Manny Chevrolet Bruno: The Domestication
of Manny Chevrolet
by Monica Mankin

According to Manny Chevrolet, "We can only have two out of three."

Manny Chevrolet Bruno was troubled the moment the bartender at the Circle Bar set his drink in front of him.

“What’s this?” Bruno pointed to the offending lime buoyed against an ice cube. “What’s this,” he demanded, seeming insulted that the bartender, a personal friend of his, had mistaken lime for the lemon that compliments the Stoli, cranberry juice, and splash of soda (“for flavor,” he said). “That’s my drink, you know. It’s called The Manny.”

I grabbed my beer and followed Bruno who, with his yard cards under one arm and his lemon-topped trifecta of flavor in hand, led the way to a table in the parlor area of the bar, where he explained to me how his troubles began.

“I came to New Orleans from California to get clean,” he started. “My band, the ‘Too Free Stooges,’ we developed drug habits. Mine was a big one, so I came to New Orleans to get clean, which is crazy.”

Crazy indeed, when considering that in 2002, after he voted on the morning of the primaries, Bruno could be heard campaigning via megaphone from the back of a yellow, zebra-striped convertible. “I’m giving you kids what you want,” he had shouted. “I know what you want. You want progress. You want jobs. You want to be able to get high every once and a while without somebody breathing down your neck.”

Back then, Bruno had run for Mayor as “A Troubled Man For Troubled Times.” I could see from his ‘06 yard cards that much had not changed since then, only he’s “Troubled Now More Than Ever.” In 2002, Manny called for “radical revolutionary change.” He suggested implementing an economic aid package similar to the Marshall Plan that brought Europe back to life after WWII; he suggested that police no longer pursue victimless crimes such as possession of marijuana and prostitution.

Four years later, Bruno still calls for radical revolutionary change. “New Orleans needs to get out of the 19th century. We can’t rely on tourism forever.” Bruno declared that New Orleans should, in fact, become the new Amsterdam, complete with hash bars and a red light district. “That’s how we’ll pay for the levees,” he noted.

To resolve post-Katrina rebuilding issues, Bruno proposed we invite the Amish down from the North. “They can build a barn in a day,” he said. “And they can do it without electricity.”

Bruno is known for his punch line politics. He’d even be the first to don his campaign button: “Manny Doesn’t Have A Prayer.” “I’d be happy just to have campaign buttons,” he smiled. But not everything can be a joke for Bruno anymore.

“I’ve been domesticated since the last election,” he explained. “Times are different. I’m more serious with wife and child,” he explained. “Four years ago I was shaking babies and kissing hands. I’ve learned to kiss babies and shake hands.”

Bruno lit a cigarette. “Some people say that people are running for Mayor because they want their fifteen minutes of fame, but I don’t need that.” He gently tapped his cigarette against the ashtray, and then took a drag before he said, “I think a lot of people are angry citizens who want to be heard. If voices are heard maybe whoever is Mayor will consider what they say.”

For Bruno, the Mayor’s list of top priorities should include improving the city’s educational system. Four years from now Bruno’s daughter will enter the public school system. “If the city doesn’t get its act together, I’ll move,” Bruno said. “I’ll move to Los Angeles. Or I’ll send my kid to a school two hours away, but there’s no way she’s going to school here.” Bruno speculated that many displaced families would not return to the city because their children are already enrolled in fantastic schools elsewhere in the country.

“People run around saying they’re proud to be part of the Third World down here, but even in the Third World they get an education,” said Bruno. “It’s one thing to make jokes, but people aren’t going to take you seriously unless you take yourself seriously. New Orleans has been last in education forever it seems like. I’d throw everything into the shitter and start over.”

Bruno explained his “triangle of semi-success” for reviving New Orleans, represented on his yard cards by a martini glass. “My pillars,” he said, “are ‘fast,’ ‘cheap,’ and ‘good.’” But let’s be honest,” Bruno smiled. “Really, we can only have two out of the three. If we want to fix it fast and cheap, it’s not going to be good, you know.”

Fortunately for Bruno, these are the days when two out of three ain’t bad.

Before I left him at the Circle Bar, Bruno confessed his undomesticated affinity for New Orleans: “Even though it’s part of the reason New Orleans can’t find its way into the 21st century, it’s the only city left in America where we can smoke indoors and drink outdoors.”


Monica Mankin works and writes in New Orleans. Look for first in a series on post-Apocalyptic sex, Hanging with the Spur Posse, in the next NOLAFugees.com.

photo courtesy the author.