In 1970, Patric M. Verrone, age 11, started amassing the 2.75-inch plastic replicas of US presidents made by toy company Louis Marx. Sadly, the series petered out well before Watergate. There would be no miniature Gerald Fords, no tiny Jimmy Carters, no Lilliputian Bill Clintons. The geeky completist in Verrone refused to let the line of micropoliticians die — why, it would be like ending X-Men at issue 93!
Verrone, now 50, went on to be a writer on Futurama and The Simpsons, and he serves as president of the Writers Guild of America, West. But in his spare time, he brought the progression of plastic POTUSes up-to-date, in his kitchen. And when he finished the presidents, he started on the losing candidates, too. He's also working his way through the US Supreme Court justices, past and present. He begins by making rubber latex molds of whichever original figurine best matches the body type he needs: His Obama is based on Louis Marx's JFK; his McCain is a modded Nixon. "That wasn't meant to be a political statement," he insists. Verrone shapes fine facial features with "everything from fingernails to toothpicks to dental tools and X-Acto knives."
You can admire his handiwork at Verrone.com — and nab a Sonia Sotomayor figurine for $25. She may have the torso of Mamie Eisenhower, but from the neck up she's pure Sotomayor. Verrone says it's easier to make a toy version of a judge who passed away before photography was invented: "People aren't going to complain, 'That doesn't look like Chief Justice Oliver Ellsworth.'"
Here's an extended version of the interview between Patric M. Verrone and the writer of this piece, Olivier Knox. Knox, a Washington, D.C., correspondent for Agence France-Presse who also happens to be well-versed in Star Wars action figures, was able to keep up with Verrone as he detailed his intertwined obsessions with politicians and classic toys.
Samples of Verrone's Work
US Presidents
Jimmy Carter
Ronald Reagan
George Bush
Bill Clinton
George W. Bush
Barack Obama
US Supreme Court Justices
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Clarence Thomas
David Souter
Olivier Knox: Can you tell me the background of these Louis Marx figurines?
Patric M. Verrone: For about 30 years, the Marx toy company produced little 3-inch figurines, first of generals, then of presidents, and then other related historical figures. This was throughout the course of the '50s, '60s, and early '70s. Louis Marx himself was a friend of Dwight Eisenwhower and was allegedly "the Man Who Saved Christmas." According to legend, in World War II, the Congress wanted to cut back on domestic spending so they were going to ban Christmas, and Louis Marx went to Capitol Hill and pushed to save Christmas, so to speak. Anyway, he put out these figurines for about 30 years. And the president figurines are the ones that were the most popular when I was a kid. They sold them in supermarkets, and at gas stations, and the idea that you could collect the presidents was kind of a big deal to me.
My original set I got as a kid in 1970 was from a coupon in Parade magazine. When the Marx toy company was sold to Quaker Oats in the early '70s they stopped making the presidents, and so the last one that anybody had was Nixon. Once eBay came along in the late '90s, I was able to find all these other off-beat figures, prototypes, and alternative poses of Kennedy and Nixon — unreleased figures that are excruciatingly rare. I think I probably have the largest private collection of these figures outside of the Marx Museum in West Virginia.
I had a set of these in the office during the original incarnation of Futurama, and when the show was initially cancelled, I decided I would take it upon myself to make the presidents after Nixon. As prototypes, I used candidates that the Louis Marx company had already made. For example, I turned Hubert Humphrey into Gerald Ford and Bobby Kennedy into Jimmy Carter. They had made a Reagan in 1968 as a presidential candidate, when he was still governor of California. All I had to do was give him more of a pompadour and age him a bit. And then I turned Nelson Rockefeller into Clinton. The first Bush was based on a George Romney, and the second, George W. Bush, was an alternative Eisenhower.
After making my own set, I made a second set and put it up on eBay. It sold for $700. So I said "OK, there's obviously a demand for these, at least from two people who were bidding on that one set." Since that time, I've sold about 500 sets of the presidents.
Then I got it in my own craw that I would make the chief justices of the Supreme Court. And so I went back and turned a James Madison into a John Jay, all the way up to turning a Harry Truman into William Rehnquist. Then I started making the sitting associate justices of the court, O'Connor and Ginsburg and all the rest. Sandra O'Connor was also made out of a Mamie Eisenhower. This will make you laugh: Ruth Ginsburg was made out of a Jackie Kennedy.
Every so often I'll make an older justice, you know, an Oliver Wendell Holmes or Cardozo or Brandeis. And then when Roberts and Alito were appointed I made them. So now Sotomayor comes along and it's the natural process for me.
Knox: As someone who covered the confirmation hearings, I'm curious: At what point did you start designing that Sotomayor figurine?
