Q&A With Theodore Wallbanger

In October of 2025, DUMBO Press published Smile Central. The author has remained anonymous, working under the pseudonym Theodore Wallbanger. This is our attempt to learn more about the man behind the mask.

DUMBO Press: Can you share a little bit about Smile Central, and what the publication of this book means to you?

Theodore Wallbanger: Cue Don LaFontaine narration…In a world with Smile Central dancing the streets, I am beyond ecstatic. Within the book… oh, sorry… we can pause the Don LaFontaine dub now… as I was typing… within the unscented pages of this book, there are whimsical tunnels granting Smile Central audiences portholes into my soul. Move to strike as non-responsive.

To answer your query, this BOOK captures a sequence in time which shifted my direction in life. This book means life. Smile Central will always be the catapult-dynamite stick I can reflect on if I need to find a low point during my existence. The joy in these words, which were created by me, allowed me to survive and to always keep going.

DP: What does your writing process look like?

TW: Not many souls recall The Benny Hill Show. My process is 38% Benny Hill. It is a blend of madcap, whack-a-do, unbridled energy sautéed with subtle pornography and prayer. I sense agitation amongst the hecklers.

DP: How would you describe your book in three words?

TW: Muses are Magical

DP: What element of this book are you most excited for readers to experience?

TW: The grappling rivalry between Sundance and Butch when honey-dipped bullfrogs… apologies, I was reading from my dream journal.

In my gut of guts, I am most excited for readers to find joy. Imagination celebration has been scoffed at far too long. When I chalk in my sketch pads down by the polluted ocean, I sense imbalance. Many vessels are hamsters on wheels slithering toward their final dream curtain.

Break on through to Smile Town by unleashing the inner smile in you.

DP: The letters in Smile Central are signed off differently each time – can you talk about your reasoning behind that? How does this connect to your identity as a writer?

TW: Variety is one of the rare smiles we have on life's path. Being nonsensical is a sticker I wear with honor. For I am a pseudonym pogo dancing on a planet spinning in space. Nobody wants to eat chocolate cake for every meal for 97 years in a row, 96 maybe, but not 97. I originally signed, "Nakedly yours, T-bone and all of my Demonic Love Sprackle," and opted to tone it down a tick. R.E.D. was relieved.

DP: When you look back on the past few months of working on this book, what emotions arise for you?

TW: Let me tell you, DUMBO Press, do you mind if I call you DP? Oh right, inappropriate, apologies. Let me tell you, DP, to be shunned by family hits on so many emotions I was almost forced to find an outlet or become a bikini cocktail waitress and DP, just between us, my cysts would melt my ability to earn.

I never considered it "work" while inhaling the edit process for Smile Central. I broke out laughing on so many occasions, I destroyed a wicker vibrating massage chair and I am svelte beyond a reasonable doubt so this was a complete shocker.

DP: The letters in this book were presumably meant for one person (R.E.D.). What does it mean to open this correspondence to a large audience in the form of a book?

TW: Opening this vault of chaos grants admission to those willing to peak into the circus-like world where I rampage and masticate but not in that order. The word was masticate, pull it together.

There is a bit of foreshadowing in these madcap letters with murmuring of a book. That is a fun word, murmur. I might of stitched those thoughts to pulp in order to tame my narcissistic self. One of my many selfs. What a fun word, "selfs", elf with a slithery "s". Apologies, where were we?

DP: Smile Central is an epistolary work of real letters sent to your muse, R.E.D, while she was incarcerated during COVID. Can you tell us about your relationship with R.E.D.? Why were you inspired to write so prolifically to her, and what does she mean to you today?

TW: Painting the vision who embodies R.E.D. to anyone would seem inappropriate. In keeping with tradition, I can say that the incarceration of R.E.D. set me free to be me.

You know when a puma frolics in lavender fields with other fancy cats longing for that one seductive meow firecracker. Well, R.E.D. is not the puma frolicking in the lavender for R.E.D. is an unpredictable shimmy shake in a world teeming with banality.

