Monthly Archives: May 2016

One of the more satisfying aspects of Donald Trump's candidacy, at least to folks like me, is that it's exposing the phoniness of so many public moralizers. As Francis C. Beckwith notes, Mike Huckabee used to say that "Most people exhibiting crude behavior or language aren't doing anything illegal, but they're contributing to a culture that is abrasive, rude, obnoxious, and just plain mean." But he's fine with Trump.

Here's a 40 minute video — the first in a series being produced by the National Cartoonists Society — in which great cartoonists are interviewed. The subject this time is the great cartoonist Mort Drucker and he's quizzed by John Reiner, who draws the newspaper features, The Lockhorns, Howard Huge and Laugh Parade. Drucker is one of those cartoonists whose work causes other artists to stare with open mouths and mutter, "How does he do that?" He explains a little of how he does that in this conversation…

Ricky Gervais, a comedian I usually find brilliantly funny, wrote this piece about people being offended at jokes, primarily his. I would have been more impressed if he'd just written, "Hey, if you don't like what I do, don't watch me." Instead, he tries to blame "political correctness" and people who aren't smart or hip enough to understand what he's doing.

As I think I wrote here recently, the term "politically correct" seems to me to becoming pretty meaningless since so many people use it with such different definitions. One which irks me is when people employ it in to try and deflect or suppress criticism. Another is when their definition is that they should be free to say whatever they want without anyone disagreeing or making personal judgments about them.

My concept of Free Speech includes your right to make racist remarks or jokes but it also includes my right to say I think you're a racist. And my umbrage might not be because you're being "politically incorrect." It might be because I think you're a racist. Actions have consequences and so does speech.

Like I said, I usually find Gervais quite hilarious but that doesn't apply to every comedian out there. More and more, I hear the ones who don't evoke the laughter they seek blame their audiences for being too "politically correct." Well, maybe it's that. But maybe they just aren't as funny as they think.

Here's another review of L.A. Now and Then, the show I saw last Friday night. The final performances (hopefully not forever) are this weekend and there are still some tickets left…but not many. Details are over here. It's a fun revue, especially for someone who grew up where I grew up…in the city where no one grows up.

I may be away from the blog for the rest of the day. I'm directing cartoon voice actors this morning and then there's a meeting and a script I have to finish and somewhere in there, I need to make up about three hours of sleep I didn't get last night. But I will return to you soon and maybe you can find something else on the web to read. I hear a few people have posted things about Donald Trump…

True Facts About The Owl…

It's now been a little over six months since the second of my two knee operations…so time for a report. The knee's doing pretty well most of the time. I have problems getting up out of low chairs or car seats. I have trouble getting up after I've been sitting anywhere for a long time. And every once in a while, things hurt more than I'd like.

But other than that, the knee's doing well. I'm walking better than I have for a year and certainly better than I'd be walking now if I hadn't had them swap out the old knee for a new one. I'm still not driving much and especially not when I'd be in a lot of traffic but I hope to drive more in the coming weeks.

My assistant John has been driving me about and I've been taking a lot of Uber and Lyft cars — mostly Lyfts. There's not that much difference between the two services but at least in my area, Lyft seems to show up sooner and I've had a higher percentage of interesting conversations with Lyft drivers. Last Friday, my Lyft driver turned out to be a longtime comic book fan and an artist, not of comic books. His name was Jerry, he recognized me and we talked about Jack Kirby all the way to my house. A very pleasant ride.

The other day here, I told the story of how I was hired to write a cartoon special/pilot based on the works of cartoonist B. Kliban. You may recall that I started work on it and then we found out that the folks who'd hired me had somehow neglected to acquire the rights to do that with Mr. Kliban's material. Several of you wrote that you found it hard to believe that a professional company would make a mistake like that. Well, check this out: James Franco began work on a screen adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's novel Blood Meridian. He cast it and made a distribution deal and began shooting test footage but guess what he'd neglected to do.

A sketch from Your Show of Shows with Sid Caesar, Imogene Coca, Carl Reiner and Howie Morris…

Neal Gabler laments that none of Donald Trump's followers seem to care that he's a serial liar. Here's my question: How often do Americans ever change their minds about a politician because he or she says things that aren't so? Lies are something that are only bad when the other guy tells them. When your guy fibs, it's for a good cause or it's a misunderstanding or he was misinformed by his staff.

