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I first heard of Reggie Montgomery back in 1977. Just out of college, I was working at the Inner City Cultural Center in Los Angeles, directing a play of mine called Backalley Tales. The main character in this New Orleans-based fable is a down-on-his-luck vaudevillian named Willie Bones. Everyone told me I just had to meet this actor, Reggie Montgomery. "Reggie's amazing. He sings, he dances, he acts, he directs. He was the first black clown for Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. Reggie can do anything." I was jealous and intimidated and we hadn't even met.
Two minutes into our first conversation I believed that everything everyone had said about Reggie was true. Still, they'd failed to mention the one quality that I would come to love most about Reggie-his madness. Reggie Montgomery was mad with talent and intensity and vulnerability...