The surfing world is a colorful one with no lack of multi-layered stories to tell. But there has never been one about long-haired godfather-type Italian with a Rhode Island accent – not quite Boston but definitely not New York – over a backdrop of snow-covered cliffs, gritty skate spots, Irish neighborhoods and pumping right-hand points.
Like 73-year-old Sid Abbruzzi, aka The Package himself, this story is one of a kind. Abbruzzi is the tattooed anti-hero who propelled New England’s singlefin movement, pioneered Northeast skating, challenged surf restrictions and fronted a band, while bringing together a community around his Newport surf/skate shop for five decades. He pushed limits and livers.
Right now, Water Brother: The Sid Abbruzzi Story is being screened in packed theatres on the East Coast. Many of those seeing this film were directly affected by the icon himself, but every sideways-standing weirdo north of Nags Head has been influenced by Abbruzzi. As told by the Kinnane Brothers (makers of Home Team starring Kevin James), this is one of those roller-coaster-ride human interest stories. Through interviews with friends and luminaries like Tony Hawk, Christian Fletcher and Selema Masekela, it’s as able to grab the attention of Lynn in accounting who only drinks decaf out of her Friends mug, just as easily as regional surfers and skaters. We sat down with Abbruzzi and Chuck Kinnane – the Package and the Director – to learn more.
SURFER: First off Sid, how you feeling this summer? Good to be back in the water?
SID: It’s been about five or six years since I’ve had a double hip replacement and I’m 100%. It slowed down my surfing a little bit. I don’t know whether that’s a combination of age, scar tissue and the whole bit, but you know I’m still giving it a go every chance I get. I’m physically in shape and feeling good.
SURFER: What is the Kinnane Brothers’ background as it relates to Water Bros?
CHUCK KINNANE: We’re from Rhode Island, eight brothers, born and raised. Our Dad started taking us into the shop on the beach when we were kids, like knee-high, to buy wetsuits and wax. We grew up with Sid, going to the shop. We like to joke that we were always the last customers on Christmas Eve, the family walking in as he was about to close the door.
SID: That was the original shop on the beach at Little Compton, our Holy Land. That was our Western Oz over there, you know, just a beautiful surfing area. We used to say, “Keep the Little little.” I got to be great friends with Chuck’s Dad. I sold the boys their first surfboards.
CHUCK: We rode my Dad’s boards from the 70s and 80s, whatever we could patch together, that’s what we learned on. Water Bros was doing a shaping demo one day. I was maybe 14 at the time. Sid saw me just wide-eyed, looking at this one new board. He was like, “Here, take the board.”
I said I couldn’t. I had no money or anything and he was like, “No no take it.”
And I’m like, “What do you mean? He’s like “Take it. You’ll pay me when what you can.” He was this mythical being. He did that for everyone. I worked my summer jobs and paid him $50 whenever I could. And in the film, we mention the Black Book where he kept track of what people owed. I had no idea I was ever in the Black Book.
SURFER: I was amazed at how much archival footage you had. It took a lot to get that film developed or have a tape and battery all the time back then.
SID: We had been shooting Super 8 stuff since the 70s. We had 50-foot cartridges. Those were really hard to hold onto. The film would burn inside the projector. I have to give credit to Mike Tabeling (Florida surf legend.) Michael was one of the first to really shoot Super 8 and that inspired us. We had our own camera that we passed around. When it came time to meet with Chuck, it was a collaboration of their hard work and my vintage footage.
CHUCK: Sid had a stockpile. He came over to the studio and dropped like seven or eight crates on the table. We went through everything. We took it all to Cinelab, one of the last places in the country that processes film. It just happens that they’re in New Bedford (Massachusetts, 30 miles from Newport, RI.) Instead of shipping off all this irreplicable archival stuff, it got driven right to New Bedford. The guys there had known of Sid for years and they rolled out the red carpet for us. They painstakingly restored the footage to 4K resolution.
SURFER: So, this documentary was already in the works when the Water Bros building came down?
CHUCK: We had already been interviewing all the great people who knew the shop and knew Sid. And in the middle of it, we find out that Sid’s getting kicked out of the building and they’re tearing it down. We always knew we wanted to tell his story. But when you do a documentary, you always ask, “Why are we doing the story now.” This was the answer.
SID: Chuck and I looked back and it was such a blessing that we waited until we did to do this. It was the perfect time.
SURFER: Chuck, I know there are eight Kinnane brothers. What was your role?
CHUCK: I was the co-director with my brother Dan. Kala Moniz was our producer with my brother Will and Jeffrey, my brother-in-law. We basically had a two-hour film but then all these things happened to change the arc of the story. The strike was going on in Hollywood. Sid was out of the building. We were out of work and now a new story presented itself about the shop going away and what it had meant to the community.
We’d be in the studio until 2 a.m. with six editors going, all our brothers and family. Will would fill the cooler full of beer. It was one of the most amazing summers we ever had as a family working together. It was a story we were so passionate about.
Obviously, Danielle (Sid’s wife) was such a special part of this film. Typically, you’d present her early in the film but she’s part of the later story of Sid’s epiphany.
SID: There was so much we touched on. Chuck and those guys just cut it perfectly – a dose of this, a little dose of that. We had five sell-out shows in a row and we have more coming up.
SURFER: I wrote a piece last year on what happens to surf culture as coastal real estate becomes too expensive for the middle class? How are you seeing that in Newport?
SID: It’s already happened here. Anybody who wants to live in the town they grew up in, can’t do it in Newport. Every home on this island is getting close to a $1 million. The original locals who bought a house or have a family house, you see them taking their kids to the beach but everyone else, I have never seen them before in my life. It’s rare in this town for locals to afford it anymore.
CHUCK: All the young people who grew up here are struggling to stay in town.
Related: What Happens When Middle-Class Surfers Are Priced Off the Coast?
SURFER: What is the state of Water Bros now? Are you still a brand, a retailer or what’s happening?
SID: We had no idea it was going to develop. A friend of ours, Jerry Kirby, who was actually the executive producer, purchased the land right next to our shop – a big house and a little lot. We were going to put up a pop-up tent for Christmas sales and Jerry was running into little problems with regulations. Turns out, it’s easier to build something, so he put up one heck of a temporary building and told us to operate it like a pop-up shop. We opened up at Christmas for one day and sold everything in the store. Now we’re there, three maybe four days a week. It’s been a blessing to have that going. We can never get thrown out of this one.
SURFER: Without giving too much away, a lot of the plot is essentially the end of Water Bros. But what I got out of it was a pretty positive outcome – that Sid is still alive, Sid is sober and the spirit is being passed on in the same way Sid passed it on to kids at the original shop.
CHUCK: There was a time when we started this project that I was wondering if we’d have a good ending. It’s amazing. As Logan Hill says in the film, everything happened after he got sober.
Water Brother: The Sid Abbruzzi Story Summer Tour Dates
Village East Angelika Film Center, NYC, NY July 26
Village East Angelika Film Center, NYC, NY July 27
Village East Angelika Film Center, NYC, NY July 28
Village East Angelika Film Center, NYC, NY July 29
Village East Angelika Film Center, NYC, NY July 30,
Village East Angelika Film Center, NYC, NY July 31
House if Independence, Asbury Park, NJ, NY Aug 8
Daytona State College, Daytona Beach, FL Aug 17
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