Monthly Archives: May 2003

Trina Robbins is — in no particular order — a wonderful illustrator with a clean, expressive style…a superb historian who (sadly) is about the only one ferreting out the history of female cartoonists…and a charming, funny lady. We hereby recommend a visit to her website.

Here's another one of these. Rick Phillips is trying to identify the following movie…

Sometime ago, in the 80's I believe, I saw a movie that took place in World War I. Two young men were arrested and told they had a choice of going into the army or to jail. They chose the army. During a battle in Germany they got scared and decided they would rather face a court-martial then fight so the tried to desert. However, they ran into the enemy and found the Germans' secret weapon. A giant zeppelin. Since no one else knew about it they hid on board it and destroyed it. Instead of being kicked out as cowards they were hailed as heroes. I have no idea what the name of the movie was and neither do my friends who saw it with me. There were no big name stars in the movie when it was released. The movie was only at the theater for 2 weeks so I know it didn't make any money but I enjoyed it would like to see it again. Please let me know if you or anyone knows the name of the film and where I may get it on video or DVD.

I can't help him. But I'll bet someone reading this can.

Did Walt Disney ever live in Asheville, North Carolina? His official biographers say absolutely not. But some folks down in Asheville — especially the ones selling a drawing table they claim was once his — insist he did. Here's a news story from that town that claims "the question remains unanswered," though the evidence for Walt in Asheville seems pretty much non-existent.

Bryan Dawkins writes with what seems to be the solution to the query that Steve Thompson had earlier. It's Breakfast With Les and Bess, a 1985 TV-Movie starring Dick Van Dyke and Cloris Leachman. Mystery solved!

Once upon a time — back when new artists rarely turned up in the pages of Marvel Comics — a kid named "Barry Smith" abruptly drew an issue of X-Men. And not too well, I might add — though in hindsight, it looks a lot better today than it did then. He was a Kirby imitator at first. Then as Marvel gave him other gigs, he began branching out from Kirby, attempting designs and fascinating perspectives and styles of storytelling. In record time, he seems to have found an individual artistic identity and developed a style so original and fully-formed that others would soon be imitating him. This occurred not long after he'd gone from being Barry Smith to being Barry Windsor-Smith, and you can see some of his recent and splendid work at his website. Do this now.

Clear your damned voice mail so I can leave you a message!

Frank Rich explains why the fervor over things like The Matrix is distracting us from important matters.

Occasionally in comic-type magazines but also in publications and advertising of all sorts, Mitch O'Connell has distinguished himself. He has a fresh-yet-retro, clean-but-complicated style. Matter of fact, he has many styles. You can see some of them over at his website. Enjoy the purty pictures.

Weblog software such as I use to maintain this site works like this: As I post items, the software builds a page of that day's postings arranged from latest to earliest. It also builds the front page which displays the last few days of postings.

Previously, the front page displayed a whole week's worth of postings but I've been posting a lot lately. Seven days of messages made for a long page…too long for folks who are on slow connections. So now the front page only displays four days of postings. To read earlier news items, click on the right arrow at the bottom of the page.

If that doesn't make sense, don't worry. All you have to know is that when you come here, read down and keep clicking the right arrows until you come to messages you've read before.

As you've probably heard, Democrats in the Senate are filibustering some of Bush's nominees to the Judiciary. If you're interested in the history of this tactic, and in what it might mean if Republicans reconfigure the rules to eliminate it as an option, John W. Dean explains.

I probably should write a little more about Tom Terrific. A lot of the cartoon shows of my youth do not, to put it simply, hold up too well. I can sometimes retain affection for them in the same way that I remember the enjoyment of Franco-America canned spaghetti when I was ten. That is not necessarily faint praise for a cartoon because obviously, its primary purpose is to please children. If it achieves that in its time and bores the hell out of us as adults, it is not unsuccessful: It did what it was supposed to do. There are a number of cartoons — all the Warner Brothers and Jay Ward productions, most of the MGM and Disney, the early Hanna-Barbera offerings, a few others — which amused me then and which amuse me now. With some others — like most Walter Lantz productions, Terrytoons, and Mister Magoo, to name a few — well, they just aren't as good as they used to be. I can respect the obvious skill involved in some of them and occasionally laugh at a bit, but to me as an adult, the appeal is largely nostalgic. The later Popeye cartoons, for example, are like Franco-American spaghetti…only not as funny.

Which brings me to Tom Terrific. I was five when the Captain Kangaroo program debuted on CBS. (Years later when I worked with Bob Keeshan on a project, I told him I vividly recalled watching the first episode. He said he was flattered but I got the idea that he was just being polite; that everyone in my age bracket tells him that, and that he doesn't believe it. In my case, I really do.) I liked the Captain and Mr. Green Jeans and Dancing Bear but only up to a point. Years later when I watched some old kinescopes, the only part of the show that held my interest was the daily installment of Tom Terrific.