Prolific inspiration, otherwise known as PI, stemmed from the gods, so to speak. When my shunning sentence was locked in place I was released from the constraints of not being authentic.

R.E.D. has fantastic timing, her nickname was metronome when she was in kindergarten. As if we were fire flame matching one another, R.E.D.'s sentence commenced with mine.

Judgement is not in my wheelhouse, for I am not omnipotent nor am I omniscient. I am a big fan of words starting with "omni." I do have empathy which is another trophy for my collection along with whimsy and generosity.

DP: Teddy Wallbanger is a pen name and, sometimes, it seems like your writing creates even more of an enigma of Teddy Wallbanger the more I read. Do you see yourself as enigmatic? Why do you write under a pseudonym? Does writing ever expose the truth of the self, or does it only create more questions, more illusions?

TW: We are not taking any more questions at the moment.

Ok, now we are. I see myself as a bearded chalker who often slips words into pages to release the turmoil from my past. Much like a massage therapist for unruly buffalo will crack billiard balls on weekends to release their pent up agitation.

Teddy Wallbanger blossomed to protect the smile souls who still actually associate with me, but then I ratted myself out to everyone to reveal I was just like Samuel Clemens but totally different.

In closing up this multi-tiered question, I would… excuse me… I had egg sandwiches for dinner…let me open a window…. the pseudonym has created more questions…definitely more questions.

DP: What do you believe your letters accomplished and can you talk about that more generally i.e. what effect your writing can have in the real world? Should we think of R.E.D as a specific person, or a kind of stand-in for us, the audience?

TW: The teeny-tiny mini movies I was allowed to create enabled me to continue. So, thanks for getting locked up R.E.D., she will love that.

When a family who framed unconditional love as unbreakable shuns their own blood, it is a wake-up call for the soul.

R.E.D.'s unfortunate set of circumstances dovetailed with my mid-life hiccup and here we are. What's that? Becky! What a sweet ray of sunshine this dedicated follower of mine is. Excuse me a moment, DP.

Becky, I have leftover Denny's pancakes but I tossed chicken nuggets and blended the monstrosity with four syrup packets.

Ok, I'm back now, apologies. This will all unpack itself if the reader of this sentence opts to gain entry into Smile Central. To answer your question, Bob, I mean Parker and the DP team:

If there is one life vessel who can finish Smile Central without a subtle chuckle, I would be disturbed but then, within about nine seconds, I would forget about it. Life is a tour. I like to pack smiles now because I know ultimately everyone has a moment where their life hits the skids. The core ingredient I thrive on now correlates directly to empathy so it cannot be meatball sandwiches.

DP: How did/do you see your relationship between yourself and the prison complex? Knowing that officers were reading your letters, did that influence what you wrote? Did you ever have issues getting your letters inside?

TW: Interesting query to investigate my relationship with the prison complex. Also, it was jail and there is a BIG difference, buddy boy. Tickles are not allowed in either. I only say this because my faux toupée was blown back infinite times by R.E.D. as she demanded I memorize the intricate differences between PRISON and jail.

There was a certain dangerous element I felt my letters were going to pass through while being watched by the suspicious eyes of the sheriff's department. Within the sacred walls of Smile Central, there is an unhealthy dose of "phucks" but with an "f"… oh, you get it.

So, in that vein, I suited my words up with simulated leathered armor in the form of profanity. Also, I would like to add … never mind. It will all make sense when you go to (please insert marketable link here, but don't distribute in any form or fashion to a one Hector Geekowski on Candy Crunch Lane).

I emailed four snippets of smile sunshine once a day over a four month stretch with a few personal days off for good behavior.

R.E.D. was a champion, tiny-golf pencil letter writer and I have a bundle of her words which are not in Smile Central because the spotlight should only be on my Wallbanger's words. If you heard the tone of my voice with that last statement it would read more comical than I feel it does without my voice in your head hole.

