Bozo’s No Clown as a Businessman

Larry Harmon gave Bozo The Clown really, really big feet because he wanted to make a really, really big impression.

“I felt if I could plant my size 83AAA shoes on this planet, (people) would never be able to forget those footprints,” Harmon said.

Harmon was right; everyone knows Bozo. But it’s not just because of the shoes, or the orange-red hair or bulbous nose. The whole package, one that Harmon has adroitly marketed for decades, has made that big impression since Bozo was born 50 years ago.

Bozo is entertainment, having made tens of millions of children smile and laugh over the years. Bozo is also big business, the most successful product of the multimillion-dollar Larry Harmon Pictures Corp. The clown’s likeness, created by Harmon, has been imprinted on thousands of products.

Harmon wasn’t the original Bozo, however. Pinto Colvig, the voice for Walt Disney’s Goofy, created the character when Capitol Records introduced a series of children’s records in 1946.

Harmon met his alter ego after answering a casting call for a clown to make personal appearances to promote the records. He got that job, took over as the singing-reading record voice in the late 1940s and then bought the rights to Bozo.

The rest is international history. Harmon, now 71, made thousands of appearances as Bozo, on TV and in person. He turned Bozo into a character for 156 cartoons that he sold to all 183 TV stations on the air in the United States at that time.

The animation studio he created as a rival to Disney employed 400 people who made cartoons starring not only Bozo but Mr. Magoo, Popeye, Dick Tracy, Laurel and Hardy and others.

Harmon also turned Bozo into a franchise, training 203 Bozos over the years to represent him in local markets.

“You might say, in a way, I was cloning BTC [Bozo The Clown] before anybody else out there got around to cloning DNA,” Harmon said recently at his Hollywood office.

“Bozo is a combination of the wonderful wisdom of the adult and the childlike ways in all of us,” said Harmon, who was born in Toledo and raised in Cleveland but built his empire in Hollywood.

*

Recognized in a Harris Poll as the world’s most famous clown, Bozo has no competition, Harmon insisted. “Bozo is a star, an entertainer, bigger than life. People see him as Mr. Bozo, somebody you can relate to, touch and laugh with.

“I had to find a way to perpetuate Bozo. Bozo would never be old, Bozo would be forever,” Harmon said.

To assure that, Harmon started promoting. An incessant talker whose favorite words are “I” and “Bozo,” Harmon has delivered enough pitches to guarantee long life for Bozo and big bucks for himself.

So if Bozo on television or in person isn’t enough, you can eat, sleep and talk with him. There is Bozo brand peanut butter, jelly, juice drinks, cotton candy, ice cream and bubble gum. Cookies, bread and other products are on the way. There are toys and watches and bedsheets and telephones and a brand-new line of dolls.

There have been more than 3,000 products in the last half century--a huge marketing success story.

“It takes a lot of effort and energy to keep a character that old fresh so kids today still know about him and want to buy the products,” said Karen Raugust, executive editor of the Licensing Letter, a New York-based trade publication.

A normal character runs its course in three to five years, Raugust said. “Harmon’s is a classic character. It’s been around 50 years.

“The character markets the products, but the products in the store market the character,” Raugust said. “It works both ways.”

The clown’s striking appearance helps. Besides big feet, Harmon gave Bozo flaming, upswept hair to “match the vivid, exciting color of the sun. I wanted to make sure Bozo was a reflection of flight with the excitement of spreading his wings and taking off.”

As for the red, white and blue costume, “it stands out like an American flag and says ‘Here I am, folks.’ ” The big red nose and cheek-spanning smile are hard to miss too.

*

Harmon and Bozo have met with majesty and performed for presidents. They’ve made training films with astronauts, firefighters and Navy divers. They’ve raised money for charity and ridden in more than 10,000 parades.

And during the last 35 years, Harmon has been responsible for producing more than 50,000 hours of Bozo TV shows. His contract with Chicago superstation WGN-TV takes the show to the year 2001, adding to its status in the Guinness Book of Records as the longest-running children’s television show in history.

Bozo and Harmon have become one over the years. You listen to one, you listen to the other, with Bozo’s trademark laugh and lectures intertwined with Harmon’s memories about milestones.

“Bozo is Larry, Larry is Bozo,” Harmon said. “Bozo gets up in the morning with me, takes his briefcase, goes to work and makes plans for more laughter.”

Bozo’s name even appears on the license plate of Harmon’s white Rolls-Royce, with red interior. “BOZ-N-SUE,” it reads, referring to Harmon and his wife of nine years, Susan, or “Bozette.” She is also executive vice president and secretary of Harmon Pictures.

Harmon protects Bozo’s reputation with a vengeance, while embracing those who poke good-natured fun at the clown--if it puts Bozo’s name in the right public spotlight.

All of Bozo’s shows--from his first cartoon, “Bozo Meets the Creepy Gleep” to his latest live-action show--come with a message.

Harmon said he believes in one particular piece of advice more than any other. It came in a live action show, when Bozo said: “Remember what your old pal Bozo always says, it’s nice to be important, but it’s more important to be nice.”

Harmon, who hadn’t dressed up as Bozo for 10 years, donned the costume on New Year’s Day to appear in the annual Tournament of Roses parade.

The crowd loved him.

“It was deafening. They kept yelling, ‘Bozo, Bozo, love you, love you.’ I shed more crocodile tears for five miles in four hours than I realized I had. . . .I still get goose bumps. I passed one grandstand and saw a group of naval officers and they saluted. The Marine Corps band saluted. Police officers saluted. I saluted back.”

Bozo’s golden anniversary promises to be one long salute.

Harmon is talking about Bozo’s first major motion picture, an autobiography called “The Man Behind the Nose,” auditions and lessons for new Bozo clones, a reunion for old Bozos (including NBC’s Willard Scott), new products, his own site on the Internet, a series of compact discs, a whole new series of animated cartoons, more television shows and more of the seemingly endless parades and personal appearances.

Retirement is an abhorrent thought for Harmon: “Never. Never, never, never, never. You ain’t seen nothing yet. I don’t know what I would do without my wonderful world of Bozo.”