"Saint Misbehavin’: The Wavy Gravy Movie" at Upstate Films

Amber Waves of Gravy

by Sparrow, November 29, 2010

Best known as a flavor of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream, Wavy Gravy is immediately recognizable as the voice saying, “What we have in mind is breakfast in bed for 500,000!” in the Woodstock film (and innumerable `60s montages). Actually, at the Woodstock Festival he was still known as Hugh Romney, a member of the Hog Farm, one of the earliest hippie communes. (He was given his current name by B. B. King in 1969.) Born in East Greenbush, New York (near Albany), Romney was a poet in Greenwich Village in the late `50s, managed by Lenny Bruce. After moving to California in 1962, Romney became one of Ken Kesey’s Merry Pranksters.

The Hog Farm traveled in school buses for seven years, eventually settling in Northern California. Wavy Gravy co-founded Seva, a medical relief organization, in 1978. He has organized dozens of benefit concerts for Seva featuring members of the Grateful Dead, Jackson Browne, Bonnie Raitt, Ani Difranco, and Elvis Costello. Wavy and his wife started Camp Winnarainbow, a multicultural children’s camp, near the Hog Farm in Laytonville, California. Wavy Gravy also spearheaded numerous Nobody for President campaigns. The renowned 74-year-old hippie spoke to me by phone from his bedroom in Berkeley. His greeting was: “Gravy in your ear!”

Saint Misbehavin’: The Wavy Gravy Movie will screen at Upstate Films in Woodstock on December 11 at 4pm, a co-production with the Woodstock Film Festival. Mr. Gravy himself will appear, along with director Michelle Esrick, for a question-and-answer session after the film. www.upstatefilms.org; www.woodstockfilmfestival.com.

I saw your film, Saint Misbehavin’.
Fuck a chicken! Did you go on the back end for the little treats? There should be something on Seva [Foundation].

You mean DVD extras? I didn’t see them on my copy.
Seva is the charity I founded 33 years ago—something like that. “Seva” is a Sanskrit word that means “service to humankind.” We mostly work in curable and preventable blindness. You know, 80 percent of the people in the world that are blind don’t need to be? You can get their sight back for about 30 bucks. It’s pretty amazing. We’ve done about two million sight-saving operations. It’s a good thing.

Are you listening to jazz right now?
Actually, this is the new Jimi Hendrix album! It’s really a great album, too.

What’s it called?
Oh, Something on Venus? You can Google it. [It’s actually Valleys of Neptune.]