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From Chimp to Chump and Back Again
An excerpt from the soon-to-be-released autobiography
by Bingo Chimp

The following is an excerpt from From Chimp to Chump and Back Again, the soon-to-be-released autobiography by Bingo Chimp. Known to a legion of late 70s TV fans, Bingo played "Bear" on NBC’s hugely successful comedy/adventure, B.J. and the Bear from 1978 to 1981. This excerpt is reprinted with permission from Bingo and Grove Atlantic Press.

Prologue

My last couple of weeks at San Quentin I made two lists. One was of all those people who lent me money over the years or let me sleep in their bathtub, especially after B.J. and the Bear got axed. The second list was of all those who screwed me like a Thai prostitute. You know who you are, Greg Evigan, you lousy stinking bastard!

At least some of the blame for what happened to me falls to my parents. My father was a drinker and gambled away everything my mother made at NASA. When she finally ran off with Johnny Weismuller, he lost it completely and joined a right-wing militia group. After blowing up two rings of a three-ring circus outside Ontario, California, in March 1972, killing two dog trainers and six jumbo poodles, he fled to Mexico. Nothing has been heard of him since, except conflicting reports that he is now perhaps a dentist in Cuernevaca or a yoga instructor in Cancun.

I was left to fend for myself. Petty crime and sperm donations kept me afloat until a friend saw an ad in the Los Angeles Times looking for a "small primate actor that knows how to operate a sixteen-wheeler." I’d driven a few trucks in my day for various "associates" let’s call them, so that part was easy. But as for acting, I’d only done a little summer stock and one commercial for a brand of suppository -- not exactly a long resume. Still, friends encouraged me, pointing to my dead-on impressions of Johnny Carson and Carol Channing, and my true tenor singing voice. So I auditioned.

After two call backs, I was offered the job of a lifetime, that of "Bear," the fun-loving pet chimp and sidekick of a good-looking, crime-fighting trucker named B.J. McKay, played by then unknown actor, Greg Evigan. Now, before going any further I should clear up what has become one of those Hollywood legends that just won’t die. Let me say once and for all that Dudley Moore was NEVER up for my part. Our falling out was over something entirely different (let’s just say it involved Susan Anton).

For three wonderful seasons, I put everything I had into that role. I WAS Bear. And audiences responded. It was the greatest time of my life. I made enough money to choke Liz Taylor. I owned six cars, a house in Malibu, and a Cessna 172 I’d fly to Vegas on the weekends. And I banged every major actress working in TV: Cher, Carol Lawrence, Florence Henderson, some of them at the same time. I even did Uhura from Star Trek, though I was drunk on tequila and never got her real name.

Yes, NBC and I did have disagreements about money. I knew just as well as they did that there was no B.J. without Bear, and I deserved to be paid accordingly. But it was just business. And the show was a hit, after all. Still is in parts of Bangladesh and the Solomon Islands, for which, incidentally, I have yet to receive a single goddamned red cent! Kiss my hairless monkey ass, NBC!

When the show was cancelled in 1981, everyone was looking for a scapegoat. So what did they do? They blamed the chimp. Never fails. Evigan, that prima donna pretty boy jackoff, told TV Guide and Variety that I was "not a team player." Team player! I’ll give him team player. Who was late to the set because he was having his teeth bleached or getting a high-calonic with Linda Carter? Huh? Who insisted that his trailer have a velvet toilet seat cover and that he not be disturbed while listening to his relaxation tapes?! Let’s just say I didn’t lose any sleep when My Two Dads got shelved.

After the show, I drifted. No one would hire me. What I soon realized was that the show’s success had a downside: I was now typecast and couldn’t get any roles that didn’t involve trucking. Unfortunately, the CB craze was over, and with it, my career. The only work I could get was in monkey fetish movies. When I started doing kid’s birthday parties I knew I’d hit rock bottom. One minute you’re at the top of the showbiz food chain. The next you’re eating bugs out of the hair of homeless guys while they sleep.

I turned to booze and drugs to get by. This led me first to the Shady Lane Rehabilitation Center in upstate New York, and then to San Quentin, where I served eight years for going apeshit on a convenience store clerk. He caught me stealing a carton of cigarettes, so I plunged the poor guy’s head right into the hot dog rotisserie. Third degree burns all over his face. It’s not something I’m proud of.

Prison was good for me though. I learned a trade for one (I’m now a certified chiropractor). And it gave me time to write this autobiography. I’m also working with Shelley Long on a new TV project about a pair of crime-fighting psychics. I’m back in the game, baby!

This is my story.

Finally, this book is dedicated to my mentor and friend, Claude Akins, who was always there when I needed him. God bless you, Sheriff Lobo, wherever you are.