Search Results for: Garfield

This morning, I guested on Comic Book News with Dan Shahin, a popular video podcast. I figured it would be an hour at most and we wound up chatting for close to two-and-a-half hours about Jack Kirby, the way the comic book industry used to operate, Groo the Wanderer, Garfield, some of the famous people I've been fortunate to meet…and not much else. I've promised Dan we can do another one of these soon so we can get to some other topics on his list. If you wanna watch it, here it is — but I'll warn you: It's an awful lot of me…

In an alternate universe where COVID-19 was stopped at the borders — preferably not our borders — WonderCon 2021 would be convening tomorrow in Anaheim, not far from where Disneyland is (and has been) in full operation. But we can all attend it virtually this weekend from wherever we're sequestered.

Tune in tomorrow and enjoy the many great panels that will be available online including the three of mine that will go online tomorrow. They will also be linked here at some point. You can find the whole schedule posted here. I will, as usual, be cosplaying as Harley Quinn for much of the event…

All of these are tomorrow, Friday, March 26, all times are Pacific and all panels run an hour, give or take a few minutes…

10 AM – The Jack Kirby Tribute Panel
Mark Evanier (Kirby: King of Comics) talks about the man some call "The King of the Comics" with author Neil Gaiman (American Gods) and TV host and mega-Kirby fan Jonathan Ross. They will attempt to discuss what was special about the work of Jack Kirby and why, long after we lost him, he seems to be more popular than ever.

1 PM – Cartoon Voices
Mark Evanier (supervising producer of The Garfield Show) welcomes four of the best actors today supplying the words and sounds of animated superstars and the strange beings who inhabit videogames. They are Maurice LaMarche (Pinky and the Brain), Mara Junot (Mortal Combat 11), Brock Powell (Phineas and Ferb: Candace against the Universe) and Anna Brisbin (Final Fantasy VII Remake). There will be a script reading of a script they've never seen before and plenty of talk about their craft.

5 PM – The Groo Crew
The four guys responsible for the comic book Groo the Wanderer — Sergio Aragonés, Mark Evanier, Stan Sakai and Tom Luth — talk about how and why they create the adventures of the stupidest character in all of comics, and maybe we'll get Sergio to talk about his 55 years with MAD magazine and Stan to discuss new and exciting news about his creation, Usagi Yojimbo.

Two weeks from today, we won't all be in Anaheim enjoying WonderCon. We will be in our homes watching all the great panels that will be available online including three of mine. The entire schedule has been posted here and I'll just spotlight my three…

All of these are on Friday, March 26, all times are Pacific and all panels run an hour, give or take a few minutes…

10 AM – The Jack Kirby Tribute Panel
Mark Evanier (Kirby: King of Comics) talks about the man some call "The King of the Comics" with author Neil Gaiman (American Gods) and TV host and mega-Kirby fan Jonathan Ross. They will attempt to discuss what was special about the work of Jack Kirby and why, long after we lost him, he seems to be more popular than ever.

1 PM – Cartoon Voices
Mark Evanier (supervising producer of The Garfield Show) welcomes four of the best actors today supplying the words and sounds of animated superstars and the strange beings who inhabit videogames. They are Maurice LaMarche (Pinky and the Brain), Mara Junot (Mortal Combat 11), Brock Powell (Phineas and Ferb: Candace against the Universe) and Anna Brisbin (Final Fantasy VII Remake). There will be a script reading of a script they've never seen before and plenty of talk about their craft.

5 PM – The Groo Crew
The four guys responsible for the comic book Groo the Wanderer — Sergio Aragonés, Mark Evanier, Stan Sakai and Tom Luth — talk about how and why they create the adventures of the stupidest character in all of comics, and maybe we'll get Sergio to talk about his 55 years with MAD magazine and Stan to discuss new and exciting news about his creation, Usagi Yojimbo.

The times given are when these panels will debut on the WonderCon@Home website but soon after, they will be seen on this page and elsewhere. There are a lot of great panels and — just think! — because they're pre-recorded, online and there indefinitely, you won't have to miss one to see another…and you can get a great seat, assuming you have one in your home.

