Here's a report on that thing I attended over the weekend.
Monthly Archives: November 2009
Recommended Reading
My pal Bob Elisberg writes about How to Hate the President. I'm linking though I don't agree completely with Bob on this one. Like, I don't think George W. Bush was wrong, per se, to cut taxes during a war. Cutting taxes can be a very good thing. I think Bush was wrong to cut taxes without cutting spending, which is difficult to do during a war. Slight difference. I also think he was wrong to shift too much of the burden from the wealthy to the middle and especially the lower class. And I don't "hate" him for that. I just think he did a very good thing for his friends and a very bad thing to the rest of us.
This may be a small, obvious point but I think we've cheapened a lot of words and metaphors lately. Hitler and Nazis used to have a specific historical reference and now they've kind of become freeform insults for anyone you don't like for any reason. If Obama goes out for cheeseburgers, he's Hitler. If my gardener overtrims the hedges, he's a Nazi. If someone ever comes along again who arranges for mass genocide, it's going to be very difficult to compare them to anything meaningful. I'm also bothered by the way some are tossing the word "hate" around.
Foto File
Continuing our dip into old photos I found in my files, here's one I took at a New York Comic Convention in, I think, 1976. The lady at left is Marvelous Marie Severin, who worked for Marvel for so many years drawing Hulk and Sub-Mariner and Not Brand Echh and other comics. Her real specialty, however, was drawing hilarious and insulting caricatures of anyone who stumbled within about ten feet of her drawing table. In recent years, Marie has had some health problems but we're hearing good things about the recovery process.
The gentleman at right is my long-time (like, back to the mid-sixties) friend, Tony Isabella. Tony was then writing and sometimes editing for Marvel so Marie drew a lot of insulting caricatures of him…and she should have been ashamed of herself for that because it was just too easy. Tony has since written for most of the major publishers and he recently authored a huge, popular book entitled 1,000 Comic Books You Must Read, which is a shameless lie because I haven't written quite that many comic books. Almost but not quite. Ergo, there aren't a thousand you must read. But I guess if you view it as 1,000 Comic Books You Might Wanna Read, it's fine. Even then, I'm sure it's only because he wanted to show his impartiality that he left out most of what his dear friend Mark has written. I shall show mine by recommending it anyway and putting in this Amazon link so you can order a copy or three.
Today's Bad Idea
When I was in Vegas this past weekend, I was amazed how bad the traffic was. They've removed pedestrian crossings on The Strip in the most crowded areas. If you cross, you have to use these M.C. Escher-designed escalators or walkways that link some hotels to others via bridges. Even with that, it was bumper to bumper at the intersection of the Trop, the MGM, the Excalibur and New York, New York…and not much better at the juncture of Bally's, Bill's, the Bellagio and Caesars Palace. You'd think it couldn't get any worse.
Apparently, someone took that as a challenge and asked themselves, "How can we make traffic on The Strip even more impossible? We need something that will slow down drivers and distract them." The answer, obviously, is to put strippers in glass trucks and drive them up and down Las Vegas Boulevard at night. Think I'm making this up? Check out the video clip on this page.
I didn't see one of these trucks even though I walked The Strip from about Midnight 'til 2:45 AM. What I did see — and it's relevant to the question of whether these trucks should be allowed — was an awful lot of parents who were toting around very young kids. Even just before I called it a night, I saw children under the age of twelve being led around or if very young, pushed in strollers. None of them particularly looked like they were enjoying the experience. Then again, I wouldn't be happy if I had parents like that.
Today's Video Link
Shelly Goldstein, who I haven't mentioned on this blog for almost two days now, has written a little something you all oughta hear. You can sing along if you like…
Overloaded Servers
Bruce Buschel is an author who is in the process of opening a restaurant. He recently published a list in two parts of "100 Things Restaurant Staffers Should Never Do." I'd quarrel with about five of 'em…and I think the list should actually be "100 Things Restaurant Owners Either Should Never Do Or Should Tell Their Staffers Not To Do." But it's not a bad list for what it is and the comments from readers are even more interesting. I agree with the person who'd be a lot happier if restaurants would just stop playing music completely. Anyway, here's a link to Part One and here's a link to Part Two.
