Today we’d like to introduce you to Arthur Romeo.
Arthur, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
I am from Hollywood CA, I’m a product of foster care and it was a pretty rough ride, and adding blackness to that provides a whole other layer of trauma. Growing up in the racist homophobic Reagan-led crack epidemic era, at some point tragedy was going to reach most black families. That’s what happened to mine.
At five years old, my sister Twighla and I were ripped away from my mother’s loving hands through the Child “protective” services and courts. These Systems dispassionately destroyed our lives henceforth with arbitrary apathetic aplomb. What followed was living in over twenty homes throughout my childhood and being separated from my sister on several occasions. Ironically having contact with that many parental figures, there wasn’t much parenting to be had, and I was left to make of the world what I could in my meager naive adolescent existence. Many kids don’t make it out of situations like this without turning to crime, suicide, or jail, I believe this to be common knowledge and have seen it with my own eyes.
What made my situation different from a young age was that my mother taught me to read early. It made all the difference in the world. Reading early, besides making you smarter, imbues you with empathy. So I would structure most of my viewpoints on life with the books and other media I was consuming at the time. I got to see healthy family situations in the Judy Blume Fudge books. I deeply identified with Oliver Twist, and Maniac Magee horrifically. My imagination lifted off and soared with Calvin and Hobbes, thank you Mr. Watterson. I got to feel like a superhero when I read the first Static books from Milestone Comics, thank you Mr. McDuffie. I got a fractured yet perfunctory sense of family and identity from the Cosbys, Winslows, and Tanners. The other thing I had on my side was an overwhelming addiction to art.
Art saved my life. Through all the terrible angry thoughts born out of the chaos of the situation. Run in with cops, being bullied and jumped at school, the absence of actual parenting and guidance, the misery and constant frustration. All of that somehow was quelled with drawing and creating in my sketchbook. My sketchbook was my gateway to all of the other things I would eventually learn and accomplish. The spirit of enduring ingenuity with the cheapest tools, paper and pencil, because goodness knows I didn’t have the benefit of funds or actual familial support. Thank goodness for school, and my great teachers.
Since school was everything to me I was able to get help through an independent living program for emancipated youth. I would have some help with college. I needed to leave California and eventually made it To Prairie View A&M, and started my journey through adulthood, not fully armed, but not many of us are, are we?
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
Child Protective services, held at gunpoint by cops before I was 12, being bullied, childhood destroyed by foster care, getting hit by a car when I was eight, every year growing up black in America, it felt like it would never end. Quite frankly I look back and I have no idea how I survived it. This is one the more horrifically absurd things that happened to me, brought to you in technicolor by the LAPD! It was 92′ in South Central L.A. and things were not better. Different house, with a tempting yard I wasn’t allowed to play in unless company was over. I wasn’t allowed to do a lot of stuff. Tried to stay out of trouble, but trouble kept finding me with these monsters. At least there was a dog, Roald Dahl from the school library, and drawing Calvin and Hobbes strips. My big challenge of the week was to draw the giant sunday spread. Joy!
I.Q.S. (clueless about the acronym) was a stalwart German Shepard, who lived in the backyard and would often dig an opening on the front fence. Every now and then he would get out and I was often tasked in getting him back. One night he got out again, and there I went into the dark, but the dog was with someone. It was a cop in the dark yard who, as I unwittingly ran up, maced me and the dog.
I couldn’t see, I was screaming and crying in agony. A murder of cops were approaching the house again no warrant, with me in tow. The monster let the other monsters in, and I was led to the bathroom to flush my eyes out. The cops ransacked the house.
My foster mother’s abusive son who terrorized me for years, was on the couch in hand cuffs, with single a tear streaming down his face, I couldn’t help adding to the water works, given the sight, and he said without an ounce of sympathy said “Don’t cry”.