One of the loveliest and most talented people I know is the lovely and talented Laraine Newman. If you were watching Saturday Night Live when it started, you "discovered" her like I did: As part of that amazing first cast. After that cast moved on, she did some amazing things as an actress in film, on other TV shows, in the improv comedy community and, more recently, doing cartoon voiceovers. I booked her whenever I could for The Garfield Show because no matter what the role, she could do it. She's also worked with just about everyone in show business for whom I have the slightest respect.

Now she's written her autobiography…but you can't read it. That's because it's only available as an audio book on Audible-dot-com. It'll be released in March but you can advance order now. I did. If it's one tenth as interesting as having dinner with Laraine, it'll be nine hours and five minutes of pure fascination.

A recurring peeve of mine is "friends" — I'm intending a slightly-sarcastic usage of that noun — who love to tell you things that they hope will make you mad or make you cry or in some way disrupt your happiness. There was a writer-acquaintance who, during the eight-or-so-years that I did the Garfield & Friends TV show, would periodically send me notes that would say "Checked the ratings and it looks like your show's a sure bet to be canceled."

That was never true, not for a minute. We were the highest-rated program on CBS's Saturday morning schedule for much of that time and even when the show did finally end, it was because the producers chose to end it despite an offer (though not a great one) from CBS to do another season. In fact, one time when the "friend" told me we were on the chopping block, it was right after we'd just gotten a pick-up for three more years.

But some people are like that. They so love to tell you bad news that they can't even wait until it's real.

He tried to make it sound like he was a pal trying to alert me to something for my own good but he wasn't a good enough writer to pull that off. I always knew he was making things up just to try and wound me and for a time, I wondered why he did that. It didn't take much wondering to finally figure out he was just an unhappy guy. No matter what successes he had in his life — and he had several — he was still just an unhappy guy and I guess misery does love company.

When I discussed him with a few other friends — the true kind, not the faux kind — they all said the same thing. He couldn't help but piss on everyone else's good news and while he pretended to be a buddy while pissing, he didn't fool anyone. One true friend said, "He kept telling me I was about to be fired and I kept asking myself, 'Why is he telling me this?' If I was being fired, I'd find out soon enough."

True…but then he might not be there to see your expression or to hear you moan.

Election Night last week, I was sitting here not watching the election returns and I got an e-mail from a Trump-favoring "pal" (again, the quotes denote sarcasm) telling me he was "sorry" (yeah, right) that the Democrats were going down to such a smashing defeat in Georgia. I took a quick peek at the CNN site to see if it was true and at that moment, the G.O.P. candidates were each about two points ahead in the total.

I didn't — and this is just me being dumb — notice that we were at something like 70% of precincts reporting. Those races were far from being called. One of them wouldn't even be final until the following afternoon. I was also dumb to not remember that this guy was not exactly a pillar of truth. But at that moment, I believed what he told me.

Disappointed but not crushed after his call, I tried to get my mind back to the script on which I was working. It was hard but I managed it. A couple hours later when I took a break and turned on the TV, one of the Democratic candidates (Raphael Warnock) was claiming victory and the other (Jon Ossoff) was ahead. Moreover, three different channels I checked said that the yet-to-be-counted vote was mainly in Democratic areas and that turned out to be true.

I didn't know for sure that they'd win but I did know that when my "friend" had told me they'd lost, it wasn't true. He just said that to be an asshole…and I should point out here that this is not a slam at Republicans. I know Democrats who do that kind of thing too. Assholes come in all shapes and sizes, all races, all political parties, all religions, etc. They're easier to spot when they're not part of your group but that doesn't mean they aren't there — somewhere lurking about.

A lot of obits lately and I have one more to post after this. I was a fan of David Lander's before he ever Squigged on Laverne & Shirley. He was part of a wonderful comedy troupe called The Credibility Gap which was big — but not as big as it deserved to be — beginning in the late sixties on KRLA radio here in Southern California. It consisted of David, Richard Beebe, Harry Shearer and Michael McKean. Michael was David's longtime friend and later played Lenny to his Squiggy.

