The Best Little Warehouse in L.A.

By Josh Eliot

In 1982, after living in San Francisco and studying filmmaking at the Art Institute, I found myself at a crossroads. I moved to Hollywood and started attending a film school on La Brea Avenue, but within a few days I had dropped out and returned to Rhode Island. I could not handle the drastic change of environment and loss of my friend group, so I took a time out and moved back east. I found myself working back at the Bostitch Staple Factory in East Greenwich, where literally all of my siblings, cousins and extended family worked. I was depressed and smoking a lot of weed: a joint on the way to work, another during my first ten minute break, a third at lunch, a fourth to wake up at my second ten minute break and one when we drove home after punching out for the day. Bostitch, now Stanley/Bostitch, had a mega warehouse with many departments. My mom and sister put the staplers together, my dad was a drill press operator, my brother worked in the nail department and I drove a fork lift. That is, until I wasn’t paying attention and bent a shelf, causing a skid with thousands of metal pieces to fall to the ground. My supervisor ripped up my forklift license right in front of all the onlookers, and I got written up for not wearing my safety glasses. I felt like I had taken ten steps backwards and thought that my dream of being a filmmaker would never happen. I found myself stuck in: “The Worst Big Warehouse in Rhode Island.”

After getting my shit together, I moved back to San Francisco, reconnected with my friend group and took a job as a medical claims examiner. At some point, I attended The Baillie School for video production, and then made an indie movie called Fright Night of the Living Dead (1986). Somehow the movie was chosen by The San Francisco International Video Festival, which helped me land a new job with Catalina Video in 1987. In 1990, Catalina moved me from San Francisco to West Hollywood and I now worked out of another kind of warehouse. Unlike working at Bostitch, which made me depressed, developing my career in the Catalina warehouse helped me to flourish. A couple years later with new management in charge, we moved the warehouse from North Hollywood to a smaller one in Reseda, CA. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the fact that there were so many great people working behind the scenes at the Catalina offices. Names you’ve never heard of or knew about, because even though they were part of the process for each and every movie, their names were not in the film credits. This is a good opportunity to acknowledge their contributions.

All of us bonded like family and fought like family, but mostly bonded. My biggest nemesis was Steven, who was in charge of the money! We always paid the talent in cash; I needed to get large sums several times a month and dealing with him was like pulling teeth. When money wasn’t an issue, we bonded by hanging out and going to parties and clubs, but when I would pop in for a cool $10K, he became a raving bitch - but I’m sure he had a lot of pressure on him. It’s not like he could say no, though - we had to shoot movies, and weren’t we making money for his ledgers, anyway?! In the sales department was Lance, a wiz at getting companies to pick up a lot more pieces of a new release by being super aggressive and utilizing smart sales techniques. He was non-stop sales 24/7, but ended up leaving after about a year for medical reasons. He was replaced with Jeff, who had a true hidden talent: how to get free food from fast food restaurants by calling the managers and complaining, even if he hadn’t ordered anything in the first place! I can’t tell you how much contraband we ate thanks to him! He also had an artist’s touch when he took on building the mirror frame which Scott Bond walked through in my movie Object of Desire. Not only that, he hand-painted my jeans that I wore, with a military jacket, to receive my very first award for videography. He bedazzled them and painted in script: “What the hell is a Josh Eliot anyway?” I’m still trying to figure that one out.

TJ Renzi ran the art department, and was always up for taking my unconventional box cover ideas to the next level. We had an ongoing banter between us because of his constant denial that he was not wearing colored contact lenses, when he obviously was! I still, to this day, have no idea if his eyes are brown or blue. He swore his baby blues were real, but I definitely saw some brown around the edges of those lenses. Clint Yeager eventually took over for TJ and started running the art department. In addition to designing the boxes and promotional material, Clint was an amazing guitarist and vocalist. He performed two songs in my movie The Hills Have Bi’s: “White Trash” and “Desires of the Heart,” which was a duet with Sharon Kane. Over a thirty-year period, he worked with bands Daisy Face, Sour, Speed Queen, Super Fiends, BC and the most recent being GAYC /DC. Unfortunately, he passed away of a respiratory infection on August 15th, 2023. His best friend, and some would say brother, Tom Walker (@djtommyrocker), worked in our marketing department after Chi Chi LaRue moved on to greener pastures. Tom arranged some amazing promotional parties at the Saint New York and other larger than life venues, and is a very renowned DJ at the Eagle LA and other venues. Tom was my absolute favorite at the company, once Chet Thomas passed away, and I’m so thrilled to see him achieve his goals and dream of being a mega DJ phenom! Last but not least was Javier in the warehouse. If you ever ordered a movie from Catalina, chances are Javier, who worked there before and after me, packed it personally. A special high-five to him for always packing and mailing the Christmas gifts I brought in to send back east! These guys all helped keep the engine running and the movies flowing out the door! I fondly remember the Catalina facility as: “The Best Little Warehouse in Reseda!”