If you loved Reagan and hated Bill Clinton, "I did not trade arms for hostages" was not a lie but "I didn't inhale" was solid proof that "Slick Willy" was a congenital prevaricator. And when Al Gore said he invented the Internet, that was proof he was a liar (even though he didn't say that), whereas George W. Bush and Dick Cheney never misrepresented anything about Iraq.

One other thing: Gabler says "If you look at Politifact, the Pulitzer Prize-winning site that examines candidates' pronouncements for accuracy, 76 percent of Trump's statements are rated either 'mostly false,' 'false,' or 'pants on fire,' which is to say off-the-charts false." That's true but misleading. A more correct way to put it would be "If you look at Politifact, the Pulitzer Prize-winning site that examines candidates' pronouncements for accuracy, 76 percent of the Donald Trump statements they chose to analyze are rated either 'mostly false,' 'false,' or 'pants on fire,' which is to say off-the-charts false."

I think Politifact is pretty good and pretty fair but they do pick and choose what to scrutinize. They don't evaluate everything anyone says in public.

I'm taking Sunday off.

Okay, I guess I posted a second post about Trump this weekend…and this would qualify as Numero Tres. But if he can flip-flop on everything else, I can flip-flop on that.

Whether you're panicking or gloating, please stop sending me links to polls that show Trump winning or coming close to winning in November. In case you haven't noticed, it's not November.

In every single presidential election in recent memory that has not involved an incumbent — and even some that have — there were polls months earlier that showed the candidate who eventually lost clobbering the candidate that eventually won. Before Election Day, there will be plenty that are not to be taken seriously.

We don't even know half of each presidential ticket and already, people are sure they know how those tickets will fare.

Polls this early are pretty meaningless as to who'll win. They arguably may tell us something significant about the mood of the electorate at this point in time but just at this point in time. You know, when pollsters get rated — when someone looks to see how accurately they predicted any given election — they're judged by the closeness of their projections the day before the election, not on how they did in May.

I do think that the Democratic nominee will enjoy a tremendous advantage in the Electoral College. That's not a prediction. It's just recognizing that some states are almost certain to go to one party or another, and the ones that are almost certain to go Democratic total a lot more electoral votes than the ones that will go Republican. That's how the real game is scored.

While I'm at it: I have one pro-Bernie friend who keeps e-mailing everyone, including me, side-by-side photos of Sanders rallies with huge turnouts and Clinton rallies with smaller crowds. He thinks this proves Sanders will win. I think it proves my friend is good at finding photos of some Sanders rallies that look more populated than photos of some Clinton rallies. He wouldn't have to send these things out if he could send out actual delegate counts and projections that look more promising for the Sanders campaign. And I say that as a person who would not be unhappy if Bernie did somehow pull it off. Yeah, crowds matter but numbers matter more.

Last evening, I attended the premiere of a new musical revue. If you live in or near Los Angeles — and especially if you grew up in or near Los Angeles — you're going to want to go see this. I was born and raised in Los Angeles and while that's not a prerequisite to enjoy this show, it sure helps.

It's called L.A. Now and Then and basically, it's songs and sketches about Los Angeles, mostly past and a little bit present. There are segments about disco, the old wrestling matches down at the Olympic Auditorium, partying on the Sunset Strip in the sixties, kid show hosts on L.A. television, The Black Dahlia, the 1962 Dodgers, Walt Disney, Helms Bakery trucks and more.

The show was conceived and directed by Bruce Kimmel, who wrote much of the material with contributions by Michele Brourman, Grant Geissman, Paul Gordon, Karen Gottlieb, Shelly Markham, Wayne Moore, Adryan Russ, Doug Haverty, David Wechter, Bruce Vilanch and the Sherman Brothers (Richard and Robert).

I'll tell you more about the show in a minute but first, let me tell you about the venue and the cast. This production was assembled under the auspices of the Los Angeles City College Theater Academy and it's on the L.A. City College campus in an intimate theater there. This is the same place where Bruce Kimmel staged that superb production of Li'l Abner that I raved about here.

A few of the cast members are experienced pros like Robert Yacko, who I've seen for years in theater and on TV, or past graduates of the L.A. City College theater department. Most of them are current students there — and there's a nice touch of irony that, for example, the three ladies singing about Helms Trucks were born well after the last one had disappeared from L.A. streets.

