Whatever happened to . . .

Richard Grieco of 21 Jump Street fame blows his cover: He's a serious painternow, no joke

After painting for more than two decades, Richard Grieco started showing hiswork in 2009.
Courtesy Photo
Complexity of Twins, mixed media on canvas.
Void of Emotion, mixed media on canvas.
Oceans of Mars 2 , mixed media on canvas.
American Red, mixed media on canvas.

Three years ago, 21 Jump Street 1980s TV legend Richard Grieco decided to share a secret with the public. Like Tony Bennet, Jerry Garcia, and Jane Seymour before him . . . Grieco too was both a celebrity and a painter.

It all happened on the set of If Looks Could Kill, a 1991 action/comedy in which the actor plays a high school slacker who gets mistaken for a secret agent. (The movie didn't earn great reviews, but it does feature a surprise cameo from Roger Daltrey.)

"We were filming near Montreal and I was hanging out with a bunch of artists up there," Grieco, who is in Houston to meet with art collectors, tells CultureMap.

" When I started dripping the paint over the piece, it just seemed to come alive all of a sudden. I got this feeling like this is what I should be doing."

"I'd painted a little bit before, but never seriously. Anyway, I decided to get a canvas and started painting the mountains around the chateaux where we were staying. I worked on it for a few days but was really pissed off at the way it was going and threw it on the ground."

But there at his feet, the three-by-four foot canvas took on a new life.

"I decided to try something else and asked my assistant to pick up some gallons of black, red and white paint," Grieco says. "When I started dripping the paint over the piece, it just seemed to come alive all of a sudden . . . I got this feeling like this is what I should be doing. I felt such a strange feeling of relief in a way."

As he continued acting throughout the 1990s, painting remained at the forefront of Grieco's creative drive, often serving as an outlet for his frustrations with the entertainment industry.

"With both acting and painting, you derive from and manifest emotions you wouldn't normally tap into," he says. "The main difference is that when you finish a piece of art, there's final product that you can see. With acting, the end product is decided by directors and editors.

"You see the movie and say, 'What happened to that scene we filmed?' All of those months torturing yourself to get a character right can be for nothing sometimes."

In the last decade, the actor has moved away from film and television to concentrate on writing music and poetry. The introspective mindset needed to write has dovetailed nicely into creating art, Grieco says. Nevertheless, his paintings have largely remained out of the public eye until recently.

"About eight years ago, Dennis Hopper, who was a good friend of mine, told me to start showing my work . . . I really respected his opinion."

"About eight years ago, Dennis Hopper, who was a good friend of mine, told me to start showing my work," he says. "We talked about art all the time, just knocking different ideas around. I really respected his opinion but I only finally got around to sharing my work in 2009, when I sort of randomly posted a piece on my Facebook page."

Someone wanted to buy the piece right away, he laughs, saying that he scrambled to call an art dealer friend and quizzed him on how to price paintings. (For those wondering, this particular piece went for $10,000.)

"I've sold about 20 pieces worldwide since then," Grieco says. "Buying a piece is a very personal thing, so I always make sure I speak with each person interested in getting a painting. It's wonderful for me to hear from owners once they receive the pieces as well."

Stylistically, he has dubbed his work "abstract emotionalism," a moniker he said captures to the "unbridled emotion" that goes into each work.

"I paint because I have to paint, like I have to get these feelings out of my head," Grieco says. "There will be this vague idea I have when I begin and then the painting begins to take over itself. There are certain times when people ask me about why I did this or that.

"Honestly, though, I can't really answer them. I just let the paint move and give it room to breathe."

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Movie Review

Summer camp drama The Plague proves middle school is still pure horror

Photo courtesy of IFC

Everett Blunck in The Plague.

Anybody who’s attended elementary school in the last 100 years knows the concept of “cooties,” a fictional affliction that is typically caught when touched by a member of the opposite sex. A more updated version of the same idea is featured in the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series, this time called the “Cheese Touch,” making anyone who touches a moldy piece of cheese on the school’s basketball court an outcast.

A much more menacing version of this “disease” is on display in The Plague, which takes place at a summer water polo camp for tweens. The film focuses on Ben (Everett Blunck), a slightly awkward boy who struggles to fit in with the “cool” crowd led by Jake (Kayo Martin). That group has no problems making fun of others that they deem to be different, especially Eli (Kenny Rasmussen), who has been ostracized because of a rash he has that the kids call “the plague.”

Ben wants to be part of the main group, but his natural empathy leads him to reach out to Eli on more than one occasion despite Eli engaging in some uncomfortable behavior. With the camp’s coach (Joel Edgerton) not much help when it comes to the bullying tactics by Jake and others, especially those that take place at night, Ben is left to fend for himself. His vacillations between wanting to be accepted and wanting to do what’s right continue until his hand is forced.

Written and directed by first-time feature filmmaker Charlie Polinger, the film has all the feel of a horror movie without actually being a horror. The staging used by Polinger gives the film a claustrophobic feel as Ben can’t seem to escape the psychological torture inflicted by Jake and others no matter where he goes. He also employs a jarring score by Johan Lenox to great effect, one that’s designed to keep viewers on edge even when nothing bad is happening.

No matter how far removed you are from middle school, the film will likely bring up feelings you thought you had left behind. Much like with Bo Burnham’s Eighth Grade, Polinger finds a way to tap into something universal in his depiction of tweens, an age when everyone is still discovering who they really are. Some go along to get along, others don’t even attempt to fit in, but no one truly feels settled.

Whether the plague is real or not in the world of the film is up for debate. While most of the time it comes off as something made up to underscore the feeling of otherness felt by Ben, Polinger does literalize it to a degree. He even tiptoes up to the line of body horror before wisely retreating, although what he does show will still make some viewers squeamish. However, because he seems to be leaning one way before pulling back, there’s the possibility that some will be disappointed by the tease of something more intense.

The film’s biggest success is in its casting. Finding good child actors is notoriously tough, and yet Polinger and casting director Rebecca Dealy found a bunch who sell the story for all it’s worth. Blunck, Martin, and Rasmussen get the most play, but everyone else complements them well. Edgerton is the only well-known actor in the film, but he’s used sparingly and isn’t asked to do much, leaving the kids to carry the story on their shoulders.

Fitting in as a tween is hard enough without others actively trying to find ways to cast someone out. The Plague is an effective demonstration of the dynamics that can play out in a competitive environment that also includes a group that has yet to develop into fully-rounded people. It features discomfort on multiple levels, marking an auspicious debut for Polinger.

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The Plague is now playing in theaters.

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