Riggs was born in Peoria, Illinois. 1920. His father was a mechanic. Riggs’ Rigs. Such an embarrassing name to young Riggs that he needed to believe he was different, that he had a special magic inside, that he could be someone else. At eighteen he escaped on a bus to Hollywood, unable to conceive how he could be anyone else in Peoria, unable to conceive of becoming anyone else unless someone told him who to be and gave him transformative lines to speak. He started wearing a fedora. This was the extent of his personality at the time.