I'm going to list the entire cast here because (a) they deserve it and (b) at least one or two of these folks are going to go on to notable careers and someday, someone will Google their names in connection with some movie or TV show and they'll be directed to this site.

Here they are, alphabetically: Apri Audia, Jenny Bacon, Sarah Barnett, Paolo Fregoso, Alexis Jackson, Bedijou Jean, Prisca Kim, Michael MacRae, Kole Martin, Shawna Merkley, Lamont Oakley, Kasper Svendsen, Elle Willgues and I've already mentioned Robert Yacko. Most are current students. Here's a short video of them in action…

I'm a bit hesitant to single performers out because, being a lousy reporter, I'm not completely certain which name to put with which performer in some cases.

Still,  I'm pretty sure Kole Martin was the guy who did the great physical comedy as a Travolta wanna-be who longs for disco to return and who also scored as an effeminate wrestler in the Olympic Auditorium sketch. I think Alexis Jackson was the stunning lady who did the great dance moves throughout and especially in a musical salute to shows like Shindig and Hullabaloo.

I'm confident in stating that Michael MacRae was the Uber driver in a very funny sketch written by Bruce Vilanch. (The character drives for Uber but is also a member of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association so he's also one of the tiny handful of people who vote for the Golden Globe Awards.) April Audia, Sarah Barnett and Elle Willgues were surely the ladies who sang so well about the Helms trucks and April delivered a touching, slightly outraged monologue about the demise of the old Pan-Pacific Auditorium.

Other folks were great too but I'm not as certain of their names.

Oh — and I'll mention one particularly wonderful moment. There's a song in Act One called "The Whimsy Works," performed expertly by Mr. Yacko. It's about Walt Disney and it was written for this show by one of Walt's two favorite songsmiths, Richard M. Sherman. The tune is great and I hope there will soon be some other place where you can hear it…and as it was performed, there were projections of photos from the Disney lot back in Walt's day. One was of the Sherman Brothers back then and when it came on, the audience broke into loving applause not just because of the sweet sentiment but because they knew that Mr. Sherman was with us in the audience. (He sure seemed to have a good time and not just during the two songs he worked on.)

But let's get down to the crucial question: How can you see this show? Well, you may have to hustle. The next performance starts in about an hour and a half but there's an 8 PM show tonight. Then there are two shows on Thursday, one next Friday, two next Saturday and then I think that's it. The tickets are real cheap and you may still be able to get a pair on this page. If they're sold out there, try this one.

If you can see it, try to see it as it will make you feel good twice. You'll enjoy it and then, one of these days, you'll see some new star on the screen and you'll be able to boast to your friends, "Hey, I saw him [or her] in a play they were in back in May of 2016!"

Go read Frank Rich on how Trump is not hijacking the Republican Party. He's representing its core.

Very sad news: Comic book and animation writer-artist Darwyn Cooke passed early this morning, losing his battle with what his family called "an aggressive form of cancer." Earlier in the day, a press release had shocked his friends and fans, announcing that he was receiving palliative care, which if you're unfamiliar with the term usually means that doctors see no way to save the life and are merely attempting to make what remains of it as comfortable as possible. Darwyn was 53 years old.

I seriously doubt that there is anyone who knew Darwyn or his work who isn't feeling a tremendous sense of loss at this news. A great guy and a great talent. I first met him in the halls of Warner Animation around 1996 when he was working on Superman: The Animated Series. He was a key storyboard artist as he had been on Batman: The Animated Series, which had preceded that program. He introduced himself and told me at some length how he had become an artist largely due to his love of Jack Kirby's drawing. Later, on panels about Jack, he would repeat the story of how he had learned so much by slavishly tracing every large-sized Kirby drawing he could get his mitts on.

There was little in his own style to suggest that inspiration. When he began drawing comics (mostly for DC), he didn't draw like Jack…or any of the other great talents that had influenced him. He drew like Darwyn. But like so many Kirby fans, he had developed an exciting sense of storytelling. There was something fresh and energetic about his work and his peers envied the light sense of humor and the simplicity of design. He especially dazzled with a 2004 mini-series, DC: The New Frontier, which would later become an animated feature. Everything he wrote and/or drew is well worth checking out.

Did I make clear what a nice man he was? At conventions, we often talked — mostly about Jack — and you could always feel the passion he had, along with the urge to draw better and better. We were all quite satisfied with what he had done but he never was. It's so awful to lose someone like that.