18

SUNDAY

K.I.T.T., the Batmobile, the General Lee. More than cars, more than popular lunch-box fodder, these are vehicles that talked to David Hasselhoff, hunted the Penguin, and eluded Boss Hogg, respectively. But George Barris, the man who designed said automotive apotheoses, can’t be pegged as simply a slave to the Hollywood money machine. George Barris is a futurist: He created the X.P.A.C. 400 Air Car, a sleek disc that glides on a 5-inch cushion of air. George Barris is an aesthete: He made the Emperor, a purple piece of passion rightly billed as “the world’s most beautiful roadster.” George Barris is, well, a bit of a slave to the Hollywood money machine: He birthed the Car, a satanic sedan that haunts a desert town in the 1977 James Brolin horror flick of the same name. But most of all, George Barris is not that Gong Show guy, Chuck Barris. Point out to George that he, too, is clearly CIA material when he appears at the Carquest World of Wheels beginning at 11 a.m. (see City List for other dates) at the Washington Convention Center, 801 Mount Vernon Square NW. $15. (202) 249-3000. (Josh Levin)