I saw two favorites at New York Comic Con yesterday – Nichelle Nichols from Star Trek and Stephan Pastis, Pearls Before Swine cartoonist. Stephan was signing books at the GoComics booth and Ms. Nichols downstairs at the autograph section.
I admire Stephan a lot. I interviewed him for my 10 With Tom column once. You can see that here.
I visited MOMA (Museum of Modern Art) yesterday in New York. It was quite crowded, I guess it always is. I feel very at home there, whenever I’m in town, I make it a point to stop by, I say that I’m visiting “my friends,” Picasso, Van Gogh, Monet, etc.
Van Gogh’s “Starry Night” is my favorite. And then I love the Picasso’s “Les Demoiselles d’Avignon.” I think I’ve told the story often; in college we had to recreate a famous painting using the colors that we cut out of magazines. I chose the Demoiselles painting by Picasso. I did a great recreation, the size was about 3″ x 3,” so when I first saw the original at MOMA a few years later, I was flabbergasted at the size of the real thing. I was so used to seeing my original at that small size that the original really threw me. And “Starry Night” is so much smaller when you see it in person. I has such a prominence in the art world that you would assume it would be much larger than it really it.
Went to Wynwood (the Williamsburg, Brooklyn of Miami) for lunch with my friend Harry the other day, Zika mosquitoes and all. Visited the Wynwood walls next to Joey’s, the restaurant we ate in and found that they repainted most of the walls. I didn’t know they did that, but it seems like a crime to paint over that great art. I had come upon the this photo of me in front of the walls a few years ago. I noticed that this great colorful mural was changed you can see it here. Then and now.
I use the image of me and the colorful walls sometimes up above as the name plate of this blog.
Here are a bunch of new murals at the Wynwood Walls and other areas in Wynwood.
10 With Tom
10 questions in 10 minutes
I’ve been pumping out a bunch of 10 With Tom’s for the Huffington Post, so rather than post them all separately here, I’ll link to the Huff Post instead.
I recently interviewed Andrew Farago, who has one of the coolest careers as the curator of the Cartoon Art Museum in San Francisco. You can see that interview at the Huffington Post here.
Willie Geist, NBC newsman is one of my favorites. You can see his 10 With Tom here.
And Kim Zolciak-Biermann, who rose to fame in 2008 as one of the Real Housewives of Atlanta can be seen here.
There’s a great Facebook account called Editorial & Political cartoons, they have almost 85,000 fans. They liked my Hillary cartoon from the other day and they posted it and apparently it struck a nerve because almost 1900 people liked the comic and 2078 people shared it last time I checked. That’s a nice audience for the cartoon. If each share had 100 eyes on it, that’s 190,000 people seeing it. Check out the page, with the current political season, there’s plenty to laugh (or cry) about.
10 With Tom
10 questions in 10 minutes
Marc Tyler Nobleman, shown here, is the author of books including Boys of Steel: The Creators of Superman, Brave Like My Brother, and Bill the Boy Wonder: The Secret Co-Creator of Batman, which helped correct the 76-year-old credit line of one of the most iconic fictional characters of all time. This effort is the subject of the Hulu documentary Batman and Bill, premiering in October.
I had the chance to ask Marc the 10 With Tom questions:
TOM: You rescued the legacy of Batman by taking over 10 years to have Bill Finger proclaimed co-creator of Batman so he has his rightful place next to Bob Kane. Why was this so important to you?
MARC: Because it was so important to so many. For decades, Batmaniacs have clamored for this (rumblings at cons, message board posts) but there was no organized campaign to rally around. I had intermittent delusions that Bill the Boy Wonder: The Secret Co-Creator of Batman alone could lead to change, and if not, felt it could serve as a tangible focal point to educate people and build a groundswell of support for additional efforts. At the heart of the issue, the man who co-created one of our greatest champions of justice suffered from an egregious cultural injustice and it simply wasn’t fair to the Finger legacy, the Finger family, or Batman fans.
TOM: You also talk about the creators of Superman. Who would you prefer to be, Batman or Superman. Why?
MARC: Superman. Power of flight = no airport security lines.
TOM: You interviewed Peanuts voice actors a couple of years ago. That’s such a clever idea, what possessed you to do that?
