Born September 15, 1967 on the U.S. Military base in Stockholm, Sweden, Vincent Guerrero is the son of Manny Luis Guerrero and Luiza Juanita Batista, star members of the world famous Argentinean Cirqe Royale de Feilo circus troupe. Father Manny and mother Luiza hold the world record for distance in the tandem trapeze launch. Both the military surroundings and the circus lifestyle would greatly contribute to Vincent’s upbringing.
As with any young child, especially one raised near the performing stage of the circus tent, Vincent found the show fascinating. When his family was not on duty, they lived and breathed the circus. Although their military service paid the bills, performance was in their hearts. The gleam of amazement in the eyes of a child was a sight Vincent grew up around.
One of the aspects of circus performing that Vincent values most is the way it can bring people of all ages together; a circus show is one of the few places where children and adults alike can gaze in awe as if living for the first time. The sights and sounds of the big top instill a youthful wonder in the hearts of even elderly viewers. “It is truly something of magic,” Vincent claims, a tear of joy and admiration running down his creamy mahogany cheeks.
From the tender age of seven, young Vincent knew that he wanted to dedicate his life to entertaining people. He dreamed of starting a circus of his own, dedicated to his parents, and to those many talented performers who would hold him above the grandstand railing to watch the lion tamer as his receding hairline was dictated by the incisors of a surly lion. Throughout his teen years he planned and honed his vision of the greatest circus ever created.
However, three days after his 23rd birthday, a shocking announcement read over the radio. The nation had taken to war. Still a young man, Vincent understood that this was a time where all able bodied men would rush to join the fighting across Europe. Although his experience with the military pushed him to value peace and civility, he knew that he must do his part to stop the advance of the German army, for great justice.
Over the next three years, Vincent served in tours of duty across much of Europe. He had reached the rank of Lieutenant in the Army’s 25th Infantry Division by the end of his first year of overseas duty.
Little did Vincent know that an important chapter in his life was to unfold in a small Eastern European fishing village. He arrived with some of his buddies during a weekend off, but left with his heart in the hands of a young girl.
Priscilla Romano, originally from New York State, assisted as a Peace Corps volunteer in a local medical clinic, and happened to be on duty when Vincent and his buddies walked by the complex window. According to Vincent, one glance in the window stopped him dead in his tracks. There, inserting an IV into a badly wounded patient, sat his future wife.
After the war, Vincent and Priscilla were married. Vincent joined, and Priscilla re-enlisted in, the Peace Corps. The next five years they spent together in a remote village along the eastern coast of Africa, working to aid in the efforts toward building schools and municipal swamp gas refineries. It was in construction of these refineries that Vincent met with his third love – business. Fortunately, he would be able to combine his love for the entertainment, Priscilla, and business later in his life.
After several decades of career hopping following discharge from the Peace Corps, Vincent and Priscilla finally settled in the city of Wallaceville, Ca. It was here that Vincent and Priscilla started their business. Thinking back on the things he had loved in his life, Vincent realized that his three loves, as stated, were entertainment, Priscilla, and business. Priscilla was a beautiful and well-endowed woman – the envy of all Vincent’s peers – and Vincent himself was a born entertainer. It was only natural that they go in to the film industry. Thus, BangLove Productions was born. Throughout the cold war era, Vincent and Priscilla started in many of their own films, and earned a solid reputation, earning several Woody Awards for excellence in their genre of filmmaking.
Unfortunately, Priscilla’s ties to Eastern Europe caused her name to come up often in the communist witch-hunts so prevalent during those years. Though several court subpoenas turned up nothing on the couple, and they were determined not to be a red danger, all of their tapes and equipment were seized; their film making days were over.
Financially secure, yet high on broken dreams, Vincent and Priscilla moved back to Vincent’s birth town of Stockholm, where he finally opened his circus. It was not to be the grand show he had envisioned, but he found it satisfying. His was a small circus company, composed mainly of independently wealthy volunteers. They traveled Europe, performing free shows for orphans with diseases, and inhabitants of low-income housing and underprivileged elders. I am Jack’s sense of Vincent’s contentment.
Finally in the mid 1990′s, Vincent gave the rights to his circus to student and confidante, Ryu Sakisumi. He had very much enjoyed the years of performing, yet felt it was time to move on, sharing his passion with the world in other ways.
In 1997, Vincent moved one last time back to the states, residing in Cottondale, Ca. He found success in a training center for aspiring circus performers. Through this venture, he could once again experience his love for business and the circus, though in a way more suiting of an older man. Priscilla also found success in her own practice of medicine.
Vincent currently resides in Cottondale with his wife Priscilla, consulting for his circus training center, and writing part time for foohonpie.com, an internationally syndicated web site.