You Were Warned!
We told you last Wednesday that four-day passes for next year's Comic-Con International would soon be gone. They're gone.
Cartoons! Live!
Have you been listening to Cartoon Carnival? My pal Joe Bevilacqua ("Joe Bev" for short) hosts his little audio extravaganza each week on Shokus Internet Radio. You can scurry over to that site, find out when it's on and listen to the world's first radio program all about animation — with rare cartoon-releated records, interviews with V.I.P.s in the field, etc.
And if you're in the Los Angeles/Glendale area, you can be part of the studio audience for a broadcast! A week from today — Monday evening, November 16, Joe is recording an episode with some very special guests and one or two not-so-special ones. They include animation voice actors June Foray and Gregg Berger, Bill Marx (son of Harpo), the great comedy writer Bob Mills, animation writer-historian Earl Kress…and me. It all starts at 7 PM out at the Glendale Library Auditorium and while you're there, you'll have the chance to purchase (and have autographed) books by several of those folks. Check out this page for more details.
Counter Intelligence
I should write something here about J. Nicholas Counter III, who passed away the other day at the age of 69. Here's the New York Times obit and here's a piece I wrote about him here some time ago. Basically, Mr. Counter represented the interests of the movie and TV studios in most recent instances when there was a labor negotiation and/or strike with the Screen Actors Guild, the Directors Guild, the Writers Guild or several other unions or guilds.
If we were writing a screenplay about a guy who did that, could we think of a better name for him than Nick Counter? I know if we were casting the role, we couldn't have done better than the actual man.
Not long ago, I had an ugly exchange with a lawyer who was attempting to screw over some friends of mine on a deal. He insulted me so I insulted him back. He retaliated with the old line about how he was just doing his job…a rationale that I don't think excuses much (if any) one does in this world. I mean, a Mafia hit man is "just doing his job" and that doesn't absolve him of a smidgen of moral responsibility. I also don't buy that if something is arguably legal — or even inarguably — it's ethical. Half the time a person says, "Well, someone's gotta do this," I think, "No, no one has to do that" or that you still can think ill of the person who wants to do it.
If I'd had ten more seconds to think of a reply that day, I probably wouldn't have used a Nazi reference since those are cheap and obvious and if someone's not actually killing Jews, never quite comparable. But what I said to Mr. "Just doing my job" was "You know, I've had hundreds of jobs in my life. I never had one I had to justify by quoting Adolf Eichmann." I later apologized for the low blow…but you know, I didn't draw any equivalence between his actions and actual genocide. I just pointed out that in this world, one is responsible for one's deeds and actions. There's something wrong with any position where you seemingly surrender moral culpability to someone else.
I could never do what Nick Counter did for a living. I certainly couldn't come home from work and proudly tell my family and friends, "Well, I cost 100,000 people their health insurance today so the corporate CEOs can get bigger bonuses!" It's bad enough I sometimes have to say, "Just finished another issue of Groo!" But the former is not an inaccurate summary of Mr. Counter's job description. I don't think he even served the interests of the companies he ostensibly represented, at least not directly. He served their current officers and usually, but not always, that coincided with what was best for the corporations at the table.
The two times I chatted with him, Counter seemed like a decent-enough fellow and I'm sure his occupation, which was not unlike herding rabid feral cats, was difficult. I'm also sure someone else in that position might have done a lot more damage to parties on all sides. If forced to defend it, I expect he'd have said something like, "Hey, someone's gotta do it [and in this case, someone probably does] and I could name a dozen guys who'd be nastier, more ruthless, more destructive, etc." All of that would be true.
But I always felt a little bothered by the fact that he did seem like a nice guy; that he actually perceived the pain his employers often caused and the sometimes-needless (as in, bad for them as well as labor) stances they took. A man like that may be preferable to one who'll just see it as all-out war and never mind the casualties, but he's more difficult to understand and maybe, when necessary, to forgive. I guess the nicest thing I can say here is that at some point in the future, I'm sure we'll have one of those all-out warriors in his place and we'll long for the days of J. Nicholas Counter III.
