Brandon Cole "Bam" Margera (born September 28, 1979 in West Chester, Pennsylvania) is a professional skateboarder, actor, creator of the "CKY" skate/prank/stunt videos, and radio personality. He is also the star of Viva la Bam, and member of the Jackass crew. He also went to East High School. He cites Raab Himself as his only reason for attending high school, and dropped out after Raab got expelled for smearing feces on a locker (as told in CKY). He then successfully received his GED at the insistence of his parents, April Margera and Phil Margera.

The CKY Videos

Bam got his start by making his own skateboarding videos, known as the CKY videos. Camp Kill Yourself aka CKY is also the name of his brother Jess's rock band (see CKY band). These early videos feature most of the CKY Crew, most notably Ryan Dunn, Brandon DiCamillo, Rake Yohn, Raab Himself, and Brandon Novak. His videos and television shows often include his long-suffering parents, Phil and April, his uncle Vincent Margera ("Don Vito"), and ex-fiancée Jenn Rivell (Margera broke off his engagement to Rivell in early 2005).

Skateboarding career

Before becoming a professional skateboarder, he could be found frequenting the local skate spots, performing at area fairgrounds, and loitering at Fairman's skate shop.

As a professional skater in the summer of 2005, Margera successfully landed The Loop in Phoenix, Arizona. He became the 13th known skater to land it, and was the first street skater to successfully land it.

Other enterprises

Margera directed and co-wrote (with Brandon DiCamillo and Chris Aspite) a low-budget independent film called The Movie, starring himself and his friends, released in 2003. Margera also has a small speaking part in the skateboarding movie "Grind".

He also directed four music videos for the Finnish love metal band HIM (Buried Alive By Love, The Sacrament, And Love Said No and Solitary Man).

He directed the music video for The 69 Eyes (Lost Boys)

Margera also appeared on Punk'd, in 2005. Ashton Kutcher 'trapped' Margera's Element team manager inside of a convenience store while staging an elaborate hold-up, complete with weapon-wielding police officers. (The real LAPD SWAT team helped with this prank)

He has also been animated as a character into a number of pro-skateboarder Tony Hawk's video games. In fact, he is featured as a main character in Tony Hawk's Underground (1 and 2) and Tony Hawk's American Wasteland.

In 2006, Bam started on a new animated series for MTV slated to air in the summer. Bam also had two special episodes of Viva la Bam entitled Viva La Spring Break.

He will also be starring in Number Two, the sequel to The Movie, which will be released September 22 2006.

Bam will also star with Ashton Kutcher in the 2007 comedy Surviving Sundays.

Trivia

• Bam's name originates from his childhood when he would sometimes go crazy and run into walls, causing his grandfather to say "Bam, bam, bam, chill out! Bam!"

• Bam is a fan of, friend of, and occasional video director for H.I.M.'s frontman, Ville Valo. Bam has licensed the band's logo, the heartagram (a pentagram with two points curved to incorporate a heart symbol), for personal use. Bam has had himself tattooed with the heartagram.

• Bam is engaged to Melissa Rothstein. He proposed to her in the King of Prussia Shopping Mall. The two are going to be tying the knot in October 2006."Hitching Post", Page 10, New York Post, ^*,February 24th, 2006

• In the DVD comentary for Jackass: The Box Set, Margera said that Element Skateboards pays him two million dollars a year to wear their clothing.

• Bam is currently writing, producing, and directing his new feature film, a sequel to The Movie, titled Kiss a Good Man's Ass. The film will feature the "garbage juicer" invention shown in Haggard http://www.ugo.com/channels/sports/features/bammargera/He announced another film he is working on called The Dream Seller. The Dream Seller is a nickname for long-time friend and fellow skater Brandon Novakhttp://www.imdb.com/title/tt0466764/.

• Current episodes of Bam's show have shown him to own both a red 2003 Hummer H2 as well as a purple Lamborghini Gallardo and a Mercedes-Benz S55 AMG with a heartagram on the front instead of the Mercedes-Benz logo. A recent episode, however, showed the H2 being dropped off a cliff by Don Vito as revenge for constant torment. The Lamborghini has been modified with help from friend Billy Idol to include a sunroof (a rough rectangle crudely cut with a reciprocating saw). Bam bragged that his was the only vehicle of its kind with a sunroof. Since the end of filming on Viva La Bam, Bam has replaced the red H2 with a blue H2. Adio shoes recently presented Bam with a light blue Lamborghini Murciélago Roadster.

• An Easter Egg on the first 5000 DVD copies of CKY4 shows a sex act between Bam Margera and former girlfriend Jenn Rivell.

• He has a niece named Ava Elizabeth.

References