Nick Bougas
American film director
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Nicholas Arthur Bougas[1] (1955[citation needed] - c. August 23, 2026) was an American documentary film director, illustrator, and video and record producer.[2] As a cartoonist, he used the pen name A. Wyatt Mann to produce racist, antisemitic, antifeminist, and homophobic cartoons.[3][4][5]
1955
Nick Bougas | |
|---|---|
Bougas in 2008 | |
| Born | Nicholas Bougas 1955 Savannah, Georgia, U.S. |
| Died | c. August 23, 2026 (aged 71) |
| Other name | A. Wyatt Mann |
| Occupations | Film director, illustrator, record producer, cartoonist |
| Years active | 1977[citation needed] – 2026 |
Early life
Bougas was born in 1955 in Savannah, Georgia, United States.[6][unreliable source] His father was the businessman Arthur Nicholas Bougas.[7][better source needed]
Career
Bougas directed the mondo film Death Scenes, hosted by Church of Satan founder Anton LaVey.[8] The film was followed by Death Scenes 2 in 1992,[9] and Death Scenes 3 in 1993.[10] In 1993, he directed the documentary Speak of the Devil: The Canon of Anton LaVey, a profile of LaVey.[2][11][12]
In 1988, he was a contributing editor and artist to the pro-Charles Manson book, The Manson File.[13][14][15] Bougas directed several other films, such as the 1994 documentary The Goddess Bunny, about disabled transgender tap dancing artist Sandie Crisp.[16][17] In 1998, Bougas released the album Celebrities... At Their Worst!, a collection of comedic audio blunders by such celebrities as Elvis Presley, Casey Kasem, Paul Anka, and John Wayne.[18][19] As an illustrator, Bougas worked with writer and publisher Jim Goad on such publications as Answer Me![20][21]
A. Wyatt Mann
Bougas used the pseudonym "A. Wyatt Mann" (phonetically: 'a white man') to produce overtly racist and antisemitic cartoons in the late 1980s and early 1990s.[5][4][14] They were first published in the white supremacist newspaper WAR, operated by Tom Metzger.[14]
Besides black people and Jews, his cartoons occasionally targeted other minorities and groups, including gay people and feminists. Bougas never publicly confirmed his authorship; however, his identity as Mann was confirmed by multiple people who worked with him at the time, and in captions of photos taken at various events.[4]
The Mann cartoons have been widely reused as memes in original context by white supremacists, various internet trolls, and later, the alt-right. One cartoon in particular, a stereotypical caricature of a Jewish person referred to as the "Happy Merchant", became one of the most popular antisemitic images on the internet. It has been reused, modified and parodied multiple times, eventually becoming part of the visual language of websites such as 4chan.[3][4][22][23] Bougas' work as Mann has frequently been combined by Internet trolls with cartoons by political cartoonist Ben Garrison, which Garrison has said generates confusion between the two artists.[3][5]
Death
Nick Bougas was reported dead in 2026, at the age of 71.[24][unreliable source?]
Selected filmography
- Death Scenes (1989)
- Death Scenes 2 (1992)
- Death Scenes 3 (1993)
- Speak of the Devil: The Canon of Anton LaVey (1993)
- The Goddess Bunny (1994)
- Serial Killers (1994)