Individually and as a duo, Michael and David did an awful lot of television and a number of movies. I don't remember them not being good in anything. David also did an awful lot of cartoon voice jobs, starting with (I think) supplying the voice of Jerry Lewis on the 1970 cartoon show, Will the Real Jerry Lewis Please Sit Down. In the late eighties, he began appearing as Doc Boy, the brother of Jon Arbuckle, in the prime-time animated Garfield specials.

I didn't work on those but I worked on all the daytime Garfield cartoons, none of which featured Doc Boy so we never called David for them. In 2011 when I was working on The Garfield Show for worldwide syndication, I was asked by the execs at the studio to do a few episodes with Doc Boy. We recorded the shows here in L.A. but the studio was in France.

I told the folks there that it would be no problem to write Doc Boy into some shows but I wasn't sure if we could get the fellow who'd done the voice. By this time, it was well-known than David Lander was suffering from multiple sclerosis. He'd tried to hide it for a while but eventually, it got so serious that that was not possible. He'd even written a book about it called Fall Down Laughing: How Squiggy Caught Multiple Sclerosis and Didn't Tell Nobody. It's very good but very sad and they seem to have copies of it for sale on Amazon.

The folks in France understood and suggested that roles can be recast. They're right but I felt that if David Lander was able to work, he should play the part again. This was not easy to make happen because, as I found out when I called, the Screen Actors Guild had no agent listing for David, nor could (or would) they give me his personal contact info.

I hit a few other dead ends before I thought of calling Paul Doherty, who's the head of one of the biggest agencies for voice actors, CESD Talent. He said, "No, David's not with us but I think his agent is Acme Talent." That's not the name he gave me but in light of what comes next, I thought I should disguise the real name of the agency. If there is a real Acme Talent somewhere — and there probably is — it wasn't them.

So I called the Acme Agency and the receptionist said, "No, we don't represent him." I tried some other agencies and the answer was the same.

I was running out of time and close to giving up when I chanced to talk to Paul Doherty again about something else. He asked me, "Did you ever manage to book David Lander?" I said no, Acme said they didn't represent him. Paul said, "It wouldn't surprise me if they did represent him and didn't know it." Paul is wise so I called back Acme and had the following conversation with a lady who may or may not have been the same receptionist…

HER: No, we don't represent him."

ME: Are you sure? His name's David Lander…he sometimes goes by David L. Lander and he was on the TV show, Laverne & Shirley.

HER: I'm afraid I've never heard of Laverne & Shirley, sir.

ME (after one of those "I'm older than I feel" sighs:) Maybe you've seen him around the office. He may have been in a wheelchair.

HER: I'll connect you with our Handicapped Department, sir.

That was their name for it, not mine. I was soon talking with an agent there who told me that, yes, they represented David Lander from the Laverne & Shirley show. Having multiple sclerosis isn't the only thing that can prevent an actor from getting work. Sometimes, no one knows how to find them.

I asked as delicately as I could if David's health would allow him to do a voiceover job. The agent wasn't sure and wound up taking my number and promising David would call me. I suspect the agent didn't want to say "Of course he can" in case he couldn't and I would accuse the agency of something. This way, I could hear his client on the phone and answer the "can he do it?" decision myself. An hour later, David called and he sounded fine. He did caution me though that he might take more than a few takes to get a line right. I told him, "If you keep it under a hundred, we'll be okay."

"Hey," he said. "I'm a professional and I always get it in ninety-nine or less." So I knew there was nothing wrong with his sense of humor. "But there's another problem," he said. "I don't drive and I may not have anyone who can take me to your studio."

I asked him where he lived. He lived three blocks from me. During those days I was searching for him, I'd walked past his house at least twice. I may even have been on my cellphone, asking someone if they knew how to get in touch with David Lander as I walked past his house.

So a few days later, I picked him up and took him with me to the session. This was not long before my mother passed away and the trunk of my car always had her wheelchair in it so we used it to get David in and out of the recording studio.

There was no problem with his performance. Yes, he did take four or five tries to get some of the lines right. I've worked with actors who didn't have multiple sclerosis who took six or seven or more.

Once or twice, it took a lot more and he got way more impatient with himself than he should have…but so what? We got what we needed. In fact, we wrote Doc Boy into some other episodes and had him back. If you check out his IMDB page, you'll see that a lot of cartoon producers got what they needed from him. He was real good. He just wasn't real good immediately all the time. There's a lesson here for all of us.

