Comic book lessons

Saturday Leftover Day.

I do not often or quickly link to other sites or bloggers, but todays post is directly linked to Mike 'Doc' Vassallo's post about the work comic artist Jerry Robinson did for Timely/Atlas in the late forties and early fifties. Robinson is best known for his contribtions to the Batman legend (as Bob Kane's 'inker'), his coolaboations with Mort Meskin and to some for his seminal book about newspaper comics. But in the late forties, when he was teaching a night class on comics at the New York School of Art (where he had many later comic greats. like Steve Ditko, Ross Andru and Marie Severin among his students), he asked Stan Lee to come and have a talk - which led to him doing stories for the crime, romance and later horror books Stan Lee edited for Msome of rtin Goodman. I have shown some of these before and said how to me they represent Robinson's best comic work. Mike Vassallo does an overview for all the work and proves my point. Robinson was a major comic book talent, an inspiration to people like Bob Forgione and Steve Ditko and his stories are just plain gorgeous. My favorites are his crime work, which are not only very good - but also very good three or four years before everyone else was very good.

Go and see Mike's blog http://timely-atlas-comics.blogspot.com/2012/11/jerry-robinson-1922-2011-timely-years.html for the full story and then come back here for these two samples.

A Bounce With Greatness

My Great Big American Adventure 6.

Most of Tuesday was spend trying to write the article on my visit to the Daily Show, but I couldn't because my mind was still set on English and it had to be written in Dutch. I kept thinking of great opening lines, but they were in English. At one point I wanted to open the article with: "Don't do a look behind the scenes," they wrote. "We've seen that a thousand times already. And don't do a piece about how the Daily Show is a bigger source of information to young people than the normal news channels." Which was suppose to be my way of getting that information in anyway. But I just couldn't do that in Dutch, so I skipped it. Maybe I should write the whole thing angain in English for you guys. It would probably be a better artcle.

Anway, the visit was great and here were tons of stories invoved, but you'll have to with until the article comes out. One thing I couldn't include in the article, was the fact I did get to interview Jon Stewart after all. Not before the show, of course. You have to be God to get an appointment with Stewart and even he has to send the holy ghost to negotiate. I did see him when I got a tour of the offices, or at least I saw the back of his head behind a cubicle in a glass conference room. "Is that Jon Stewart," I whispered. "Yes, he is," the press ladies replied and immediately pulled me away before he could turn around and see me. After that, while we were standing in the hallway a five foot two guy came towards us and the girls immediately jumped aside. "Hi ladies," he pitched in that high voice he uses whenever he is angry. I sort of felt bad I did not wear a skirt.

After my interview with Steve Bodow I was seated in the audience, front row, very good seats. We had the best view of everyone in the audience of the cameras. Before the show Jon (I can call him Jon) does a question and aswer session with the audince to show he can really improvise to questions he has been asked two hundred times before. I thought I'd throw him a curveball and raised me hand. He pointed to me and said 'yes'. The audience went quiet and rehearsed the question in my head. They had just announced that later in the week President Obama would visit and I thought I'd be clever: "When are you getting Romney?" I said. He put his hands up and said: "Sorry, I am not answering foreigners. The audience exploded. "No, I'll tell you. I have been trying to get Romney to get on the show forever. My people were in touch with his people. I even wrote him a letter. Well, it wasn't really a letter - I cut out some letters out of a newspaper and pasted them on a piece of paper." Again, the audience showed their apreciation. "So I guess what he is saying is - and that's really out of character for a Mormon - he is saying 'fuck that'." If that joke was improvised I'll improvise a hat and eat that.

Todays picture - on the floor of the conference room where the first writers' meeting takes place every day, I found the secret behind their creativity.

In the evening I cooked Dutch food for Craig and Clizia and Michael and his wife at Craig's place. I had chosen to do a trio of Dutch mashed potato dishes. We usually have one at the time, but I really wanted to show what huge effects can be reached with this one principle of adding vegetables and meat to mashed potatoes. I had a carrot and onion mash with fish stick that were fired in butter, one with leeks, egg and bacon and one with i=undercooked belgian andives with smoked pork sausage. Of course I had made to much, or at least I think that's the reason so much was left over.

New York State Of Mix-Up

My Great Big American Trip part 5.

