Charlee Flatt Customs: Were they on a new body?

[Type Two]

holy crap this thread is so intriguing, a tortured artist, greedy middle men, and a Police officer, u can't make stuff like this up!!!

So true and so glad I started the thread. I only knew Flatt from the customs he did in Toyfare and his Flatt World project. Now I see an amazingly complicated artist and the strange journey he went on in an attempt to bring his joy regarding making figures to others.

You could only contact the guy through snail mail and he wanted $1200 up front for a figure? Did this money have to be left, in cash, in a brown paper bag under a table in a restaurant in Orlando, FL, or could you send him a cashier's check through the mail?

[johnmiic]

This Ron Murgo, (last on right), was an ex-cop & did homina, homina on what Google said?!?



More pics at:

http://www.megomuseum.com/megolibrar.../friends.shtml

[Robin NY]

holy crap this thread is so intriguing, a tortured artist, greedy middle men, and a Police officer, u can't make stuff like this up!!!

[Tothiro]

Dan Platt sculpted the Phantom, Samaritan, and Zorro heads for FlattWorld, it wasn't Charlee.

There were other reasons why FWF failed, the manufacturing rep being the least of them.

mikej

Dude, this Dan Platt? He's got some nice stuff there...
I find that kind of interesting too - because the FWF Phantom head was probably the one I'd seen the most "Charleeism" in.

[megozilla13]

I don't know who told you that, but Charlee and FWF did not farm out that sculpting - he did all the work.

FWF failed for one very good reason - a lousy underhanded manufacturing rep that took advantage of the company and drove them out of business with increasing demands for money and never producing product on schedule. Crappy manufacturing reps are the bane of small action figure companies to this day.

Dan Platt sculpted the Phantom, Samaritan, and Zorro heads for FlattWorld, it wasn't Charlee.

There were other reasons why FWF failed, the manufacturing rep being the least of them.

mikej

[Dark Shadow]

Not too sure about that.

It was, after all, one of the first (if not THE first) Lugosi portraits on a figure following a very long dry spell. The Sideshow efforts, which also took flight in 1998, did quite well.

The price point & limited availability would be my top two suspects.

[TrueDave]

"All customizers should try to learn before they die What they are customizing for and who and why."

All production business being equal. Maybe Dracula was a bad pick because Dracula had been done before. A lot.

[The Toyroom]

Ah yes the magic of "Google"

[Donkey Hoatie]

Got it. Thanks.

Wow.

[boss]

google his name.

[Donkey Hoatie]

uh... he was avoidably detained.

Sorry, not quite sure what this means. My apologies if his history is common knowledge.

[boss]

uh... he was avoidably detained.

[Donkey Hoatie]

"I know Ron kept pushing him and pushing him to do more. I think it just stopped being fun. He once told me he didn't care if someone made money on one of his figures but he didn't want to sell to someone he knew just wanted to flip it. The crazy money the figures were changing hands for caused him to raise his prices, who could blame him for that. I think Ron had alot to do with that"

Wait, was that Ron Murgo? Whatever happened to that guy? I played in a Fantasy Baseball League with him for a few years, but then he stopped doing it a couple years ago.

[CrimsonGhost]

Castaway bought one of the Phantom prototypes from Charlie years ago. The 45's, belt buckle, and hands used on the Castaway figure was from the Flattworld Phantom prototype. We then sent Charlie a head Corey Wood sculpted and he totally reworked it. We were very happy with the end results. He also helped us with some of our other parts (hands and boots) We've had good dealings with Charlie over the years. Just talked to him on the phone recently and he's still interested in toys.

Wow, that's really interesting. The Phantom head is great. Still surprising tho, as I don't see any of Charlies "style" in it. Is he still sculpting? Perhaps his abilities have improved from 10 years ago.

[boss]

now I remember what I was told. ;-)