More
than a few Tarzan fans consider Russ Manning to be one of the best
Tarzan illustrators. I know that he's one of my Top 5. He drew both
Edgar Rice Burroughs' Lord of The Jungle and his own creation , Magnus
the Robot Fighter , in much the same manner.
They both seemed to be
built along the lines of legendary heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali. At
his best the Greatest stood about 6 ' 2 " or 6 ' 3 " and weighed about
215 pounds with a bicep that measured less than 16 inches around. You
read that right. Less than 16 inches.
Miles O '
Keefe who starred in TARZAN THE APE MAN ( 1981 ) opposite Bo Derek as
Jane was also built along the same lines. O ' Keefe and Derek reminded
me quite a bit of the Tarzan and Jane drawn by Manning. Super - models
of the jungle. But look at O ' Keefe. Is he bigger than Johnny
Weissmuller ? Or just more defined ? As I keep saying " Muscular. But
not overly bulky ". He looks like a decathlete.
Which
brings us to Bruce Jenner. Snicker if you need to. That's right. Get it
out of your system. But back in 1976 when he was winning the Olympic
decathlon in record setting fashion I thought the 6 ' 2 " 194 pound
Jenner
would have made a pretty good Tarzan.
Maybe not the Tarzan of
Burroughs. But in the fashion of many of the movie Tarzans. And of
course he would have been following in the tradition of other Olympians
who played the role like Johnny Weissmuller , Buster Crabbe , Herman
Brix and Glenn Morris.
There are those that believe that Tarzan should be built like Mr. Olympia so he looks strong enough to wrestle a gorilla while ignoring his other feats of athleticism. No one is going to be strong enough to wrestle a gorilla.So just having muscles would be enough to be some what believable.
ReplyDeleteMany concentrate far too much on his muscles and too little on his intelligence and his father's hunting knife imho.
ReplyDeleteWithout the knife he wouldn't have survived in the first place.