Today disaster struck.

I had planned to go into town early, to do some research before goint to the Daily Show Studios to do a behind the scenes tour and interview with one of the writing producers. Craig had to get into town even earlier, so when Michael Vassallo offered to pick me up to go to the train station, I jumped at the chance of an extra hours sleep. I dowloaded an alarm app to my Ipad and set it to 7 o'clock, more than enough to meet Michel outside of Craig's house at 7.45.

At five o'clock I woke up with a slight headache and realized that I hadn't drunk any coffee the night before. I am such an addict that I get a headache if I go more than 12 hours without caffeïne. I once saw a BBC documentary where they showed that the coffee headache is a real thing and that it is a real addiction, but that it is also over within a week. That is information that is no help whatsoever in the middle of the first night, though. So I took a ibiprofen, my painnumbing pill of choice.

At six I was awoken by Craig and Clizia leaving. I didn't mind, in fact I was glad that I wasn't so drugged out that I slept through that. So I turned over and pulled the covers over me for one more hour of blissfull sleep - I had the alarm, right? Unfortunately I had forgotten to check f the battery of my Ipad was full - so at 7.48 I was woken by Clizia's mom (who is also staying over, from Italy) that there 'was a car outside'. Cursing myself , my Ipad and the electricity company I quickly put on some clothes, packed my toiletries, empied out some of the junk in my bag and added the Ipad and the computer so I could check the interview information that was still in my online mailbox at some free WIFI point.

Michael told me to go to Starbucks and get the cheapest cup and and enjoy free internet acces. Or as his wife said: "Don't take the Frappalazzo for twenty bucks!" The Vassallo's are pretty funny. I sat down with my coffe and went online. After some hassle with loading the 'I accept this without reading it all because I am too much in a hurry' page, I tried to go to my mailbox, but it wouldn't load. I tried other sites and they did. What was wrong here? An how would I get my information from my email?! This interview pays fr the trip and now I can't even do it, because I was stupid enough to trust Steve Jobs to wake me!

Then it hit me. Facebook worked. I typed a message to my friend Sytse Algera in Holland. He is a policeman and a Applefile and he checks his facebook every hour. He might see my message and maybe he could try and contact the Dutch Comedy Channel and get the information to me. At that point it was about 9 o'clock in New York and 3 o'clock in Holland, so he wouldn't be out to lunch> It shouldn't take more than an hour.

Witin five minutes Sytse had reacted, I told him who to contact at The Comedy Channel and soon after I as abe to copy down the information in a new file. Not online, easily accessible on my labtop. Long live the internet and good friends.

Actually, I don't even think he did this because we are such good friends. He just did it because he is such a good and decent guy. He's the type that give cops a good name (and we need more of those). Of course, when I later went to the Apple store in Grand Central Station where they have free WIFI as well, the mailbox did load and they told me because the Starbucks one is notoriously slow. But that's not the point. The point is, evrything went wrong and then it didn't. I guess that's something you learn with old age - that al small problems can be solved with a little bit of common sense and maybe some creativity. And never be afraid to ask for help.

I'll tell you all about my visit to the New York Library and the Daily Show in the next post. But, just in case I can get this online before eleven... you will be able to see and certainly hear me in the audience, so watch! An also, there was a guy of a girl in the audince with a black blouse with white dots, short dark hair and earring and I just couldn't see if it was a man or a woman.

Maybe one of you guys can help me out?

The Great Defender

My Great Big American Trip part 4.

SUnday I spend a leisurely day doing nothing special. Although it meant not meeting my intrenet friend Steven Brower, I just wanted to stay up in putnam and not go into New York. But after speding all morning typing up Saturday's report, I git a bit restless. I called Michael Vassallo if we could maybe get together again. H said he was free and we spend a lovely afternoon in his basement, talking about comics, life and eh... comics. I could easily spend a week there, just going through all his stuff. Only he would have to be out, because you couldn't scan on epage without him running up to you with yet another amazing piece of comics or pulp history. In the end, we talked mostly about our lives by the way and I think I may even prefer that to all the comic book stuff.

