The story of ‘Big Chick’: the bodyguard Prince would ride up on stage
For all Prince was an absolute force of nature in a musical sense, if you were to consider him physically, he was hardly an intimidating presence. Short, slight, and tender, standing at only five feet and two inches tall, this was a man who had to make up for his small stature by being an inimitable persona, and, boy, did he. However, ultimately, being an icon is not going to save you in a fight, so he needed to draft in some reinforcements.
That call was answered by Charles ‘Big Chick’ Huntsberry, the man mountain who came to Prince’s aid and served as his bodyguard throughout the most prolific period of his career in the 1980s. Becoming a staple of the Purple Rain Tour and famously piggybacking the star to the stage every night, he almost gained a cult following of his own within the Prince fandom, and even took on a cameo role in the movie Purple Rain. It was a perk of the job, after all.
Whenever you laid eyes on ‘Big Chick’ for the first time, there was no denying that you were meeting a figure you would never forget. Standing over a foot and a half taller than Prince himself, at a whopping six feet eight, this was a man who most definitely made up for what the singer lacked in physical height. Not only this, but weighing in at over 400 pounds, he was clearly not a guy you would want to mess with, because, quite simply, we all know who would win.
Of course, this kind of structural mass is part and parcel of what comes with being a bodyguard, and if anyone had the stereotypical look down to a tee, it was ‘Big Chick’. Yet, naturally, the second part of the job description revolves around working with people every waking moment, and, in this sense, you couldn’t find anyone nicer than him.
Throughout the Purple Rain Tour, ‘Big Chick’ became synonymous with having a wicked sense of humour. With a thunderous laugh that sounded like it could have awoken the dead, he was the ultimate alpha male who could lead the pack with brutal force, but do so with a grin and a joke and, naturally, a curse word or two thrown in between. In many ways, this was how ‘Big Chick’ and Prince embodied the very same principles, as although they may have physically been at opposite ends of the spectrum, they both delivered in bucketloads of personality.
Another area in which the bodyguard could be likened to ‘The Artist’, perhaps unexpectedly, was a pretty bold sense of fashion. One fellow bodyguard recounted the story of him attempting to design uniforms for all the entourage on the Purple Rain Tour, made up of “suits that were double-breasted, purple satin with white belts”. Let’s just say it wasn’t the look of the season, and especially in Prince’s eyes, who, after one look at his bodyguards lined up in their new gear, burst out laughing and called them “Friar Tuck and his Merry Men”.
These were the kinds of characters who were absolutely best suited to working with an icon, because they were equally as inimitable on the surface, but also helped to keep his feet on the ground, except when he was being carried to the stage, that is. And although ‘Big Chick’ was only one chink in the Prince armour—he tragically passed away from heart failure in 1990—his story and impact can never be left out of recounting the tales of those iconic days. You messed with Prince? You also messed with ‘Big Chick’.