So as I was sitting here one minute ago, trying to figure out how to end this, I received a text message from Jason Marsden, who did the voice of Nermal and other characters on The Garfield Show. Jason wrote, "I'm sad to hear about Mr. Lander. Thanks to you, I can say I worked with him a couple of times. What a fun talent he was." Thank you for my closing paragraph, Jason. You're absolutely right. What a fun talent he was.

Gene Davis wrote to ask…

I've been reading your blog for a couple of years now and really enjoy it. Thanks for all the information and entertainment.

You've done so much work involving voice actors for television programs. Have you ever done any similar work for advertising interests making radio or television commercials? If not, was it a personal choice or an understanding that people in your position don't work both sides of that street? How does working for advertisers differ from working on programs for voice actors? I'm not referring to a famous actor or entertainer who lends his/her well-known voice to a company (for example, Gene Hackman for Lowe's).

I directed Lorenzo Music a few times for Garfield-related advertising. It was exactly the same as directing him for the cartoons. He read the copy, I said either "Let's try it one more time" or — more often — "That's fine. Let's do one more for protection, then move on to the next line." Lorenzo needed about as little direction as any actor who's ever worked in animation.

And I directed Gary Owens once for some network promos — oh, and I also once directed promos with Mark Elliott, a veteran announcer that most folks think of as The Disney Movie Trailer Guy. This is Mark Elliott but that's not the thing I directed him for. It was the same amount of effort on my part as it was with Lorenzo. They read it once, it was fine, we did it again just in case…and we moved on. If you've hired the right voice folks, it's real easy. The casting and booking are often the hard parts.

But that's about the extent of it. I haven't done any more advertising stuff not because of any personal choice but because no one's asked me. The above minor instances were easy because no one who outranked me was present. I've heard (and even witnessed as a spectator) times when the sponsor or the ad agency was present, kibbitzing about every syllable of every word uttered as if the wrong read of a "the" would cause the entire commercial to fail and the company making the product would go bankrupt and the ad agency would follow them into receivership and everyone's children would starve to death.

I've had a little of that in directing cartoon voices…producers or network people sitting behind me, telling me they didn't like the way a line was read. But not much. I'd have no overall objection to working on commercials. It would depend on the product and the circumstances — who I'd be working with, whether I'd have a boss sitting behind me, etc.

The seventh volume of Pogo: The Complete Syndicated Comic Strips is a'comin'. Printed copies exist.

It's called Pockets Full of Pie…and how could you not love a book called Pockets Full of Pie? I like that title so much that at this very moment, the pockets in the pants I'm wearing are indeed full of pie. The right one has Chocolate Cream, the left one has French Apple, two back pockets have Lemon Custard and I just paid my cleaning lady Dora with money that was covered in meringue.

The book — which contains no actual pie, its foolish publishers having rejected my brilliant suggestion for an "extra" — will be out around November 10. We actually got this one to press well before the deadline. The first four, for reasons everyone following the series knows, were all late — in some cases, very late. Volumes 5 and 6 went to press on or about the deadline.

This one got in early and then along comes Trump's foreign import tariffs and then there was that Pandemic Thing you may have heard a little something about, screwing up both the printing and importing businesses. But Volume 7 should be shipping from Amazon by 11/10.

Rather than me, the co-editor, telling you how great this series is, I thought I'd enlist the aid of whoever wrote the longest review of the previous volume on Amazon. Well, I didn't really enlist their aid. I'm just stealing (without their permission) their review and reproducing it here. This is by someone named "Newsboy" and I swear it isn't me, nor do I know who that is. He's reviewing Vol. 6: Clean as a Weasel, which you can order here…

The Pogo collections from Fantagraphics Books continue to be the gold standard for comic strip collections. It's an incredible presentation for what many (me among them) consider one of the greatest comic strips ever. Pogo may never have inspired multiple cartoon series, it didn't have the merchandising success of Peanuts, Garfield, Bloom County or some other strips, but it had as big an impact — arguably bigger — than many strips that are more well known today.