May he rest in peace…and I sure hope St. Peter is not locked in negotiations with the man.
Face Time
Tom Richmond is, as you probably know, the star caricaturist of MAD Magazine's new generation. Recently for a project, he did caricatures of every member of Congress…and as you also probably know, there's an old and glorious (almost patriotic) tradition of caricaturing our elected officials so who could object to that? Well, someone at Apple could. They reacted like he'd drawn them all nude and fornicating, which perhaps would have been more appropriate, given their frequent behavior. Read all about it.
How I Spent My Day
While in Vegas, I did not attend any of the ninety-seven thousand productions of Cirque du Soleil currently playing in that town. That had to wait 'til my return to Los Angeles.
Woke up at 9:30. Caught the shuttle to the airport at 11:30. The plane took off at 1:20 and landed a bit ahead of schedule at 2:12. Carolyn met me at the airport and we went for a late lunch, then out to Santa Monica Pier where a Cirque show called Kooza is currently packin' 'em in. This one is different from the others because…well, I guess it isn't. You've got your haunting music, your colorful (but sometimes bizarre) costumes, your incomprehensible and ignorable plot line, your intermittent clowns and your people doing physically impossible feats.
There are three women who bend and balance with amazing poise and flexibility. There's an amazing juggler. There are four tightrope walkers who'll have you holding your breath. There's a lady who flies about via trapeze. There's a gentleman who balances on a precarious perch, a dozen chairs high and does one-handed handstands. There's a pickpocket. There's a unicyclist who balances a lady all over his body while unicycling. There are people who leap on a teeter-totter and send others hurtling through the air. Then there's this thing, which they call The Wheel of Death…
I dunno. Even if I were a trained athlete with the physical prowess of those two guys, I'm not sure I'd want to make my weekly paycheck by being in or on something called The Wheel of Death. Carolyn had a better name for it. She called it The Double Hamster.
In person, of course, it's even scarier than it is in a teensy YouTube embed. During an act like that (or the tightrope daredevils who close Act One), I find myself reminding myself: These folks do this eight to nine times a week on stage and goodness-knows-how-many-more in rehearsal. Just because it's the first time I've seen it doesn't mean it's the first time they've attempted it. Still, there are moments — including one "slip" I suspect was planned — when you find yourself wondering if you're about to see a human being maim themselves before your very eyes.
I was a bit disappointed by the last Cirque troupe that made its way through Southern California. That show, which is now in Tokyo, was called Corteo and it wasn't quite as jaw-dropping as some others I've seen. Kooza is a lot more fun. It goes from here to Irvine, San Diego, Portland, Seattle, Vancouver, Houston and Miami — in that order.
Now to go unpack…
Foto File
I got out of the habit of doing this and I'm now resuming. Lately, I've been unearthing and digitizing old photos from my files, mainly of folks in the comic book field. Here are three great friends who are no longer with us.
The gentleman at left is Don R. Christensen. There have been a couple of Don Christensens in the comic book and cartoon industries. This one, who sometimes signed his work "Don Arr," is best known for writing countless comic books for Dell and Gold Key — mostly funny animal stuff, though he occasionally did an issue of something like Magnus, Robot Fighter. He was a storyman in animation, including a stint in Bob Clampett's unit at Warner Brothers, and he wrote and sometimes drew a lot of great silly comics for publishers like Standard and ACG.
The fellow in the middle is Zeke Zekley, who was best known for his many years assisting 'n' ghosting for George McManus on the newspaper strip, Bringing Up Father, aka "Maggie and Jiggs." McManus wanted Zeke to take over the strip after he died but when that day arrived — in a scandalous tale Zeke only told me about nineteen times — someone else got the gig. Zeke went off to do other strips on his own, including a Dagwood-like one called Dud Dudley. Comic strip bylines were never more colorful than when you could read Dud Dudley by Zeke Zekley. Later, he ran a company that produced "commercial" comics for advertising and educational purposes, and he employed the other two men in this photo.
