by Garrison Frost

The idea must be that there are hundreds, if not thousands, of people driving around greater Los Angeles looking for either a place to live or a way to invest the giant wads of cash they have stuffed into their glove compartments. These people, apparently, drive so much that they don't have time to open a newspaper, visit Craig's List or hire a real estate agent. Instead, they just keep their eyes peeled as they drive for available housing opportunities they happen to come upon. And so these people are not only pleased, but immensely relieved, when they see a kid dancing on the sidewalk with a giant sign that reads only "Condos" with a big arrow pointing down the street. Quickly, these drivers perform whatever turns and maneuvers necessary to head in the direction the sign points them toward, and within minutes, they have their condo.

That must be the vision, because if you didn't believe that there were legions of drivers out there actively looking for property (or in the case of condos, air) to buy, why they wouldn't put those guys out there with the signs. For my part, I can't image that a dancing 20-year-old making no more than a few bucks an hour could prompt someone to buy something as expensive as a hot dog, needless to say a condominium. But I've been wrong before. And I must be wrong now, because I see the dancing Condo guys all over greater Los Angeles, in Westwood, downtown, Santa Monica, Culver City, the South Bay.

I've long had a soft spot for human advertising. Every Halloween, one or two of the temporary costume shops in my neck of the woods stakes a person dressed as a witch or a ghost out on the sidewalk to wave at traffic – and it always makes me smile. But those are nothing compared to the chicken suits that appear on the sidewalks every time some kind of chicken place opens up. Almost makes me want to stop and buy some. But the Condo dudes don't strike me as particularly appealing. They smoke cigarettes and their clothes are often dirty. They do a lot of tricks with their signs, but they're not exactly Cirque de Soleil. Moreover, with all that sign spinning, one gets the impression that potential customers have no idea which direction they're supposed to go to find the condos. Most of that performance art would seem to get in the way of the message of "Condos, thataway."

But somebody must be following those signs and buying condos. Otherwise we wouldn't see so many of these guys on street corners with their signs. Their antics are a particularly unique form of performance art -- L.A.'s street theater for the driving homeless.

(June 17, 2006)

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