MARC: Thank you. In between what I am supposed to be doing (writing books and speaking at schools/conferences), I like to fill gaps in pop culture history, particularly the eras I’ve lived through. Everyone has a story, even those who think they don’t. I believe in documenting as much as possible while the principals and firsthand witnesses are still here. The internet has been a boon for the kind of oral histories I do, in terms of both tracking down people and providing a platform to present the result. If there even are any magazines that would run such a niche feature, it’d be there-and-gone; so many fans would miss it. Online, the stories are generally easier to access and available indefinitely.
TOM: Can you draw?
MARC: Certain things! Actually, I’m a lapsed cartoonist. For several years I was regularly licensing single-panel cartoons to publications including The Wall Street Journal, Harvard Business Review, Forbes, and Good Housekeeping. I also drew a book of cartoons for Scholastic. I started cartooning professionally with only one goal: break into The New Yorker. I got as far as having my own rejection folder there, and was proud of it! One day I’ll give it another go.
TOM: If you could spend the day inside any newspaper comic strip (other than Batman or Superman), which would it be?
MARC: Given how often I’m speaking in elementary schools, I already feel like a recurring cameo in Peanuts. But beyond that, Little Nemo in Slumberland for the visual stimuli alone.
TOM: Word of the moment?
MARC: Unconventional.
TOM: What is your favorite book of all time (not including your own)?
MARC: Morality Play by Barry Unsworth.
TOM: What’s the one thing you would like to change about yourself?
MARC: I’m in a constant state of trying to sleep and exercise more. At the moment, I’m doing better than usual.
TOM: What was the best phase of your life, and why?
MARC: Fatherhood. It encompasses all else (love, fun, challenge, responsibility, fear) and ultimately matters most.
TOM: What’s the one thing that people always misunderstand about you.
MARC: Perhaps some don’t realize that my persistence is not only a personality trait but also a bridge to do my job: tell stories to people whom I am confident will be moved.
Thanks for being a good sport, Marc! Marc is one of the great personalities in Tom Falco’s 10 With Tom series.
I was going through some old comics I did in the mid-90s. And I found some from the 1980s, too! I don’t know if I ever submitted them to the syndicates, I used to like the process and the journey, rather than the final destination back then. I would draw and enjoy the process but not send the work in.
I did find a bunch of comics that King Features published in the mid-90s as part of a comic called “The New Breed,” where they were grooming new cartoonists for something bigger and better. But I quit in the middle of it all when my business took off, I didn’t have the time; the road not taken. I regret that now.
Anyway, I found an old letter from King Features and I don’t think I noticed it at the time, but there was a handwritten note that said that they loved my single panel comics and they wanted to buy them at will a few at a time for “The New Breed,” but as a regular feature it lacked a look or style. They said it was “generic.” Their words. They said I didn’t have a unique style for the characters. I wish I had noticed it back then or at least remembered that as I would have worked on my style for single panel cartoons. So to that end, I am thinking of reviving “Paws,” my comic about Tombo the Rabbit and Jacomo the Mole. People loved it when I published daily, I even had a large dedicated audience on Instagram.
Paws is a single panel comic, which I love because I find it interesting and fun to do the gag in such a small space, without dragging it out through panels and in these days of social media, I feel that the single panel is easier to see and read on things like cell phones and tablets.
A vintage Jerry Lewis Labor Day Telethon ad by Hirschfeld. How many Nina’s can you find?
I’ve been vintage comic strip shopping again, adding to my collection. I bought some more original cartoon art. This time I got four Momma strips by Mel Lazarus. Mel recently passed away, so this makes it even more special. And I purchased an original pen and ink King Aroo strip from Sept. 3, 1962, done by Jack Kent the strips’s creator and cartoonist. I just learned about King Aroo recently and love the style and comedy of Jack. I purchased a couple of compilation books of the comic strip last year. These strips are all signed.
The Momma strips are pen and ink originals from 1973. I also love Mel’s other comic strip, Miss Peach. Would love to get my hands on one of them. I’ve seen pre-production pages from a book, but I would love the original newspaper strip.
I would also love an original Peanuts strip, but those seem to be going for $25,00o to $50,000 and up!
I also purchased these new books. Love the shape, perfect to fit comic strips. The Gumps and Krazy Kat.
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