R.E.D. told me under oath and with a pinky swear that some badged workers of the incarceration system would not distribute her mail daily. The meany one with the hair. Certain days R.E.D. received a bundle of fun from me while other days would be what is now tagged as "the tumbleweed days."

Not really, R.E.D. would not agree to this last statement. This should be redacted from all future use with any focus group testing along the lines of forced comedy.

For all intents and porpoises, I feel R.E.D. received 96.9% of the intended or implied prose which I imagine I created. There will be an audit of the Sheriff's official records to compare my snappy taped together email scraps which I imagine are still authentic sans the food stains.

DP: This work obviously turns narrative on its head, not just from word to word but across the pages. Do you see the way you use language as a device to oppose existing structures in society? What mechanism, what purpose do "new" sentences have?

TW: Mama always said don't play ball in the house. Sorry, flashbacks to Brady Bunch re-runs are hitting hard on this particular Ash Wednesday because I feel like it is Sunday. To answer your specific question, counsel, I would say my device is frivolity and light. Sure, there are rules with language but there is also freedom with form. I enjoy skinny dipping in the ocean of language which creates both shrinkage and bliss.

Everything is new when I use a top-of-the-line Zamboni to clear my mind hole slate so it is able to breathe, allowing words to fly. Avoiding structure gained my alter ego royal admission into Shunnedland. I now exist to be a shunned pseudonym campaigning for the plight of the discarded using the spell-casting power of my silly beatbox hemlock words.

DP: We're curious to know about your history with writing, as you have one of the most unique voices in the literary scene today. How did your voice develop over time? What authors do you consider influences?

TW: Gracias for the high praise. When I was simmering inside my birth vessel's womb, I was infused with a dreamscape potion of honeysuckle snap dragon perfume which my birth vessel was addicted to and with which I suffered consequences. One of the consequences was a mysterious, baritone voice box…. oh wait, I must apologize. When you said unique voices. You get it. How embarrassing.

My voice has been copulating with MAD magazine as a social experiment I have performed with myself for over 38 years but not more than 78 years.

Rafael Zepeda was a college instructor with a spirit voice shimmering in peace. Ray was the first instructor who took the entire class to Hof's Hut for our weekly "educational" meetings. The class was creative writing.

This moment in time was my secret entrance into everything. You always hear Unchained Melodies, you never hear about Unchained Words. I love to let my word banks rampage.

At the end of the day's magic, it is only myself I am entertaining. Laughter is my zany addiction. I am most grateful that my addiction is not consuming dirt.

Let's also toss Bukowski, Richard Scarry, Hunter S. Thompson, Lane Smith, Alfred E. Neuman, Raymond Carver, William Burroughs, and Shel Silverstein into the party as some of my influences. Dang it, now I really want to flip through Scarry's Best Word Book ever.

DP: Sometimes the line between authors writing for themselves and writing for others can be blurred. It's not always so clean cut. Where do you fall between the two? In other words, if no one had read your letters, would that have affected your approach? Would you have written them at all?

TW: Let me turn down the music here so I can focus. I danced between both of these lanes you mentioned as I entered the trail which evolved into Smile Central. Logic would tickle us with mention of the need for R.E.D. to be incarcerated for the letters to flicker start.

These mesquite-flavored words spilled from my being because I thought I was rescuing someone from the horror show experience of dealing with shame, isolation, and misery. It turns out the letters I crafted were rescuing me from my own personal extinction. The universe spins mysteriously. I found a better mantra which has rocket launched me from "SANGRIA" into the blissful, more-refined, "KEEP GOING."

DP: We'd love to hear more about the intersections of reality and fiction in Smile Central. Some of the sections are so specific it's hard to believe they aren't taken from real life. Where does that relationship between imagination and documentary fall for you? Do you see all writing – not just your own – as at least somewhat autobiographical?