That evening I ate with Mike, his wife and daughter (while his son watched the first episode of the new Walking Dead season, which I am sure lot of my friend in Holland would much rather hear about. Contrary to the stereotypical image we Europeans have of the Americans, they all had a great sense of humor, including irony and sarcasm. Even a crack I made about how "I am Dutch, I know nothing!" was met with howls of recognition (and it wasn't even that funny). They confessed to me that may have seen Fawlty Towers a dozen times.

So here is Michael's Wall of Fame. Or at least, on of the six.

This is of course, after I asked Michael to drop the sword and shield and step out of the picture.

Little Penis Post

My Great Big American Trip Day 3.

I have been bad. I leave you with the mother of all cliffhangers about my sketchbook and then when I get back home, I am too tired to post again, so you have to wait. But let me tell you how that ended.

Or no, let me just wait until the end of this report.

Yesterday I went into New York with Craig and his wife Clizia. They have been very good to me sofar, eventhough they have a big presentation coming up on Monday. Their house is filled with books and pctures and - dare I say it - love. It's a joy to be here, apart from the fact I won't be able to get "You're my sunshine baby boy" from my mind for the next few weeks, which is waht Craig sings to their two year old son Griffith all day. And as far as his singing voice goes, let's just say Craig saved the recording industry by not taking up that professionally.

Everything else Craig does, I love. I know there is a lot of competition and even backbiting in the comics reprint industry and not every book everyone does is met with universal approval, but I feel as if I am an outsider and can call the things as I see them. That means there are some books I think could have been better (and I have done so here, even offering scans of material), some books that are gorgeous (and I am looking into more ways of linking you to them) and maybe one company I have stopped buying from, however interesting their books may sound - because they always make a mess of it. And even the Greek God of Messages can't make me to tell you their name. But on the whole I think Craig Yoe, Dean Mulhanny (both at IDW), Fantagraphics (with all their faults), Drawn & Quarterly (where Jet Heer does his Gasoline Alley reprint series), Abrams and Titan (with the Simon and Kirby Library as well as their efforts to reprint Beetle Bailey and Hagar) are the top tier, Dark Horse, Marvel (epecially the Masterworks series), DC (the Showcase series) and Classic Comic Press (Mary Perkins on Stage) a very close second, with a whole slew of publishers who do not seem to be into it for the money, such as PS, Manuel Caldas from Portugal (who does stuff in Portugese, but his website also includes the wordless Dot and Dash about which I will post soon) and the German reprinting of all of Windsor McCay's Dreams of a Rarebit Fiend, which I consider to be more like really high quality fan productions.

I helped Craig with a scan for this book.

But Craig has also done the Little Penis book, which takes some courage. "You know, you will be known as the Little Penis guy from now on," I said. "Why break a lifetime habit?" he replied.

Highlights yesterday included talking to Titan editor Steve Saffel about the upcoming Simon and Kirbt Library book with the best of their Science Fiction stories including all of their work in Race for the Moon). Because I try not to put stuff on this blog that you go out and buy, I may not have paid much attention to those stories, but anyone who liked my posts on Kirby's work for DC in the late fifties should have a look at thiese unadulterated science fiction fables straight from Jack Kirby's mind.

This is a book I also highly recommend.

I also had fun talking to Chris Claremont, the only man after Simon and Kirby to contribute something essential to the Marvel mythos. His revamping of the X-man (based on ideas from Len Wein) introduced a new level of soap opera and intelligence to the comic books. he made Wolverine into the superstar he now is. He changed storytelling by taking dialogue to a new level (after which the caption style that was preferred by Stan Lee seems to have disappeared from the comics) and created so many new strong women characters, that he deserves co-credit on all of the X-men movies and probably some of the other Marvel movies as well. I caught him talking to a young African American woman with her hair done up as Claremont's character Ororo. She told him what an influence the character had been on her live and they talked about the diversity of African types and how badly they were represented still in American comics - as if the skin color on it's own was a character trait on it's own.

Chris Claremont with Ariel. It doesn't get anymore iconic.

