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Steve Kiwus has had his hands all over Liv Tyler’s body. Also Tobey Maguire’s, Halle Berry’s, Ian McKellen’s, Hugh Jackman’s, Lucy Lawless’, Kurt Russell’s, Kevin Sorbo’s, Kirsten Dunst’s, Michael Keaton’s and Val Kilmer’s.
If you count Sheriff Woody from the “Toy Story” movies, Kiwus has an intimate knowledge of Tom Hanks’ physique, too.
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The Minneapolis sculptor is unknown to the general public, but he’s one of America’s most popular artists. He’s among the top talents in the action-figure industry, sculpting intricately detailed characters for “Batman,” “The Lord of the Rings,” “The X-Men,” “Toy Story,” “Xena” and “Hercules.”
His works have sold in the millions. Millions more have been distributed free by McDonald’s. And his new line of “Spider-Man” characters is all but guaranteed to be one of this year’s toy- business success stories.
Among toy connoisseurs, Kiwus is to plastic what Michaelangelo was to marble. JoAnn McLaughlin, senior vice president of product development for Toybiz, the toy division of Marvel Enterprises Inc., calls her frequent collaborator “one of the top four artists in the field. He brings them to life. He sets industry standards.”
Kiwus, who began his career at Minneapolis’ defunct Lakeside Games (makers of the board game Aggravation), has designed more than 1,600 character likenesses of Hollywood’s and comicdom’s hottest properties. Coveted by collectors, some of his early works have greatly increased in value.
“I’ll always place a big order for his products,” said Nick Post, manager of the Source Comics and Games store in Falcon Heights. “A lot of the first Marvel figures he sculpted are worth hundreds of dollars. I remember one comics convention where he sold a prototype for over $1,000. That was just an unpainted hunk of plastic, but he sculpted it. His stuff is guaranteed quality.”
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Kiwus scoffs. After almost 20 years in this specialized niche, he knows that most of his toys will be enjoyed for a few weeks, torn limb from exquisitely sculpted limb, and tossed in the trash. “I make landfill,” he says.
Still, he makes it with a commitment to quality. “Comic- book real” is how the 43-year-old artist describes his style. His studio on University Avenue SE. -- a messy Geppetto’s workshop fronted by the sort of office a 13- year-old millionaire would build -- boasts a plastic menagerie of majestically developed superheroes and remarkably proportioned damsels. Beside Kiwus’ creations, G.I. Joe is a wimp and Barbie is a wallflower.
When he heard that Kirsten Dunst brandished her little likeness on Friday’s “Entertainment Tonight” and groused, “My doll looks like a man in drag, I’m sorry,” he briefly felt insulted. “Then I was relieved when I realized she was talking about the 12-inch Barbie-style doll, not the 6-inch Mary Jane figure that I sculpted.”
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It’s nigh unto impossible to mistake his full-bodied female characters. Kiwus uses a figure of the “X-Men” heroine Mystique, made in 1984, to show how the toys have evolved with his prodding. The old figure was a stiff, lifeless approximation of a female form, jointed at the neck, shoulders, elbows, hips and knees. Kiwus calls it “a boy with bumps.”
His rendition of the character, released in conjunction with the “X-Men” movie two years ago, is in a different league altogether. It’s dynamic, boasts more points of articulation, and is recognizably based on the exceptional physical attributes of actress/supermodel Rebecca Romijn-Stamos.
“Hehehe!” exulted “New blunts311,” the pseudonymous 19-year-old Oklahoma City action figure authority for the Epinions consumer information Web site. “Mystique was not only hot in the movie . . . but as a toy, as well.”
The cheesecake factor is a significant aspect of the figures’ appeal, since the core audience is men between 20 and 40 or, as Kiwus puts it, “a lot of lonely guys. When I go to the San Diego Comic Book Convention every year, I always come back with mixed emotions because I see these guys and my work is making them really happy. But it’s making them too happy.”
Kiwus’ frankly sexy take on the toys was a wake-up call to the field. “His style definitely changed the way action figures were portrayed,” Post said. There’s more to making a successful figure, however, than padding the pecs and building up the biceps.
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“When I started out making these, I spent two years improving how the hands and feet were sculpted,” said Kiwus, a graduate of New York’s Parsons School of Design. “They were just clubs and blocks at the end of the limbs. But hands can give so much expression to the pose. I concentrated on that and, for the first couple of years, you could tell which pieces were mine just by the hands.”
The Source’s Post lauds Kiwus’ feel for details: “Knees are one of the hardest body parts to get right and Steve’s are the best.”
Creating an action figure is part art, part science. When figures are based on film characters, the actors playing the roles are mapped inch by inch with 3-D computer scanning technology. The schematics are shipped to the sculptor, who renders them in plastic, 6 inches high, custom-machined joints and all. Typically, the results are then submitted to the performers for approval.
They generally ask for a little nip-and-tuck microsurgery, Kiwus said: “Some guys want to look tougher. Some guys want to look prettier.”
And looks count. The qualities that distinguish hot sellers from slow-moving “peg warmers” are the figure’s pre-existing popularity, the appeal of the pose and representation, and the intangible “cool factor,” Post said.
Pulling off that alchemical mix can be richly rewarding. A successful line of toys can add a considerable amount of revenue to a film’s bottom line. “The last ’Star Wars’ line probably sold probably $300 million worth of toys,” Toybiz’s McLaughlin said.
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The work has been lucrative, but Kiwus says he would never encourage anyone to enter toy sculpting “to chase money.” He declines to specify what he earns, but notes that he owns the University Avenue building that houses his offices along with a coffee shop and other tenants. His credit was good enough to borrow half a million dollars to renovate the space, although he calls his profession “cyclical -- some years are very good and others you’re squeaking by.”
Kiwus has generated toy designs of his own, with mixed results. Those that haven’t been picked up by manufacturers decorate the shelves in his office, alongside his modest-selling $300 limited-edition ceramic sculptures of his creative muse, ’50s pin-up model Bettie Page.
Those little-seen items “will look good in the book” he hopes to publish, cataloging his works in coffee-table elegance. If that project takes some time to sell, Kiwus should be busy slinging plastic for years to come with “Spider- Man” and “Lord of the Rings” sequels.