Political humor. Funny animal humor. Jokes about the human condition (in a comic with no humans). This comic had it all. Bottom line: These comics are funny. Walt Kelly was not just a great artist. He was an incredible wordsmith, who used dialect, puns and even playing around with the font in the word balloons to make the joke work. In a review of a previous volume I compared Kelly to Mark Twain for his use of language. Honestly, that's not hyperbole.

Fantagraphics has set a standard with these books that will be hard for any publisher of classic strip collections to meet, let alone beat. The comics are reprinted at a size that never strains the eyes. The colors on the Sunday strips is perfect. The binding on the books is exactly what you want — it lays flat and no art is lost in gutter.

But what really sets this collection apart are the little things. They've included an index in every volume. There's a great introduction by a famous person who is a Pogo fan (this one is by Garfield creator Jim Davis). Each volume includes an introduction with some background on the time period and Kelly. And there is also a section, Swamp Talk, that helps explain some of the historical references (this volume wraps up a couple years before I was born, so these sections are always welcome). Beneath the pretty book jacket is an embossed cover. There's nothing they haven't thought of — even the color of each volume is a nice pastel that is different from its predecessors. On a bookshelf, it's just a good looking set of books.

If you've never read Pogo, do yourself a favor and order this volume. It's a great place to start.

Actually, I think they're all great places to start because no matter which one you pick, you're going to rush to order all the rest. You could also pre-order Pockets Full of Pie, which features a foreword by Sergio Aragonés…which shows you how hard I work to find foreword writers. Just when I needed to find one, he was sitting in my office. If he hadn't been here, I could have gone to Dora.

It also features two years of what the noted critic Newsboy considers "…one of the greatest comic strips ever." This series is just about the only thing I hard-sell on this blog and that's because I know you'll love it. And you won't love it because of anything I did except maybe to nudge you into buying it.

Dale Herbest writes…

I loved Howard Morris's role as Gopher in the original Winnie the Pooh featurettes and I wonder if you could clear something up for me. I've heard from other fans that the reason he didn't reprise the character for The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh is because he was under contract to Garfield & Friends at the same time and legally couldn't. I know you were just the head writer and V.O. director but do you know if that's true? I'm sorry he never reprised the role either way.

I do know if it's true and it isn't. Howie was free to work on any cartoon show…and I think he missed one recording session (with my permission) because another show needed him that day.

It is very, very rare that cartoon voice actors these days have any kind of overall contract, probably one that just says they agree to be available for a certain number of recording sessions and that they'll be paid some higher-than-most rate for their work. Most just sign a short contract for each episode we call them in for but I've never heard of any kind of exclusivity clause stopping anyone from working on another show. If it happens, it's very rare.

Did someone else take over the role of Gopher while Howie was still alive? If so, it would mean he couldn't do it for health reasons, he wouldn't do it for the money he was offered or someone at Disney decided they simply wanted someone else in the role. Paul Winchell was replaced as Tigger for at least two of those reasons if not all three.

Today's one Trump item is a link to a piece by Fred Kaplan, who did something you and I haven't done. He actually read the Bob Woodward book.

I said here the other day that I thought 3400 Cahuenga Blvd. in Hollywood — the former site of the Hanna-Barbera Studio — had been turned into a gym. Well, I was partly right. There is an L.A. Fitness at that address, which was the main thing that was there the last time I paid attention while driving by. But they've also now built a complex called Cahuenga Place which is full of apartments for rent. Thanks to Trevor Kimball for sending me this link to a realty listing which has some photos of the scene there. You may notice a few images of Fred Flintstone and George Jetson on some of the walls in public areas.

This evening, I will be conducting what may be the only interview done in this country this week that is not of Bob Woodward. I fully expect to see him in the next few days preparing a Sour Cherry Strawberry Meringue Galette on Iron Chef America and changing the carburetor of a Lamborghini Veneno on Jay Leno's Garage.

I will be speaking with Dennis Palumbo, a fine writer whose credits include the superb movie My Favorite Year and many mystery novels. A big parenthetical aside to his career is that for a few years, he was the partner of Yours Truly and we broke into writing for TV together. Dennis is now a busy psychotherapist and I'm not sure how much time we're going to spend on which aspects of his life but they're all interesting. Come back here tonight at 7 PM to watch our discussion live…or if you miss it, to watch a replay on demand.

