Gigi Bannister seeking assistance for husband’s care
Reggie Bannister needs no introduction to long-term horror fans. He’s practically the face of the entire Phantasm franchise — from 1979 to 2016 he portrayed the series’ ice cream truck driving, ponytail sporting, Tall Man battling, quadruple-barrel shotgun toting and occasionally acoustic guitar playing antagonist … fittingly enough, also named Reggie.
Today, Reggie is 80 years old and in hospice care in California. And as his spouse Gigi Bannister told Wicked Horror, he could use your help more than ever.
“Reggie’s condition is Lewy Body Dementia (LBD), secondary to Parkinson’s disease,” she said. “Same as Michael J. Fox and Bruce Willis.”
LBD is the second most common form of dementia, behind only Alzheimer’s. The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke indicates that more than one million Americans are currently affected by LBD.
Although stable, Gigi said Reggie’s legs have atrophied to the point they can no longer support him. He is now completely bedridden.
“His arms are atrophied as well and he has pain in all extremities,” she said. “We manage his asthma and breathing issues with treatments several times a day. He requires constant supervision.”
Gigi said she assumed Reggie’s health care coverage wouldn’t be an issue.
“With the VA (Veterans Affairs), Tricare, SAG (Screen Actors Guild), Motion Picture Television Fund,” she said. “Boy were we wrong! They didn’t do a damned thing.”
Before becoming an actor, Reggie was a member of the United States military. He served in the Vietnam War.
Not only did he experience permanent hearing damage during his service, he was also exposed to the highly carcinogenic Agent Orange defoliant.
“When Reggie was first diagnosed was in 2016, our friend and neighbor was diagnosed as well,” Gigi said. “They were kind enough to refer us to Hoag Medical in Irvine, who had a specific neurologist that diagnosed Reggie and prescribed him Carbidopa-levodopa for his tremors.”
The treatment helps patients by releasing more dopamine into their brains — a neurohormone depleted by Parkinson’s, which is needed for actions like walking and talking.
Until then, Gigi said Reggie was continually misdiagnosed with alcohol-induced detox tremors.
“Which I knew from life experience as not it,” she said. “Within hours of taking the Carbidopa, Reggie’s tremors were down. They came back and have gotten worse, but for years the vascular dementia was plateaued.”
Problems with VA coverage, Gigi said, have been constant.
“We get charged for ambulance trips when it’s supposed to be covered under VA,” she said. “The supplies the VA provides are inferior, it requires that we order better or more reliable supplies, such as these shower cloths that all you have to do is wet them with warm water and you can give a bath. No rinsing required.”
She said there are bins all over her home — in pantries, in the laundry room, in bedrooms — filled with inadequate supplies.
“The briefs are so cheap, they tear when you try to pull to adjust them — it’s to the point that pull-ups don’t work any more,” she said. “The chucks (pads) also are thin and tear easy.”
Things took a turn for the worse in February.
“Our caregiver could only give us four hours a day, leaving me 20 hours alone,” Gigi said. “I placed him in Chantilly Lace Manor in Hesperia for a month, until a social worker said there was a Veteran Directed Care program that we could apply to by April 15.”
However, Gigi said that came with a major caveat. She had to provide her own caregivers — not attached to an agency — while Reggie had to be homebound.
As a result, she said the cost of Reggie’s hospice care skyrocketed from $5,000 a month to $38,000.
A Phantasm “phan” — Billy Ferguson, of Crestline, California — launched a GoFundMe campaign to help the Bannisters with their expenses earlier this year.
“Gigi, who has promised to never leave Reggie’s side, is doing everything she can to care for him at home,” the GoFundMe page reads. “However, she is now facing the very real fear of losing essential services, including the oxygen care that Reggie desperately needs.”
Gigi said Ferguson is dealing with his own terminal health issues and desperately wanted to help out Reggie any way he could.
“Here we are, two disabled veterans trying to survive, getting screwed over by the very agency designed to help us,” Gigi said. “He hosts the GoFundMe, but it goes directly into our account where we can pay the caregivers and use it for supplies and equipment.”
As of early May, the campaign has raised more than $80,000 for Reggie’s hospice needs.
Phantasm “phans,” Gigi said, have been nothing short of amazing in Reggie’s time of need.
“If it hadn’t been for them, we would not have made it this far,” she said.
Reggie has always had a special kinship with his fan base, she noted.
“Reggie was kind enough to sign and pose for photos for free when I met him in Toronto many years ago,” one donor to the GoFundMe campaign, Ed Luskey, commented. “Reggie has brought so many smiles and laughs to fans through his Reggie character in the Phantasm movies and fans will continue to discover him and enjoy his acting long after we are all gone.”
Gigi said the support for her husband goes far beyond mere fandom.
“It’s a ‘Phamily’ that we all belong to,” she said. “We’ve been privileged to many of their hardships and milestones, weddings, births and sadly, transitions.”
It seems only natural, Gigi said, that those same fans would likewise share in theirs.
“I asked Reggie early on how much did he want me to keep private and how much to share,” Gigi said. “When he realized how many families were affected by dementia and Parkinson’s disease and cancer, he said he wanted to share as much as possible to help their families.”
Outside of the Phantasm films, Bannister has appeared in cult classics such as Wishmaster and Bubba Ho-Tep. He was also a musician for decades, performing with acts such as the Greenwood Country Singers and even collaborating with the likes of Andy Griffith and Roy Clark.
She said Reggie still laughs, tell stories, watches TV and enjoys ice cream today, adding that he remains sweet, caring and concerned for others — especially her.
“Our deep, unconditional love for each other is immediately apparent to all caregivers, nurses and social workers,” she said.
Despite being born 15 years apart, Gigi said she and her husband are both “boomers” with shared generational values.
“My daughter was born in 1980, she had said she wanted to care for me when the time came,” Gigi said. “I told her that what I’ve seen, what I’ve experienced, I don’t want to push on her. I’d rather she just put me in a home somewhere or let me have in home care.”
Gigi knows that it’s only a matter of time until her husband dies. When he does, she wants just one thing — for him to pass away in his own home instead of a hospital bed.
“I vowed to Reggie that I would stay with him in his home to the end,” Gigi said. “And I’m trying to keep that promise.”
