Sandie Crisp (1960 - ) performer.

John Baima from Los Angeles was poliomyelitic at age 3 months, and was for a while a quadriplegic. At age six, he fell asleep during a church service, and afterwards was able to move, even to walk. His parents split up shortly afterwards, and he was put into foster care, where he was severely abused physically and sexually.

One foster parent, to develop his muscle strength, made him spend 8 hours a day in the pool. This enabled him at age 12 to get a gig as a swimming double for Eric Shea in The Poseidon Adventure, 1972.

His growth was restricted by an ill-fated attempt to strengthen his spine with a steel rod. It was supposed to be removed at age 16, but the doctor had died by then, and it is still in place.

At 18 he got lost in the MGM studio and made a cameo appearance on the Lou Grant show. He worked as a children’s speech therapist, married a woman and had three children.


In 1980 he was diagnosed as HIV+, probably from one of many blood transfusions. He was very gaunt at this time, and was photographed with false lesions – the photographs were sent to the new President Reagan to spur action on Aids.  At the same time he was videoed tap-dancing.

She became a drag queen under the name the Goddess Bunny.  She changed her everyday name to Sandie Crisp. In 1986 Sandie was sitting, smoking, on Hollywood Boulevard when she was approached by Penelope Spheeris, which led to a small part in Hollywood Vice Squad, 1986.  Altogether, she has been in five films.

Also in 1986, she was approached by artist Joel-Peter Witkin who asked her to appear in a photographic reinterpretation of Leonardo Da Vinci's Leda and the Swan. She has also been in Marilyn Manson (see below) and Dr Dre videos.

Her first husband died in a car accident on Mulholland Drive. She worked as a prostitute for two years to support an unemployed husband’s drug addiction.

She has been thrown out of “half the bars in LA”.

She retains a positive attitude, and ran for Empress of Los Angeles, as a prelude to running for serious public office.

• Nick Bourgas (dir). The Goddess Bunny, with Sandie Crisp. US 85 mins 1998.
• Scott Michaels. “Shelley Winters”. Find A Death. nd. http://www.findadeath.com/Deceased/w/Shelleywinters/shelley.htm.
• James Doorne. “Goddess Bunny”. Bizarre. January 2008. www.bizarremag.com/entertainment/interviews/6423/goddess_bunny.html.
• www.goddessbunny.com.