TW: My life's journey has felt like a beautiful film, except the shunning part. Oh crap, here we go again with the shunning. Who said that?

Ray Zepeda, remember Ray from a few questions ago? Keep up, would you?

Ray revealed to his bright-eyed scribes, costumed as students, our stories would be richer if we had the ability to retell our experiences with vividness. This is not a quote. I did not use quotation marks as a result. Clearly, I am able to follow rules in the literary jungles riddled with guffaw and peppered in lies.

There is great joy and relief now with Smile Central available worldwide (please insert marketable link here, but once again I implore you not to distribute this marketable link in any form or fashion to a one, Hector Geekowski on Candy Crunch Lane). I am now free to defrag the Smile Central mental brain box flesh drives with new butterscotch dementia disguised as creativity.

DP: What has always struck me about your writing is that you seem to have this indefinable balance between simply writing for the fun of it and taking it wildly serious at the same time. So much of literature – both contemporary and historically – is serious. What is the role of humor in your life, and why is it important that literature retains an ironic criticism and relationship to itself? Do you see your own work as satirical?

TW: The studio audience would like to answer this one. As Alfred E. Neuman says, "What Me Worry?"

There is no effort in a smile. Bitterness, jealousy, rage, and shunning all take effort in order to gain infantile levels of control. Just one moment, my psychologists are clamoring around my outdoor spy cameras.

Apologies for the personal delay, I was coaxed into signing a series of NDA's.

Without humor, my turbines misfire. In my silly-stringed days of youth, we were not exposed to the term "depression." I think "sad" was a softer comfort blanket for the bummed vessels holding this name badge.

All of this to say, my only experience with bummer frown mood situations is when I hear someone else say they are depressed.

Holy mustard tarts these Canadian #222's are fire. My mood frequencies range in stratospheres shared with velvety unicorns. I found an abandoned Tioga motor van with a crate of expired Tylenol with codeine aka #222's.

I would like to apologize for all these distractions. This is my first interview of the day. My gal Friday is not here today because, as mentioned above, it feels like Sunday to me but it must be Ash Wednesday so I gave her the day off which she accepted only after I forgot I never employed a gal Friday. It was an expired taco buffet held on a Tuesday when I met a gal at T.G.I.F.'s for sundaes.

Oh, wait a minute, that's chalk on my forehead. Today is not Ash Wednesday, let the record reflect this, please.

DP: I believe in one of our email exchanges, you simply said, "I love language." Can you expound on that? What brought you to see language as something loveable and, perhaps, shapeable?

TW: As a wee Teddy, I was allergic to bark barks … I mean dogs. I owned a goldfish. Tiger, my goldfish, died. Over time, I owned a steam ship full of goldfish who all met death down our familial bleached toilet with a ceremonial "air bugle" synchronized flush.

There were deplorable reading-comprehension stats during the late 70's. A movement arose with the realistic goal of engaging child vessels with immersion in literature.

This is when the cold, prickly, and warm fuzzy sticker friends were dispatched to elementary schools in certain impoverished neighborhoods of America.

It was in this fragrant housing where I absorbed words. Mostly from my Speak n' Spell because there has always been a mystical chill quality about me which creates roadblocks to success. At least I still have my vintage Sizzler jacket when I made it into their combo Malibu & Hibachi Chicken Hero Club.

If you smile or laugh when you write, buy yourself some unicorn balls to suck on. You made it. I drip fun into my words using thimbles.

Complaints in reference to my work do not ruffle the luxurious cyst-riddled skin located near my unshaven upper thighs.

When you love yourself, everything else falls into place within the smile zone of life. Blah, blah, blah … this guy sounds like he needs a Hot Pocket (said with a Jim Gaffigan inflection). Look it up.

Language is a casserole of witchy goodness. Short form, long form engage the serotonin floodgates for me. For a select grouping of readers, my torturous process triggers migraines or frown faces. This pleases me because it does take a special someone to be able to decipher the tragedy which lies beneath my prose-pop lemon drops.

