One Man’s Junkyard Paradiso

For a brief moment, Cedric Denkins thought he’d died and gone to heaven. Junk heaven, that is.

He awakened one morning to see strangers dumping tons of scrap metal, old cars and other discards into a vacant Los Angeles lot next to where he’s lived in his battered 1963 Chevy truck for the past four years.

“Holy Toledo!” whistled Denkins, 53, who ekes out a living scavenging collectibles in the old truck and selling them at swap meets.

“Somebody’d pay $800 or $1,000 for that old gas station pump sitting over there. See that three-seater glider swing? It would go for $250. And look at those antique lawn chairs and street lights and signs.”

But it turned out the junk being dumped last month wasn’t really junk. And it wasn’t being dumped, either.

The castoffs were actually props that Warner Bros. studio workers were turning into a phony junkyard next to Boylston Street, in the shadow of downtown Los Angeles’ high-rise district. In the frontyard of Cedric Denkins, the junkman.

The setting will be the focal point for the upcoming superhero movie “Steel,” starring basketball star Shaquille O’Neal. Producer Joel Simon said the film is based on a comic book character and will depict O’Neal as a 7-foot, 2-inch crime fighter who wears armor of steel and uses the junkyard as his headquarters.

Denkins can relate to that. Living on the street and patrolling scrap-metal yards in his sputtering truck has given him a thick skin too.

“I sell at swap meets at Pasadena City College and the Rose Bowl,” he said. “They’re the only places I can get to in my truck. Coming back, it’s downhill all the way.”

A classically trained pianist who studied music and architecture at Los Angeles City College, Denkins worked as an architectural draftsman until quitting five years ago to open a furniture and collectibles store.

“But I never did open it. I guess I’ve been on the streets longer than I should have,” he said. “Someday I’ll have a storefront.”

Denkins watched with interest as 50 studio workers carefully arranged the two acres of junk. Some scraps were welded together to creature freewheeling sculpture. The workers used scale models and blueprints to position the rest.

The movie makers have watched Denkins with interest too.

“We should use his truck in the movie. It’s great,” said set decorator Donald Krafft.

There might be room for both the junk truck and the junkman in the film when junkyard photography starts today, said production designer Gary Wissner.

“I like him and his truck,” Wissner said. “We might move him down the street a bit and get him in camera range. He might end up in a scene.”

Some of the movie junk--things like the old gas station pump--have been rented from prop supply companies. But other pieces were scavenged by the production crew from salvage yards. And workers said they might give some of those things to Denkins when filming ends.

“Yeah, I’d be interested,” Denkins said.

In the meantime, he’s enjoying the ambience.

“I’m waiting for someone to see all of this and and come up and say, ‘Why, Cedric, you’ve expanded,’ ” he said with a laugh.