Next week, I'll be interviewing another fine writer, Ron Friedman, and then the week after, my friend Shelly Goldstein will be interviewing me…about what, I have no idea. Whatever she wants to ask me about. In October, I will have a conversation with Disney Legend Floyd Norman and then one with Garfield's creator, Jim Davis. And then I'm going to shut down the webcasts for a while because we're going to have several weeks in this country when no one will be saying more than eight words to anyone about anything except The Election.

About sixty minutes ago online, I noticed that John Byner has written an autobiography and it's out. It was Kindled within one minute and I really enjoyed as much of it as I've read in the last hour. My rapid response was because Mr. Byner has long been one of my favorite comedians. I'm sure I've said that on this blog and I would have said it more often if we saw more of him.

I've seen him perform live several times, met him a few times and worked with him once on a Garfield & Friends. Very nice man. Great teller of stories. When I booked him, I asked his agent, "How come we don't see this man more often on TV?" The agent sighed and said, "He turns down a lot of stuff. He's not one of those comics who gets panicked if he doesn't get applauded once a week. He's real happy with his life and with his wife and taking it easy." (I've met his wife, Annie Gaybis, and she's quite wonderful.)

In this business, that's all very refreshing to hear. What I've read of the book so far confirms my sense of him as a sane, happy man who simply has the ability to be hilarious when he chooses to be. If you want to enjoy his book along with me, here's a link. I'm thinking that after I finish reading it, I might just spring for the Audiobook. Maybe he reads a chapter or two in Georgie Jessel's voice.

For the first time since 1970 when it started, I am not attending the big comic book convention in San Diego, at least in person.  I'm participating like hundreds of thousands of others (I would guess) are…online.  It's not the same but what is, these days?

I can be seen in four pre-recorded panels — two that I moderated, two that I was asked to appear on. The times given are when the video will debut online and can be watched at your leisure by clicking on the link.

Friday, July 24 at 1:00 PM
Make Mine Marvel: Bringing Back Marvel Classics For Today's Readers
Mark Evanier (comic book writer and historian), Lauren Bisom (Marvel entertainment editor), Russell Busse (Abrams senior editor, licensing and entertainment) gather for a discussion moderated by Charles Kochman (Abrams ComicArts editorial director) about the legacy of classic Marvel Comics, and how new books for readers of all ages are bringing classic comic art, characters, and storylines to a new generation.

Friday, July 24 at 3:00 PM
The Annual Jack Kirby Tribute Panel
Every year, former Kirby assistant Mark Evanier hosts a gathering of fans of the man some call "The King of the Comics" and his vast, persistent impact on not only comic books but related fields, as well. This year, Mark and John Morrow (publisher of The Jack Kirby Collector) discuss all this with master artist Alex Ross who discusses the influence Kirby had on his work.

Saturday, July 25 at 4:00 PM
Cartoon Voices
Mark Evanier (The Garfield Show) hosts a celebration of those who speak for animated characters, featuring four of the most-heard voices around: Laraine Newman (Bob's Burgers), Bill Farmer (Goofy), Misty Lee (Squirrel Girl) and Dee Bradley Baker (Daffy Duck). They discuss their craft and demonstrate what they do with a very odd reading of Little Red Riding Hood.

Sunday, July 26 at 11:00 AM
Jack Kirby 101: An Introduction
Comic-Con legend Mark Evanier (onetime Jack Kirby assistant, and author of Jack Kirby: King of Comics) and The Jack Kirby Collector's John Morrow (TwoMorrows Publishing) join The Jack Kirby Museum's Tom Kraft and Rand Hoppe for a discussion that will provide an introduction to Jack Kirby, the man, his work, and his influence on comics, comic conventions, and the culture at large.

In case you can't guess, the second and third panels are the ones I organized. A dead giveaway is that I would never describe myself or really anyone of my generation in comics with the "L" word. It's become hokey, meaningless and kind of embarrassing. But that Kirby panel came out pretty good as I recall.

They actually all did. If you're a fan of the online Cartoon Voices Panels I'm doing, don't miss this one. The next live one will be August 8. And the two panels about Jack Kirby this weekend are about Jack Kirby. What more do you need to know? See you online.

