LOS ANGELES–George Barris, the car designer who created the iconic 1966 Batmobile for the Batman television series, died here Nov. 5. He was 89. His company Kustom City designed and built the jalopies that were featured in episode 523- VILLAGE OF THE GIANTS.
The Hollywood Reporter has an obit.
Thanks to Scott for the heads up.
I’m imagining a coffin, fitted on the end with a tiny, fiery jet engine port, about the size of a silver dollar.
Godspeed, Mr. Barris.
The 1960’s TV Batmobile was on display at the local mall maybe two years ago (at least it was billed as the legit car they used on the show). You could get within two feet of it and I leaned over the velvet rope to peak inside. Each of the buttons and knobs were labelled with a “Bat” prefix. :) It was neat to see the attention to detail and surreal to be so close to such an amazingly iconic car from my youth (watching reruns of the show and movie in the 80’s).
He did excellent work and captured the imaginations of several generations. Rest in peace George!
-Eric
He also designed the equally cool Monkeemobile. RIP.
As kids my brother and I built many car models that were George Barris designs. I remember we liked them so much we were inspired to take parts from all of our other “normal” car models and mix and match them to create our own souped up cars. Some turned out pretty nice.
He did the Munster’s Car too. Great work! Glad he was able to get a lot from his like, like selling the Batmobile for $4.6M. That’s amazing.
RIP
(btw, I thought this was James Caan when I first saw the picture! )
He was also mentioned in a comment by Crow during the garage scene in “Daddy-O”
He was Picasso with an automobile. A true original. Rest in peace George.