All of that brings me to: The Best Little Warehouse in L.A. (1982), a William Higgins classic which featured Michael Christopher, Giorgio Canali, Kurt Williams, Rick Kennedy, Cliff Austin, Terry Craig, Mike Dean, Frank Johns, Ed Michaels, Dusty Sands, Lance Whitman and Morgan. This movie was actually shot in West Hollywood, at the original warehouse of Laguna Pacific. 1984 XRCO winner for best actor Michael Christopher with his 10” thick piece leads the cast of Warehouse and is best known as a strong top. However, he did bottom in this movie for Giorgio Canali and in the movies Shore Leave (Nova) and Tony’s Initiation (Rollo Productions). I recently discovered an interview with him from the 1984 film Trick Time with Joey Yale and Fred Halsted. I am linking the YouTube video from Boy Culture at the end of this blog, which shows a very interesting side of this icon. Interestingly, the majority of the actors in Warehouse were one-offs, performing in only this or maybe one other movie.

In addition to “household names” Christopher and Canali, there is another lesser known mainstream actor featured in this movie, who actually did quite a bit of work for Higgins. Lance Whitman’s debut in Warehouse was followed with a solo in Strictly For Ladies Only (1983) and full scenes in Cousins (1983), Class Reunion (1983) and Young Olympians (1985). Later, in 1985, he appeared in Hard Action for Junior Studios before leaving the industry. The Best Little Warehouse in L.A. has a lot going for it as a film, but these days is mostly talked about because of one star, a model named Morgan. Morgan had a minuscule career, but became one of the biggest phenoms in our industry. Gracing the box cover of Warehouse was his biggest role, and many in the chat rooms think it was his only role, but he actually worked in some other projects during his brief career from 1979-1984. He played a newspaper delivery boy in Newspaper Boy (1979) and a homeowner who gets seduced by a city official in Meter Man 2 (1979), both for Magnum Griffin. After a brief reprieve he showed up on the cover of Best Little Warehouse in L.A. (1982) , then performed a solo in Catalina's Strictly For Ladies Only (1983) and finished out his career with YMAC's Peep Show 1 (1984) and Morgan and Friends (1985). In 1985 things get a little weird, when Morgan is suddenly nowhere to be found, and conspiracy theories started brewing. Some say that his quick disappearance from the industry was because his father found out that he was making films and moved him out of LA. It’s even written that Morgan met two guys for sex, who abducted him and held him captive for a week, after which the men threw him off a cliff. Others say he was part of a hiking group that fell off a cliff in 1985, as noted in the newspaper. William Higgins stated in a podcast that Morgan was going to Big Bear Lake with his dad, stopped to take a leak and fell off the side of the mountain. It’s got my mind racing, and usually I can dig up something, but I have to admit failure. For fans of Morgan, and there are plenty, you can access his paperboy scene in Magnum Griffin 14, where he is credited as Nick, but it’s Morgan, 100%.

I might have found “my” best little warehouse in Reseda, but you might find the newest version of William Higgins The Best Little Warehouse in L.A. to be your favorite. The current Anniversary Edition is packed with extras, three J/O extras to be exact. Seamlessly intercut into the movie, it features the individual solos of Michael Christopher, Mike Dean and Lance Whitman, which were originally shot for Strictly For Ladies Only, which I doubt is still in print. Let’s end this with some hope: one believable follow-up was posted to a forum in 2010 by a longstanding employee of William Higgin’s Drakes Bookstore on Melrose Avenue. He confidently believes the version told to him by a co-worker, “Lawrence.” The story is that Morgan’s dad did in fact find out about the films and convinced him to come home to the Torrance area, with the idea to further his education. The story of his death was made up and spread to prevent anyone from looking for him. He looked very young for his age and their were inquiries back in the day. I hope Morgan is out there somewhere, in his mid 60’s, happy that he split the scene back in 1985, and started a productive life for himself. If anyone has proof of Morgan being alive and well, I’m sure the chat rooms would love to hear that there was a happy ending after all.

Video Links:
Michael Christopher Interview
Josh Eliot's Fright Night of the Living Dead - full movie!
Teaser Trailer: The Best Little Warehouse in L.A.
Clint Yeager sings "White Trash" | Clint & Sharon Kane perform "Desires of the Heart"

Bio of Josh Eliot:

At the age of 25 in 1987, Josh Eliot was hired by Catalina Video by John Travis (Brentwood Video) and Scott Masters (Nova Video). Travis trained Eliot on his style of videography and mentored him on the art of directing. Josh directed his first movie, Runaways, in 1987. By 2009 when Josh parted ways with Catalina Video, he'd produced and directed hundreds of features and won numerous awards for Best Screenplay, Videography, Editing, and Directing. He was entered into the GayVN Hall of fame in 2002.