Some of you have read about this. Some of you have written to ask for my views on it…

The Simpsons will no longer use White actors to voice non-White characters, according to the show's producers. "Moving forward, The Simpsons will no longer have white actors voice non-white characters," Fox spokesman Les Eisner said in a statement Friday.

My view? That's fine. I think it's a small step but small steps are better than no steps, assuming they're in the right direction. What is the possible objection to this? Is someone saying they prefer to have cartoon black guys voiced by white guys?

What I would hope is that it doesn't lead to fewer non-white characters on cartoon shows for budgetary reasons. I'm talking here about minor characters, not major ones. Back in the early Hanna-Barbera days, when Bill Hanna went around the studio turning off lights to save money, the non-primetime shows had almost no female characters in them. The Yogi Bear cartoons had Daws Butler doing the voice of Yogi, Don Messick doing Boo Boo and the Ranger, and both of those Caucasian gentlemen taking turns doing all the incidental roles.

Cindy Bear and other female characters rarely turned up in those cartoons because Mr. Hanna didn't like the idea of paying three voice actors. Once in a while, they would spring for it but for the most part, the writers were told to avoid writing female characters. (And once in a while, when a lady had a line or two, they would have Messick do it.)

The Simpsons, of course, can afford anything, it being the most profitable entertainment franchise in the history of mankind. I just hope shows with shallower pockets don't skimp on minor non-white characters because someone says, "That character only has two lines. I don't want to pay an additional actor to come in for two lines. Make that character white so one of our white actors can do the part." I've known animation producers who were cheap enough to think that way.

Of course, ideally most shows would have a multi-racial cast and there'd be folks of all colors among the regulars. I also wouldn't mind seeing them hire older actors more. On The Garfield Show, I hired many actors who were in their seventies and eighties, and even a few in their nineties. We had Stan Freberg, June Foray, Marvin Kaplan, Rose Marie, Jack Riley and a number of others on the program.

But I think the new policy on The Simpsons is fine. I just hope they don't feel they have to take Dan Castellaneta, Julie Kavner, Nancy Cartwright, Yeardley Smith, et al, and spray-paint them yellow.

I received a lot of messages about the item here concerning Souplantation not making good on its gift cards. Most of them said something like what Karl Kuras wrote in this e-mail to me…

Long time fan of the blog and kid who grew up on the D&D cartoon and Garfield and Friends.

I'm also a lawyer who practiced bankruptcy law for many years. The Souplantation peoples' hands are probably tied on the refunds. Once a person or company (yeah, the Supreme Court thinks they're one and the same) begins to prepare for bankruptcy proceedings they are barred from paying any of their creditors.

The "court" they refer to is probably the bankruptcy court which will determine the priority of debtors and whether enough funds are left for the repayment.

I'm the last person to defend corporate America but this is sadly the best they can do under the circumstances.

No, I think they could have said something like, "We really appreciate all of you customers who bought gift cards and we wish we could somehow redeem them. But we're plunging into bankruptcy proceedings here and they're governed by laws that take most of that out of our hands. If it turns out there's any way we can make good on those cards, we will." They could have been much nicer about it.

I also seem to recall that there was some restaurant chain years ago that went outta business but still arranged with some other chain to offer something to gift card holders. The other chain wanted to see if they could inherit some of the loyal customers of the going-outta-biz firm so they offered to honor not the face value of the gift cards but some percentage up to a certain amount.

I knew about how bankruptcy court takes over in these situations. I was just amazed at how callous that second paragraph was towards folks who'd paid good cash for those gift cards and will probably never see a nickel on the dollar. The soft-serve frozen yogurt at Souplantation should have been that cold.

In this message, I said that when they did the classic Rocky & Bullwinkle cartoons, four people — Bill Scott, June Foray, Paul Frees and William Conrad — did all the voices. This prompted Erik Sansom to write…

I know you're a busy man, but I can't let this pass. Are you not counting Fractured Fairy Tales with the late, great Edward Everett Horton?