At right is Alfredo Alcala. That's right: This photo runs the gamut from A.A. to Z.Z. Alfredo was, of course, a star artist of the Filipino comic world who came to America and graced hundreds of our comics, mostly ghost titles or Conan the Barbarian. He just may have been the fastest comic artist who ever lived, especially if you factor in the sheer number of lines he put on a page. I thought he was a brilliant talent, quite apart from his sheer volume, though I don't think the U.S. comic industry ever knew quite what to make of him or where to put him.
This pic was taken — I think by me — in my front hall around (I'm guessing) 1980. The thing on the wall behind Don's head is a painting that C.C. Beck did for me of Captain Marvel, Mary Marvel and Cap Junior standing at attention before Shazam. I still have the painting. I wish I still had these three people around.
Today's Video Link
The talented Shelly Goldstein (not to be confused with the many untalented Shelly Goldsteins out there) turned me on to this nugget of Broadway gold: Nine minutes of rehearsal footage from the original 1975 production of Chicago, starring Gwen Verdon, Chita Rivera, Jerry Orbach and Barney Martin, directed by Bob Fosse. Also in there is a stunning dancer named Charlene Ryan who is now wed to the guy who draws Groo the Wanderer. The video ain't great and the audio ain't grand but it's amazing that this even exists. Certain things were changed before the show opened and wowed them in New York.
One of these days, the currently-ubiquitous concert-style staging of this show will fade from favor and view, and we'll see a revival that promises to faithfully recreate the original Fosse production. Not that what they're doing now is bad in any way but I'd sure like to see it, at least once, the way Bob did it. Here's a little taste…
Back In My Room
I just walked until my feet asked for political asylum, then hopped into a cab and came back here. Amazingly, David Siegel was not driving it.
Everything was packed, it being Saturday night…an awful lot of couples, an awful lot of alcohol consumption, even by Vegas standards. I was darn near the only one on The Strip without one of those yard-long drinks that look like some glass blower has been doing steroids. There was a major pedestrian sigalert where the pavement snakes through Harrah's Carnaval (why do they spell it that way?) Court.
Before I reached the populated areas, I was on a side street where I made eye contact with a woman who looked so much like a stereotypical hooker, I wondered if she was a police plant or something. She wasn't a bad-looking lady…or wouldn't be, I suspect, if she hadn't laid the make-up on with a trowel. I looked at her and then she looked at me and she surprised the hell out of me when she informed me that Congress had just passed the Health Care Reform bill, 220-215 with one Republican voting yes and 39 Democrats voting against.
No, I made that up. She didn't say anything. I just shook my head "no" and she shrugged like she expected it. I guess they generally expect that.
I walked through the Palazzo, the Wynn and the Encore, and I noted how the classier a hotel is, the more outta-place all those slot machines and video poker displays seem. I didn't lose any money gambling, possibly because I didn't play. Them days is behind me and I'm not entirely sure why.
It's suddenly feeling like time for bed. From Las Vegas, this is Mark Evanier saying, "Good night, Internet!"
More Vegas Blogging
Mark (that's me) had a fine time today at the Valley Vegas Comic Book Festival. Nice room. Nice turnout. Fun panels. Otherwise, not a lot to report.
My pal Tom Galloway and I had a dinner at a local casino called Ellis Island, which is famous for ridiculously cheap food. The place was packed because of it and because of some sort of Star Wars fan gathering that was dining there — lots of folks who like to dress up like Storm Troopers plus "little person" actor Felix Silla, who I guess played an Ewok in something. Anyway, Tom and I had Ellis Island's famous steak dinner which for $6.99 gives you soup or salad, a piece o' beef about the size of Felix Silla, garlic string beans, your choice of potato and beer or root beer brewed on the premises. I don't drink beer or root beer and for allergy-type reasons, skipped the soup or salad and the green beans. Even passing on those, it was a fine meal. In fancier places, I've paid four times as much for shabbier meat.
It's almost Midnight here. I've been writing for three hours so it's time to go out and take a walk. See ya later…