“It started with a red flannel hand-me-down Santa suit,” Mark Keller said, “from Sears. Over the years I got high quality pieces to upgrade it. Velvets. And things you might never see, like Santa-size striped socks from All American.”

Mark is this year’s official city Santa Claus, a role he comes by naturally, his uncle and his grandfather having been Santa too.

“I started playing the part about 1985, when I was just out of Warren High School,” said Mark, a Downey native. “My uncle’s kids could always tell it was him, but they never suspected when it was me.

Mark got started as the Chamber of Commerce Parade’s Santa in 1988 “because Marsha asked me to do it.” That would be Marsha Moode, who for years did live commentary on local TV from a Parade-side booth, with guests like Supervisor Don Knabe. All-around genial master of ceremonies and incomparable greeter at the Downey Theatre door, as well as director of the Downey Civic Light Opera, Marsha always volunteered her services at the parade as a public service, as Mark does now.

Mark will ride in the Downey Christmas Parade on Sunday, Dec. 2. “We’ll be the last float in the show, the finale,” he said. “And then on Monday I’ll be the Santa at the Tree Lighting Ceremony at the Civic Center.”

Ever wondered what makes some Santas more real than others? “Spoiler alert,” said Mark. “Three hair pieces. Not two. First the wig, and then I got good advice from another Santa, to get the moustache separate from the beard. So my jaws and chin and beard move together when I talk but the moustache stays put.”

“The make-up is the hard part.” Mark says. “First, a really clean shave,” and Mark indicated his five-o’clock shadow skin. “Then I start gluing on the beard and the handlebar moustache. And the eyebrows. It takes hours.”

But, he admitted, “there are worse characters to play. I could have to walk on my knees, like Jose Ferrer did for Toulouse Lautrec in the 1952 movie Moulin Rouge.”

“God bless my wig man in Long Beach,” said Mark, “he keeps mine in good shape. Babies get their hands tangled in the beard, and of course there’s no eating while costumed for the part. No cocoa in the snowy white moustache.”

Another personal touch: “I even got my prescription ground into the lenses of my Santa wire-rimmed glasses.”

“Doing the Civic Light Operas I met a costumer, and he now hand-makes my costumes for me,” said Mark. “For this year, we have added gold braid,” and Mark pointed to his cuffs. “And I have a specially made leather pouch on my belt that I can get into real fast, for my candy canes. I start out with four dozen. Sometimes a child sitting on my knee will ask for a puppy. I never promise anything, so I say, ‘We’ll see what we can do. But here’s a candy cane for you.’ They’re like Santa’s calling card.”

The theatre is Mark’s passion, especially musical theatre, so creating his Santa as a three-dimensional stage character comes naturally. Mark was the long-time house manager for Moode’s famed Downey Civic Light Opera productions, overseeing all the public audience areas. Later as her technical director, Mark is credited with designing and building the sets for some of the intimate side-stage scenes which were a Moode trademark, notably Jud Fry’s smoke house “lonely room” in Oklahoma.

The Downey Symphonic Society is also dear to Mark’s heart. He is a member of the Board of Directors, and drawing on his years of experience backstage, he acts as stage manager for the Symphony Orchestra’s performances in the Downey Theater. Overseeing all the areas of the property where the performers and technical staff/stage crew need to be in order to do their jobs, his is the invisible off-stage voice you hear saying, “Take note of the Exits, and please unwrap your cough drops now.”

What if it should rain on the parade, which it never does? “I have a Santa Sack,” Mark says, “with emergency supplies. There are ponchos in it, for the kids riding on the float with me.”

How does Mark get to the parade? “I dress at home and drive my car. When I get to where the cops are directing traffic, it’s obvious who I am. Sometime they ask if they can escort me to my place. When it’s over, I walk to my car, and drive home, waving to people as I go.

“I do Santa for the Children’s Christmas Story Reading at the Library,” said Mark, “and the Kiwanis Christmas Breakfast at the Rio Hondo Event Center. Each first or second grade teacher brings a boy and a girl who might not have a Christmas otherwise.”

Mark also does private parties, and occasionally parents will prep him with “the goods” on the children. “Here’s something you can work on,’ I’ll say, taking the parents’ cue.” The children are convinced he really is the Elf who knows when they’ve been naughty and when they’ve been nice.

Biggest present he’s ever brought? “A small two-wheeler bike, not a trainer. Somehow the father and I got it into my sack.”

“Christmas Eve is my big day,” said Mark. “I’m busy from early afternoon till 1 am. So I’m grateful to stay home on the 25th. Although once I did work on Christmas Day. Rick Rodriguez asked me to surprise his son who had just gotten back from duty overseas.”

“And when Joyce Sherwin won the “Rent-a-Santa,” Mark said, “at a Downey Symphony Garden Party silent auction, she asked me if I would come on Christmas morning when her adult children and their families were staying with her. They were all in the p j’s having breakfast, and that’s when she wanted to surprise them. They invited me to sit down, pull off my boots and put up my feet. That’s when my Santa socks showed.”

“Actually,” said Mark, “on Christmas day, there’s no let-down. Just a feeling of contentment. Of completion, of doing my job.”