I also met and talked with Bob Camp, who was the director of the later Ren and Stimpy cartoons after John Kricfalusi left. "Do you ever see him?" another fan asked. "No, I have never seen him since I took over. When he was fired he asked me to take over the series and I asked him if he was fine with that. He said he was and thanked me for keeping the jobs of all the other artists safe. I also told him that I would finish the six stories he had left unfinished without taking credit and turn them in hte best John Kricfalusi shows [and they were] and he thanked me for that. After which he spend the next ten year vilivying me as the guy who pushed hm out and ruined Ren and Stimpy. He didn't even thank me for not taking a credit on those six. I became a pariah in the industry. If I got news tomorrow that he was run over by a bus, I'd be happy". He smiled ruefully. "Aren't you ahppy you asked?" The fan politely shook his hand and walked away.

The most hated man in animation.

I stayed to talk with Bob, who just happened to be good friends with my friend the Dutch gag and story man Wilbert Plijnaar, who has been living in Los Angeles for the last twenty years, working on films for Disney, Blue Skies (Ice Age), Universal (Horton and the Lorax). He and Wilbert were invited to the ranch of a big time producer to talk about a big secret new project and he typed up a whole report of their trip to the Dutch Comics Creators Forum. Wilbert and I go way back, to when I interviewed him when he was still in Holland doing comics and ended up sleeping with him in the same bed (before he had come out as a serial bedsleeper). Accompanying the interview he drew a caricature of me carrying by chin on a wheel barrow and since then I have a beard.

Bob Camp Also knew and admired Bill Wray, whom I have gotten to know online through our mutual love of Harvey Kurtzman. I may have remarked here, that ten years ago he turned his remarkable talents to painting and two of his paintings have pride of place in my living room. It's a small world. And Craig knows everyone.

Oh and when I got to Neal Adams booth the sketch book was still there. They'd found it and put it aside. I was so relieved as I can only imagine you are. I went on to add even more match stick figures to the book. Even Chris Clameond drew one, although it did take him a while. My ultimate goal would be to have evry artist who comes by here add one as well. I just have to find a way to meet you.

New version! All Typos removed!

My Great Big American Trip Day 3

Today I spend most of my day at the artist alley at the New York Comic Convention. I was picked up at Craig Yoe's place by Michael (Doc) Vassallo and his wife. He drove me to the station where we took the train to go into Manhattan. Immediately after we were seated we started japping. I was just about to go into is bit about my opcoming projects, when a lady in front of us turned around and said: "May I point you to the fact that this is the silent part of the train?" Turns out that the front cabin of the train has been reserved for people who want to work or read of do something else without being disturbed by their fellow travelers. And she wasn't the only one we were bothering. At least two other women were looking over their shoulders at us as wel with their best library look. And I swear, if it hadn't been the quiet part of the train, they would have cheared the other woman on.

So Michael and I sat in silence for the rest of the trip. Michael went to work and I took a cab to the Convention Center with someone else in the line who was going the same way. That turned out to be writer Dave Elliot, who edits Heavy Metal and has been writing comics for more decades than he looked to have been. I mentioned that I was going to the Mad panel and he started to talk about the time when he was negociating with Bill Gaines (the original owner of Mad) about doing a British version. They were going to be allowed to do their own thing with the magazine without interverence (good old Bill) and of course the deal fell through when he died. I told I have been the editor of the Dutch version and he didn't bat an eye.

Surreal. It's like he told me his grandmother was taken ill and I replied that I have six grandmohers who all were dying. Such a total coincidence. Anyway, he seemed like a good guy and as far as I remember a good writer as well.

The rest of the day I met people and talked to them and had some of them draw a little something in a sketch book I have been carrying around since 1993 (starting with Don Martin) - ending up with Neal Adams, who talked to me for half an hour, did a drawing and then I lost the sketchbook.

I hope I left it at his table and it'll still be there when I get in.

I met up with Michael for the Joe Simon tribute panel, and we took the train back together (in the talking allowed section) and had some Chinese food at his house. Doc Vassallo is the greatest expert on the Timely Atlas comics and other stuff from publisher Martin Goodman. In fact, he will have a book out with Blake Bell soon about the history of Goodman's publishing company - with many photo's and illustrations from all sorts of artists. I will try and provide a link to his blog when the book comes out. Michael is a great guy, almost normal - until he takes you into his basement and starts showing you all the stuff and informations he collected of the years.Then he turns into kid showing another kid his toys. Which I don' mind, because his toys are very special and I would so much like to play with them!

I just hope I don't break anything. Or get it lost.

Neal Adams' the guy underneath the sign with his name on it.