Sophomore Iliana Phirippidis can grab her crotch, beat her
chest, and flirt with her female counterparts in front of thousands
of people, and yet no one will raise an eyebrow or scowl in
disgust.
In fact, she generates exactly the opposite reaction. At every
appearance, the public responds to Phirippidis with a wide grin and
standing ovation. Eight-year-olds flock to her for a hug while
80-year-olds wait in line for a photo-op.
But in spite of all the cameras and fans fixated on her,
Phirippidis is not the target of any of this attention or
affection.
She is merely one of the five students who make Joe and Josie
Bruin the beloved mascots they are.
Every time the student mascots put on their costumes, they
temporarily lose their personal identity and adopt the most popular
one on campus. It drives the fans wild and throws the student
mascots onto center stage. And with an array of homecoming events
scheduled for this weekend, they will be in the spotlight more than
ever.
“Fans love interacting with Joe and Josie, and we feed off
that,” senior mascot captain Jonathan Tiongco said. “I
remember watching the USC-UCLA basketball game my sophomore year
and the halftime show was rocking.”
“Joe and Josie did this hip-hop routine, and since I dance
hip-hop, I thought I could pull it off and decided to
audition,” he said.
The reasons each student has for auditioning may vary, but the
persona he or she must take on is very uniform. The ability to
completely assume Joe or Josie’s easy-going and fun-loving
character is the defining quality of a good mascot. Yet ironically,
it is also the attribute that can be most punishing to the person
inside the outfit.
Fans oftentimes lose sight of reality when they see mascots,
forgetting that they are just regular students wearing a
costume.
“You have to brush it off your shoulder,”
Phirippidis said of the abuse mascots receive from fans.
“It’s the mascot they’re making fun of, not
you.”
These fans would never pick a fight with the actual students but
would attack them as soon as they assume a fictional identity. At
the USC-UCLA football game last year, three intoxicated Trojan fans
almost mauled Tiongco, and he was helpless to retaliate.
“People can do and say stuff to you, but you can’t
do anything back,” Tiongco said. “I would have wanted
to punch them, but I can’t because I represent my
school.”
But when realizing who actually feels the pain of their
rowdiness, the fans are in for a sobering experience. Just last
Saturday, a fan tackled Phirippidis at a Bruin Batch function
before the UCLA-Arizona State football game, driving her into the
ground. Needless to say, the fan was a little surprised to see who
he really brought down.
“My head kind of flew off and I was stunned,”
Phirippidis recalled. “When my head popped off, and he saw I
was girl, he apologized.”
Keeping an eye out for violent and drunken fans isn’t
Phirippidis’s only challenge. As the only girl who plays Joe
Bruin, she must sell herself as the prototypical macho man.
Although she tried out for Josie’s part her freshman year,
those spots were filled, and she was forced to cross gender lines
in order to fulfill a dream of hers.
“I went from being super girly to really manly,”
Phirippidis said. “I would watch how guys would walk or
stand. Now it seems natural when in the suit to be manly and grab
the crotch or walk with a strut.”
Convincing fans that the student playing Joe is just as big a
stud in real life isn’t the easiest sell, particularly for
Phirippidis. She recalls a recent women’s volleyball game
where a group of guys were debating whether Joe was being played by
a female.
“I was doing dance moves and my moves were a little bit on
the girly side,” Phirippidis said. “(Jonathan) said,
“˜Be more manly, beat your chest.’ At the end of the
game, the guys weren’t sure and went up to the cheer squad to
ask.”
Having an attuned audience for every performance is perhaps the
most obvious perk to being a student mascot, yet not necessarily
the most rewarding. Joe Bruin travels with the spirit squad to all
of the football team’s road games, but the extent of travel
possibilities is far wider than that.
In September, Phirippidis was able to go to China with the
spirit squad as part of an international cultural event. That trip
highlighted how much UCLA is promoted around the world, and how Joe
Bruin is a figurehead in that promotion.
Joe and Josie frequently appear at a host of other activities,
from birthday parties to wedding rehearsals. And not surprisingly,
their iconic status invites hoards of UCLA fans armed with cameras
to these events.
“I’ve never taken so many photos in my life,”
Tiongco said. “If I went through all my baby pictures until
now, I’d have way more as Joe Bruin than I do as
myself.”
That’s the crux of playing a mascot. Regardless of how
comic or impressive their improvisations and routines may be, the
student mascots won’t personally receive the public
appreciation. They are supposed to be UCLA’s most
recognizable fan and biggest cheerleader without ever revealing
their actual faces or uttering a word.
“Not only are you the number-one-fan, but you’re
always performing,” Tiongco said. “Whether you’re
walking or dancing, anytime a fan can see you, you’re
performing. Part of the code to being a mascot is never removing
your head in public.”
Of course, having a completely masked identity can be
advantageous as well. “I think anyone in costume loses a lot
of their inhibitions and fears,” Tiongco said.
“You’d do things you wouldn’t do outside of the
suit.”
It’s this element of concealed identity that can make
playing Joe or Josie Bruin so appealing. While the other parts of
the spirit squad must maintain a cheerful demeanor regardless of a
game’s situation, the mascots can be a lot freer in their
expressions.
“I don’t have to be smiling the whole time,”
Phirippidis said. “I can go how the fans go. I can stomp my
foot when the ref makes a bad call. I can look mad when I want to
and go crazy when I want to.”
This attitude reflects how the Joe and Josie suits seem to
foster the creativity and emotion in the student mascots. But in
reality, it is the student mascots themselves who are creating and
emoting Joe and Josie.