Last Saturday evening, the Comic Art Professional Society had its annual banquet at a swanky country club out in Northridge. The honoree was the great comic book illustrator, Gene Colan.
The room was lovely. The food was excellent. There was an exhibit of Gene Colan artwork. There were guest speakers (including myself, Gerry Conway and Marv Wolfman). There were videos recounting Gene's life and featuring tributes from dozens of his colleagues, including Stan Lee, Joe Quesada, Jim Lee and Mike Carlin. There was a turnout of CAPS members eager to applaud Gene, and there were past CAPS honorees present, including June Foray and Stan Freberg. Nothing was missing.
Well, almost nothing. Gene and his lovely wife Adrienne weren't there. They were — I just Mapquested this — 2,812.67 miles away in Brooklyn, New York. CAPS wanted to fly them out but Gene's doctor felt it would not be a peachy idea for him to travel at the moment.
But Gene and Adrienne were there…via Skype. CAPS President Pat McGreal and a batch of other folks figured out how to pipe the Guest of Honor in via a video hookup. There were occasional audio problems but for most of the event, we had the Colans on a video screen, participating from his studio in Brooklyn.
A particularly lovely moment occurred when it came time to bestow the actual trophy. Co-presenter Sergio Aragonés held one up here in California and Gene thought he'd have to wait for a FedEx delivery to actually hold it in his mitts. But unbeknownst to him, Adrienne had the inscribed statuette and she handed it to him at just the right moment. Gene was overwhelmed by that and by the entire evening.
As I said, Gerry, Marv and I spoke. Gerry talked of how much he'd learned from having Gene draw his stories. Marv discussed the wonderful working relationship they enjoyed on Tomb of Dracula. I mumbled something about how Gene, who we were all watching on that screen, now had twice the viewership of Jay Leno.
Bill Morrison was an ideal Master of Ceremonies. Everyone had a great time. The only way it could have been better is if we'd actually had Gene and Adrienne there…but I have to tell you. I've been to some events of this kind that would have been a lot better if the Guest of Honor hadn't been present.