There was a certain simplicity to the show that was irresistible, though I have to wonder if it wouldn't be highly resistible today; whether the absence of backgrounds and color and real music wouldn't cause a lot of kids to feel that someone had slipped them a cartoon made in the back room of the 99-Cent Store. But everything else about it would work today. Tom was a corny but lovable hero, utterly devoted to his dog, the lethargic Mighty Manfred. The bad guys were unbelievably sinister and/or looney, and there was a fine sense of Silly over the entire enterprise. The cartoons were also bang-bang short and their rapid pace made a nice contrast to Captain Kangaroo's gentle, slow-paced delivery. Best of all, the cartoons had a unique voice and style — maybe the first Terrytoons that ever did. I wish whoever owns them now would release them. If I understand, they're controlled by Viacom, which has leased the home video rights to Universal, which has no intention of doing anything with them. If and when they do, maybe you'll see what I saw in Tom Terrific.

This may just be a matter of awkward wording but this item on The Comics Journal's fine weblog, ¡Journalista!, makes it sound like Doonesbury's move to Slate is why the formerly-free archives of the strip now cost money to access. I believe there are two separate business relationships here. Trudeau seems to have made a deal with UClick My Comics Page to add his library to their service. This is a subscription deal where you pay to have your favorite comic strips e-mailed to you or available for online browsing. That Trudeau has also made a deal to move what was formerly the rest of www.doonesbury.com over to Slate is, as I understand it, a whole 'nother deal. (I mention this because weblogs complaining about this seem to have read it as Microsoft now charging to read old Doonesbury strips online. I don't think Bill Gates gets a cut on that…except, of course, to the extent he gets a cut on everything any of us does involving a computer.)

Remember a day or two ago, when there were reports that the Department of Homeland Security had improperly been used in an attempt to track down those AWOL Texas legislators? Well, if that tale interests you, Joshua Micah Marshall has been all over it. And he ain't letting up until he digs up enough to get the mainstream press to judge it a major story — something he helped achieve with Trent Lott's remarks about segregation.

And I don't mean to suggest that this is unfair or wrong of Marshall. No matter what public figures do, it doesn't seem to become a scandal until the press is willing to accept it as such, which is why Clinton's Whitewater deal was, and Bush's baseball stadium isn't.

While we're clarifying anecdotes, Steve Thompson writes with a question I am unable to answer…

I recall seeing a TV movie (or taped stage play. Seems like it was on video as opposed to film), possibly made for PBS, in which Dick Van Dyke appeared as a man who had fought in World War II. As he was heading off to war, he lamented that he might die without ever reading the classic works of literature. At the train station, he purchases a copy of Anna Karenina. On the trip, however, he meets other guys and plays cards. He carries the book all through the war. Afterwards, the next time he finds himself in a train station, he remembers but does not have the copy with him so he purchases a second copy, which doesn't get read either. By the time the story takes place, he has a bookcase full of copies of Anna Karenina, a book he's never even read. I don't think this was a Van Dyke and Company sketch but it might have been. The PBS part is strong in my memory, though. Seems like mid-seventies. Do you have a clue what this might have been?

No, I don't. But I'll bet someone reading this does.

Shelly Goldstein, chanteuse and Beatles historian extraordinaire, writes to correct the story I alluded to of John Lennon getting thrown out of a Smothers Brothers performance…

You must check with me on your John Lennon arcana.

At the famous Troubadour incident (during the "Lost Weekend" of Lennon's life in late '73 til early '75 when he and Yoko separated and he lived with May Pang) Lennon was never "thrown out" of the place. He was drinking his beverage of choice at the time, Brandy Alexanders, which tasted like milkshakes to him, but packed a dangerous punch. It was a big important show for the brothers and by time they hit the stage, Lennon was shitfaced. He was with Pang and, I believe Harry Nilsson, no slouch himself in the carousing depatment.

Lennon heckled during the show; not to be mean, just because he was so wasted. At one point he went into the women's loo (toilet in 'Murrican) and came out with a kotex pad on his head. These things happen to rock stars on a bender.

The waitress tried to get him to quiet down so the Bros Smos could get through their now chaotic show. Lennon looked shocked at her reprimand and said, "Do you know who I am?"

She replied, "You're an asshole with a Kotex on your head."

Lennon later felt horrible about the whole thing, sent a massive apology to Dick and Tom, which I don't believe was ever accepted. It was a horrible, embarrassing night that Lennon felt awful to have caused. But he was never thrown out.

Well, he should have been. Actually, following our trend here of fact-checking anecdotes — or at least seeing how many different versions there are out there, I just did an Internet search for various permutations of the words, "Lennon," "Troubador," "Smothers" and "Kotex" and found a wide array of reports: Lennon was tossed out, he wasn't tossed out, it happened there, it happened at another restaurant after they left the Troubador…one even said it was a Tampax, not a Kotex. I, of course, believe Shelly. But it's amazing how many different ways this story is told.