No, I was just talking about the Rocky & Bullwinkle cartoons. The Fractured Fairy Tales cartoons were narrated by Mr. Horton and then the other voices were done in each by some combination of Daws Butler, June Foray, Bill Scott and in just a few, Paul Frees. The late Julie Bennett filled in on three cartoons that were recorded during one session that June Foray missed because she was working with Stan Freberg that evening.

While I'm at it: The Mr. Peabody cartoons all featured Bill Scott, Walter Tetley and some combination of Paul Frees, June Foray or, once in a while, Dorothy Scott, who was Bill's wife. The Dudley Do-Right cartoons were voiced by Frees, Foray, Scott, Hans Conried and then some were narrated by Bill Conrad and some by Paul Frees. The Aesop & Son cartoons had Charlie Ruggles as Narrator and they all had Daws Butler, almost all had Bill Scott and when they needed her, June Foray. All of the cartoon segments on the George of the Jungle show were voiced by Scott, Foray, Butler and Frees.

The point is that most cartoons then didn't hire guest actors except if one of the regulars was unavailable. Over at Hanna-Barbera, a lot of the cartoons on shows like Huckleberry Hound or Quick Draw McGraw were just Daws Butler and Don Messick or Daws Butler and Hal Smith. A few were just Daws Butler. The Augie Doggie cartoons were usually just Doug Young and Daws. If they had a guest star, it was because they really needed a female voice or they had a baby duck in the cartoon. They'd call in a baby duck specialist.

In those days, actors were paid a flat session fee, regardless of how many different characters they voiced. If the cartoon had eight voices in it, two guys would do them all. That was why most actors in cartoons were people like Daws and Paul and June and Don and Mel who could do nine different voices in one film. It's also why very few of those cartoons had female characters in them. Once in a while in a cartoon voices by Daws and Don, one of them would try to do a lady's voice.

So most actors then had to be capable of many voices. Hans Conried, who just basically had the one voice, was a rare exception. Jay Ward thought Conried's contribution was so great it was worth the extra cost, rather than have Paul Frees or Bill Scott play Snidely Whiplash.

Also, Dudley Do-Right was produced for prime-time. On a prime-time cartoon like The Flintstones or The Jetsons, there were higher budgets so you might hire more few one-voice actors like Mr. Conried and you were also likely to have more female roles. Both of those series had two female characters in every episode; thus, at least two voice actresses in every recording session.

In the late sixties, the contract was changed so a session fee covered three roles. If your cartoon had 7-9 characters speaking, you would need to pay three session fees. You could pay one actor to do five and the other to do three. Or you could divide them up between three actors for the same cost. This led to even more female roles in cartoons and to more jobs for the actor who could do one or two voices but couldn't do ten.

In the eighties, it was changed so the session fee covered two roles but you would get a small "bump" for the third role. Then if that actor did a fourth part, they'd be paid another session fee which could also cover a fifth role…and then there'd be that "bump" again for the sixth part. When we cast shows, we often think in multiples of three.

When we did Garfield and Friends, Lorenzo Music played Garfield and Lorenzo, wonderful though he was, only had one voice. It was a great voice but it was one voice. (Actually, there were one or two cartoons where he did a line as someone else but that was rare.) Gregg Berger played Odie and Thom Huge played Jon. Gregg and Thom could each do multiple voices and usually each would do his regular character plus two others. So if we had ten speaking parts, the three of them would cover seven of them. If the three other voices were all male or all female, one person could cover them but I might need two. Of course, we could also pay Gregg or Thom a second session fee to do those three but there was no financial advantage to us; just the convenience of not having to bring in another actor and fill out contracts and such for them.

And of course, every so often, I might decide a certain role should be played by a one-voice actor because that person was so perfect. Among the actors we had on who fit into that category were Gary Owens, Marvin Kaplan, Buddy Hackett, James Earl Jones, Don Knotts, Shelley Berman, Dick Beals and Arnold Stang.

We paid our actors very well on that show. The producer agreed to do so but I promised him that I wouldn't hire more actors than absolutely needed for each episode. Whenever we had a bit part in the show that could be male or female — a store clerk or a food server or a newsperson, for example — what would determine if that character was male or female was how many other roles the actors of each gender were otherwise doing in the cartoon. It was a lot simpler in the old days where a director could just bring in Daws Butler and June Foray and they could play everyone.