We all had to sit in the living room as they searched the house. At the end after they destroyed the house finding nothing, finally it was about 12 cops who rallied in the living room. The leader asked for the tv remote. Once he got the clicker, all the cops gathered standing there around the TV watching…something enjoyable, I guess? They were laughing, I couldn’t see what they were watching. This was utterly surreal. The leader turned off the tv and they left me with another mess to clean up, they’ve raided us before, at another address no less. I was bitter with the knowledge that police don’t help people like me, a kid who clearly needed help. When I cried from searing pain of the mace, no one in that house rushed to check on me, no one hugged me, no one told me it was going to be alright. I was currently on the path to become a psycho. That night was truly one of my oddest of my trauma-laced memories.
Alright – so let’s talk business. What else should we know about you and your career so far?
My business is creation and performance. After I got my degree in theater from Prairie View A&M University, I stormed back to Los Angeles with all my dreams in tow. The typical story of hard knocks ensued as I was making my way on film sets and odd jobs. Eventually a group of friends and I started a production company, which led to my first feature film I wrote and directed called “Cruel Will” which after six years of stops and starts came out in 2013. I’ve been a professional Voice over artist for the past six years, I also teach and coach young actors and illustrators. I also consult. I’m a published illustrator and I’ve been performing at parties in Southern California for the last 15 years as an entertainer, puppeteer, pumpkin carver/sculptor, and caricature artist. There were cool milestones the last couple of years, I got to work on one of Stan Lee’s last animated projects, sharing a scene with him. Through an online art app called Creator Connect that I use for work Kanye and Kim Kardashian West now owns one of my paintings, and recently my daughter and I won awards at the Cobb film festival for our roles in the award winning short “Passage” Directed by Arron Kinser and written by me. My jewel of a Daughter Daphne Chamille Thomas does voice over too, and is developing her artistries, she’s recently taken to sculpting, on screen acting and singing. I couldn’t be happier to watch her not deal with the things I had to. Check out her film shorts on youtube at Daphneville, we make them together.
Any shoutouts? Who else deserves credit in this story – who has played a meaningful role?
Michael Verner and Connie Rex worked in a transitional program for emancipated youth, worked to help me as I transitioned to college. My best friends Michael Leon and Marco Reeder are both godfathers of my daughter and have provided brotherly love and mirth for years through all the tears. Marco’s parents Eva and James Reeder are monumental to me! Raven Matthews-Tyree, my other mother, and Chris Matthews-Tyree, my other brother. My best Foster Mother, sister, and brothers Elsie Mae Jordan, Ona, Charles Logan, Kevin Johnson, and Jayzon Miller, who was claimed by covid, rest in power, young brother. My best friend’s Keoki Kekaula and Brandon Salvatierra helped me in a crucial point of my life that made all the difference in the world for me for my survival as a young adult. My friend’s who are more like family! John and Cinnamon Cooney who is famously the Art Sherpa on youtube! Sekou Wilson, Dwight Scott, Dan Kerry, Cedrick Williams, Frances Ayala, Pam McKnight Stockland, Mark Dowell, and Jake Parker. My friends Daniel Schweiger, my film geek brother and Penka Kouneva, the most amazing film composer! I love all of my Art teachers all through my school years, especially Linda Palumbo from my High school years, which I’ve maintained a relationship with to this very hour! I call her my Aunty. My blood sisters Twighla Thomas, and April Cotton, what has to be said, they are my heart and soul! And my Aunt Yvette Critten who let me know I wasn’t the only crazy artist in my bloodline. And Leonard Joseph, my broadway brother who is a constant inspiration, and my lion king brother!!!!
Pricing:
- $75 hour a half for coaching art or performance in person, $45 for online sessions
- Caricature $195 an hour (Digital Zoom sessions during Covid)
- Pumpkin Sculpting varies
- Voice over varies
- Illustration varies
Contact Info:
- Website: www.ArthurRomeo.live
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dreamboat82/?hl=en
- Imdb: https://www.imdb.com/
name/nm3894964/
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