LA People 2008 – Sam Cherry

Sam Cherry sits in the living room of his Fairfax District home, staring at a photograph of Charles Bukowski on the toilet. “Wow, look at that!” Cherry laughs at the look on the writer’s face — one that suggests Buk is struggling through a rather troublesome bowel movement. “He’s really pushing!” A longtime friend of Bukowski’s, Cherry took the bathroom shot, which was never published, as well as countless others that were. In fact, if you’ve ever seen a shot of Bukowski and considered it iconic, it was probably Cherry’s. But Cherry didn’t just photograph Buk — legend has it the writer’s tough-guy literary persona was largely bolstered by Cherry’s true-life hard-luck tales.

“Oh, I have no doubt about that,” Cherry says. “He always used to tell me, ‘Sam, I killed 10 men.’ But he was a sweet guy. I don’t think he ever intentionally hurt a soul in his life.”

Cherry, on the other hand: “I was born tough.”

Check it out here.