The Tampa Times from Tampa, Florida • 10

THE TAMPA TIMES, Friday, January IS, 1882 7B Everything's 'S'allright' with Senor Wences and his friends By DOUGLAS J. KEATING Knight-Ridder News Service "Let's see. I do five voices," said Senor Wences, speaking with the heavy accent of his native Spain. "There is the boy, Johnny, Pedro, the chicken, the man on the telephone and myself, Senor Wences." Why shouldn't he name himself last? After all, he is, perhaps, the world's most enduring ventriloquist, and the characters he has created have been as important to his career as his own talent. For 45 years, Wences (that's what his wife calls him; for his real name, read on) and his voices have traveled the world, appearing almost everywhere that Spanish, English and French his three languages are spoken, and in a few places, like Japan, where they are not.

He has performed for presidents and monarchs, but most Americans will remember him as Ed Sullivan's favorite act. He set the record for number of appearances 48 in 20 years on the "Ed Sullivan Show," once the most popular program on television. Those who recall Wences from those days will remember that he came on stage, drew a face on the side of his hand, slipped a wig over his knuckles and had pets," which will be broadcast tonight at 7:30 on Channel 10, Wences has spent most of the past seven years performing at the Crazy Horse Saloon in Paris. The Wences voices have been alive for longer than the nearly half a century he has been a professional ventriloquist. He learned as a boy when he was still called Wenceslao Moreno Centeno that he had the gift of "throwing his voice," and he used his talent to imitate his father on the telephone.

Cecilia, the artistic chicken, and Johnny, the face drawn on Wences' hand, also have their origins in his youth. "I was always sketching and doodling in school," Wences recalled. "I was a mischievous boy, and one day I got caught drawing a caricature of the teacher. As punishment, he made me fill the inkwells. I got ink on my hands, saw the outline of the face and began to work my thumb and forefinger like a mouth." But the stage debut of Johnny and Cecilia had to wait while their creator took a fling at bullfighting.

A native of Salamanca, a Spanish bull-training center, Wences always had wanted to be a matador. He worked at it for eight years. By that time, he said, "the bulls somehow seemed to be getting bigger and meaner," and before our eyes created the musically voiced, impudent Johnny, ever ready to disobey the kindly advice of the softspoken, fatherly Wences. Later in the act, Cecilia, a hand-puppet in the form of a chicken, would make an appearance and, sometimes, draw or paint a picture. But the high point of the performance came when Wences opened a box to reveal a bespectacled, mustachioed bodyless head, the indifferent, easily annoyed Pedro.

After conversing with Pedro, Wences would set the box down, close it and talk again with Johnny or Cecilia. Periodically he would turn to the box, open it and ask. "Is everything all right?" Pedro's deep, gruff voice would reply: "S'allright." Audiences loved it then, and they love it now. He is in his 70s, and he has no plans to stop performing. "I enjoy it as much as the audience.

As long as I can do the voices, I'll do the act," Wences said. The familiar exchange between Wences and Pedro "Is everything all right?" allright" had not been heard in this country for some time. "Everyone asks "Where was Senor Wences? Did he Wences said. "He isn't dead. He was in Paris." Except for a television guest appearance on "The Mup- he thought it prudent to pursue another line of work.

He already had learned to juggle, so he combined that skill with his gift for ventriloquism and came up with a circus act. That led to nightclub appearances in Spain and Portugal, a tour of Latin America and a trip to the United States. It was during his early years in this country that a crisis with Pedro, originally a full-bodied dummy, came to a head, literally. "I was getting ready to appear in Chicago," Wences said. "The case carrying Pedro had been damaged in an accident in the baggage car of a train.

When I opened it up, the body was smashed beyond repair. "I needed Pedro for my act, so I put the head in a box and was practicing with it when the stage manager walked in. He was horrified. You can't go on with that It looks like a he told me." Wences went on anyway, and the incorporeal Pedro was a hit. Ever since, it has been a case of "All right?" "S'allright," not only with Pedro, but with Johnny, Ceci- lia and Senor Wences, who was asked whether, after alii that time spent together on the stage, he considered the characters to be his friends.

"Ah, friends," Senor Wences said, his face ing. "Yes, they are my friends." ADVERTISEMENT TV Highlights TO i Henry Fonda and Jack Lemmon in MISTER ROBERTS tonight at 8:00 RM. Make Time Stand Still On Beautiful Anna Maria Island Have you ever wanted to stop the clock during the happy timet in your life, to capture the moment and never let it go? You'll experience that feeling again and again at Retort Sixty Six, located on the sparkling Gulf beaches of Anna Maria Island. Resort Vacation Time Sharing is the smart way to vacation. Research has shown that most families use a vacation home only 2.3 weeks a year.

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(16) The Guitar With Frederick Noad. "Notes On The First Two Strings." 10:30 p.m. (16) From Jumpstreet. "Black Influence In The Recording Industry." Oscar Brown Jr. compares trends in the recording industry which have influenced the creation and marketing of music by black Americans.

(R) (CC) Movies 8 p.m. (44) "The Magnificent Seven." Yul Brynner, Eli Wallach. A band of gunfighters is hired to protect a Mexican town from outlaws. 1960. 12:30 a.m.

(44) "Houdini." Tony Curtis, Janet Leigh. The life of the world's greatest escape artist is fictionalized. 1953. 12:35 a.m. (13) "Night Cries." Susan Saint James, William Conrad.

A young mother is haunted by dreams which lead her to believe that her supposedly dead child is alive and in danger. 1978. 2 a.m. (8) "Dark Command." John Wayne, Walter Pidgeon. A federal marshal tangles with a ruthless guerrilla leader who massacres a townful of women and children.

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"Long-Term Mar- riage." Guests: former child star Bonita Granville-Wrather and her husband Texas oilman Jack Wrather. (R) (CC) 11 p.m. (3) Dick Cavett. Guest: film director Billy Wilder. (Part 2 of 2) 'j 11:30 p.m.

(8) Tonight Host: Johnny Carson. Guests: Melissa Manchester, David Letterman. 7 p.m. (10) You Asked For It Featured: "The Human Axe" and "Theatre Amazon." (44) Barney Miller. A department store owner is kidnapped and his captors demand that his merchandise be given away to the public.

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