Will Aldis

IN HIS OWN WORDS

My life can be defined by a series of name changes. I was born Charlton Ogburn III in Alexandria, Virginia. My father, Charlton Jr. worked for the State Department, then quit, started writing novels, and left. I was about nine months old. My mother changed my name to William Fielding Ogburn, Jr. After my uncle and Sociology Professor at the University of Chicago. Then she took me to my grandparents, Graham and Dorothy Aldis, noted children’s poet and novelist. And left.

William Fielding Ogburn Jr., aka Billy, spent the next five years in Lake Forest, Illinois, simultaneously spoiled and un-noticed.

My mother remarried, Roy Porter, aka Step Satan, who changed my name to Porter, Billy Porter, and moved us to Park Ridge, Illinois. In an afternoon, I went from being fabulously wealthy, with my own playhouse, to a middle class neighborhood and a pink house. Pink. I was not a happy Billy Porter. Especially since there were three other Billy’s in my third grade classroom and I got stuck with Will. Now Will Porter.

Will Porter. Who was essentially booted out of Evanston High School, who salvaged himself in an easter prep school, Hackely, God bless it, went on to Ripon College and soccer, and gigging in clubs singing and playing the git-ar, and editing the college newspaper and recreationally drugging all over central Wisconsin.

Then off to grad school, Miami of Ohio where I made great friends, got my masters in teaching and leaned relatively nothing.

Then three years of teaching high school English, a story in itself. Then off to Second City, a trip, indeed. I became an actor, known not as talented but “energetic”. Met my wife, thank God, and moved to LA to be an actor. And failed. Kerplunk!

But! Had a son. And a daughter! Figured out I better make some cash and with the help of an old Second City mate, Steven Kampmann, wrote and directed Stealing Home with Jody Foster and Mark Harmon. I worked non-stop for years. Some movies good, some movies, woof. Couch Trip. Back to School. High Spirits. Clifford. Avenging Angelo. Black Cadillac.

In the middle of all this, my step-father, aka Step Satan started going crazy, another story in itself, and I had no choice but to change my name, again. This time, to honor my grand-parents, to Aldis. Will Aldis. Confusing most, alienating some.

Then, by the time I was sixty, the old film career seemed to be winding down. My kids had grown, and I was fat. Fat and depressed. Luckily I rallied and reinvented. I lost a bunch o’weight and I became a novelist. It was like coming home. In short order, I have written three; Likely Wyatt, The Rascal Prince, and Owen Nobody. More to follow.