Language will never abandon me.

Oh, son of nut punch, here we go again with the shunning.

Are we almost finished here? I think the Pope is on the other line, calling to grant my dispensation for another nine weeks. Horrible gout and if I watch church television via the satellite, I experience seizure-like incidents. See how I did this, everything is shaping up nicely I feel. I sure am thirsty.

DP: You've said before that you're sober now; Teddy's character is a raging alcoholic. Alcohol and literature have a long, tumultuous history. Now that you're sober, can you look back and reflect on how alcohol affected your creativity, for better or worse? In what ways, if any, does it continue to influence your writing?

TW: Back the truck up kids, poppa has a brand-new bag. Hiccup. I "was" sober for over 827 days out of respect for a fallen cousin who lost his battle to alcohol. After the passing of Fedrock, I continued my sobriety. When Smile Central released in October of 2025, I booked an unbelievable Portugal adventure with loose change and a Reverend on a mission not approved by Theologians.

If you have never savored the pleasant seduction of a Super Bock beer. Whoa, whoa… this sounds like someone needs a meeting.

Everybody simmer down. I am balanced now thanks to these weighted Depends underpants … super-duper balance edition.

R.E.D. insures my attempt at sanity as part of a marshal law pact with one another. The tracking device she installed somewhere in or on my person still remains a mystery to both of us, snicker.

Sangria is mentioned ad nauseum in Smile Central. I anticipate mass revolts from the Amish community. Erase that, I love Kingpin. Alcohol will always be a whisper in a forest for me. Imbibing Port in Porto with a Burger King flickering in the distance, well, it was a magnificent purge of what is enjoyment vs. addiction. Cocktails?

The influence of alcohol as it pertains to my writing will penetrate pages only if I spill a bottle of rubbing alcohol on my Underwood whilst cleaning old boy.

DP: Going off that, do you believe a colorful life is necessary for writing that is true and exciting, or is imagination enough in itself to write compellingly?

TW: Woof! I feel like we have landed in the rule picnic side of sauce again. Imagination nation spits the fire font fuel I crave. Every life spirit grooves to their own independent temptress. Hold me, who said that?

DP: Music, live concerts, musicians, and bands are all a huge part of Smile Central. How has music been a part of your life and, more importantly, how has music influenced your writing style?

TW: You said huge. Yes, music frames my life. There is music on now, can you hear it? If you were here you would enjoy this song. "Nellie the Elephant" by The Toy Dolls is a banger. Banger is a sweet word.

Not to brag about how seasoned I am but, I experienced Guns N' Roses at The Whiskey in the 80's, man!

Live concerts connected me to the artists until Napster emerged. Then I dug a well under bunker cave retreat. Fast forward to now where I sip Lucky F*CK energy drinks in crocheted pants while I serve up fresh font to the masses.

The masses being the imaginary universes including the submerged secret lairs which only five of the six therapists know about, currently. It all depends if George reads this.

Please make note Lucky F*CK is not a paid sponsor, yet.

I only listen to G.W.A.R. This is not true. My music is as eclectic and/or enigmatic as I make myself out to be. A quick sample of the range might be Debbie Gibson to Carl Orff's sensuous cantata, Carmina Burana. I aim to be a literary jukebox bursting with fun-tacular intentions.

DP: Who is the real Teddy Wallbanger and what's next for him?

TW: Divulging this would sink the casual yet scientific importance of remaining a pseudonym.

The future holds wonderment. I exchanged a power storm of warm fuzzies to commission a Real Doll version of R.E.D. only in the event R.E.D. is unavailable for any particular book signing tour. We are splitting costs with the Girls Gone Wild Rebooted tour but R.E.D. is an unbridled pixie who shan't be tethered or chalked upon according to current orders.

Super vibrant high-fives to the rock stars populating DUMBO Press. You have all made one cotton candy cloud farmer's dream come true.

KEEP GOING