of these kids never played organized ball. They have great athletic ability but not the basics.”

Players tend to park in the key as long as they like and commit flagrant fouls--no one fouls out. Players are quick to call fouls on others but not on themselves. Many are more experienced at football or weightlifting and are not afraid to stick out a hand to stop a drive. This leads to arguments and hostility, and some players respond by moving to the half-court games. “The full court’s a lot of hotshots and showoffs,” says one longtime half-court participant.

Through the mid-’70s, the game was mostly white with a few blacks but no Asians or Latinos. “The races didn’t know each other back then. We wouldn’t be sitting here and talking like this in the ‘60s. Race was still an item,” says Al Johnson, who has been playing here since the mid-’60s. Judging from the book Johnson is reading--”The Invisible Man” by Ralph Ellison--all racial considerations have not totally disappeared.

Even today, few Latinos are integrated into the regular games. But after dark, with the regulars gone, they pour onto the courts from the T-shirt and souvenir shops where they work, some wearing shoes with heels, playing six on a side.

The Venice courts are not a place for anyone unaccustomed to aggressive play. Fighting is a part of the game, but it’s hard to measure how much of the violence here is racially motivated. Most players admit that there is an undercurrent that sometimes surfaces. Everyone on the courts seems to agree that black players regard basketball as a black game, which by extension makes the courts their turf, a place where they are supposed to excel. “It’s like jazz--it’s a black thing. You just understand that going in,” says Cowan, who is white. The fact that white players often have more formal training and are able to play a more sophisticated game only aggravates the problem and sharpens the edge. All newcomers are severely tested before they are accepted as regulars, white players perhaps more than others. Chris Beard recalls coming down with a white friend from New York University who got pounded his first time out and never came back. Losing to a team of newcomers is a mark of dishonor, especially if they’re white, so regulars will bully them if they think they can get away with it. “Hey, white boy, you can’t jump. You can’t block my shot.”

Most regulars say that violence on the courts has subsided since the early ‘80s, when increased tourist traffic brought increased tensions, drug use and gang activity. Tommy Harris, an emigre from Louisiana, recalls a time when he saw another player threaten a black man with a gun and insult him using a racial epithet. Harris stopped coming to Venice for more than a year after that. Occasional gunplay and knifings near the courts were not uncommon. One day, the even-tempered Cowan found himself in a fight over the score, and before he knew it, a guy had a hand on his throat. “The fight really set me back, but I decided I shouldn’t let some jerk take away one of the most fun things in my life.”

With increased police presence during the past six years since the opening of a substation a few blocks away, the number of fights seems to have declined, but Beals thinks the recreation department should take a more active disciplinary role. “I’d like to have a dollar for every fight I’ve broken up,” he says. Bobby Hockless, director of the Venice Beach Recreation Center, estimates that there are about four or five face-offs a month. He recently drafted a letter warning troublemakers that they will be barred from the courts. Most of the fights, he says, are the result of showing off for the girls in the stands.

The courts are a playground where everyday urban tensions can work themselves out. If an argument breaks out, it may turn into a fight faster between a white guy and a black guy, but the players insist that most of the fighting is not about color. “What it comes down to is if a guy is cool or not,” Hockless says. “If a white guy’s down to earth, then there’s no problem. It’s more a question of stamina and ability.”

The courts in Venice have a reputation for being more democratic than others in the city. “The courts have become stratified in the same way society has,” Barry Cowan says. “But it’s still a pretty good ideal for the rest of society.”

Harris, a radiologist’s assistant whose business card identifies him as an “instrument of peace,” recalls that black faces didn’t get a warm welcome when he started playing ball in Westwood. “I got a vibe in Westwood that was like tellin’ me to get the hell out of here. Out here it’s never like that.”

“You get used to playin’ in a place and come back the next day and the hoops are down,” Shields says. “You know that the neighborhood coalition moved to get you guys out of there. It’s all over the city. There’s a lot of places we’re not welcome.”

Venice isn’t one of them. With its amazing pluralism, there really is no place like it, except maybe New York. You can be a yuppie or a hippie and find someone to hang with. People are not judged by who they are or what they do, but by how they play. On a good day there is something so magical about the Venice courts that all the fighting and racial tensions are carried away by the ocean breeze.

“It’s a fantasy to play here on the beach,” says one poetic veteran. “You have to pinch yourself. The sky is so big and blue you can fall into it. And the sea gulls fly by in droves. That’s what makes it special. You see all that and you say, ‘Oh, man, let’s play.’ ”