Verrone: As soon as Souter announced his retirement, I said 'I have to make another one.' In this case, I couldn't start until I knew if it was going to be a man or a woman. Once she was announced, I set aside a Mamie Eisenhower, and then watching the confirmation hearings, it looked like she was going to get the votes, I went ahead and made it.
Knox: Can you walk me through that process? How long does it typically take to make a figurine? What sort of equipment are we talking about?
It's the old joke about Picasso: How do you sculpt an elephant? You carve away the stuff that doesn't look like an elephant. So I take one of the original Marx figurines, and I use a modeling clay to change the original to look like the new subject, and then add a robe, and then I use a rubber stamp to put the name on the base. Then I cast it and strike copies. And that's pretty much it. And as far as tools are concerned, it's everything from fingernails to toothpicks to little dental tools and X-Acto knives. The actual molds are old rolls of toilet paper, and a lot of home appliances are used. I do it all in my kitchen.
I can sit down and actually have a prototype in about two to three hours, then the actual casting and striking and painting, that's probably two to three days. Once you have the system in place, I can do another one in another hour. You cast it, and then you trim it, and then you paint it. So making number one is a multiday process, making number two takes an hour.
Knox: When did you make Obama?
April 2007. I made it sort of figuring he wouldn't get the nomination, but I thought it would be a novelty item, a serious African-American candidate might be something I can sell. By that point, I actually had a little more facility playing with the bodies, so for Obama I was able to take a John F. Kennedy body, give him a different arm, and change the pose ever so slightly. I made a prototype Hillary Clinton that I've never sold, and there were maybe a half dozen Sarah Palins that I made, and I just haven't had the energy to go back and make any more.
Knox: How closely do you follow politics?
Verrone: Oh, pretty closely. I wouldn't call myself a political junkie, per se, but I read the papers, I read the blogs. I have been the president of the Writers' Guild for the past four years, and during the presidential election we were in communication with both Clinton and Obama camps. We've had ongoing meetings with Governor Schwarzenegger.
Having been a lawyer, I am probably more of a Supreme Court junkie than most people. I was a writer for The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson in the late 1980s when Robert Bork was appointed, so I was extremely aware of that process, and how it changed the way this sort of thing is done. (It used to be that Taft would appoint somebody, and the Senate would approve it that afternoon.)
Right now I guess I've done 60 historic justices, and there's about 50 to go. I spent much of this weekend working on the remainder of the "Nine Old Men" that Franklin Roosevelt tried to pack the court with in the '30s to dilute the power of the Hoover and Coolidge and Harding appointees. So for people who were dying for a Willis Van Devanter and a George Sutherland and a Pierce Butler, they're coming! (Laughs.)
There's a problem that you get with justices that you don't get with presidents who serve for only four or eight years. They age. Clarence Thomas looked different when he was appointed in 1992 versus now. I now paint him with grayer hair than I used to. And Scalia has this beard that comes and goes, though I've typically kept him clean-shaven.
Knox: So is it like the Battle-Damaged X-Wing Fighter?
Verrone: I'm laughing, because I don't know that that is.
Knox: Oh. OK, so Kenner found a way to sell you the same Star Wars toy twice, which was they would sell you the Luke Skywalker X-Wing Fighter, and they would make this one they called the Battle-Damaged one, and the difference was that the stickers for the Battle-Damaged one had burn marks.
Verrone: No, no, the only alternatives that I've done are William Rehnquist as associate justice, and then William Rehnquist as chief justice, who has more white in his hair and has those gold stripes on he shoulders of his robe that he had when he was chief. But as I say, as time goes by, I will try to "gray up" the justices.
I've actually had lawyers who argued before the court, who ordered a set of figures because they wanted the justices that they argued before. So I painted Thurgood Marshall the way he looked at that time, later in his life.
Knox: Have you ever had feedback from someone you sculpted?
Verrone: No. Someone bought a Justice Alito from me and said, "I'm meeting him next week and I'm going to give it to him." Then I got an email back from the guy saying that Alito's wife was going to send me a thank-you note. But I haven't gotten that.
Earl Warren's grandchildren have figures of him. One of Mitt Romney's sons ordered five or six copies of his grandfather George Romney.
I know Kristin Gore, who worked on Futurama. She, of course, is Al Gore's daughter. I made one of him when I went back and did a handful of failed candidates from the past 60 years, going back to Thomas Dewey. I've met Al Gore several times, but I never gave him one.
Knox: What do your kids think of Dad's figurines?
Verrone: Well, they're now at the age where they want to help, which is nice. My oldest, who was about 10 when we started doing this, wanted to sculpt as well, and he turned William Henry Harrison into Dracula. (Laughs.) And of course he wanted to list it on eBay, and I had to say, "No, you'll want to keep this one."
