Tom's Mad Blog
August 31st, 2021 | Posted in General
I had a lot of fun doing that illustration for CNN’s “History of the Sitcom” series, but one of the disappointing things about doing it was all the great characters we had to leave out. Not just the many shows that were not represented at all in the art, but important characters from depicted shows that weren’t included. In order to represent as many shows as possible, they had me only draw a few characters from each show. For the most part it worked. For example, only drawing Jimmy Walker and Esther Rolle from “Good Times” left out some other great main actors from the… READ MORE
August 30th, 2021 | Posted in MAD Magazine
4, 8, 15, 16, 23 and 42… do you remember the significance of these mystery numbers from the mid-late 2000’s hit TV series “LOST”? No? That’s okay, neither does anyone else. No doubt not too many people remember the MAD parody either, but MAD‘s Maddest writer Dick Debartolo and I spoofed the show in MAD #453, May 2005. I recall this splash page being particularly fun to do. Not only are all the word boxes jumbled about as opposed to the strict horizontal layout that MAD usually employs, but showing the cast in mid-crash of the plane was a bit of a challenge. Fortunately in… READ MORE
August 29th, 2021 | Posted in Mailbag
Q: If a client just has a low budget, do you sometimes offer to draw with a “lower” quality? I mean, are you maybe accepting a lower wage, if you can in return reduce the amount of work like maybe fewer sketches or less worked out coloring? A: No. I would not intentionally do something with less effort or lesser quality in order to justify accepting a lower rate. If what a client wants me to do and what they are offering to pay for it don’t equate, I just won’t accept the job. My name is still on the art, and I don’t want… READ MORE
August 26th, 2021 | Posted in Freelancing
Well actually this is yet another of the roughly gajillion “workplace” poster I did for the Marlin Company from 2001 to early 2017. I think the message here was supposed to be about teamwork. READ MORE
August 25th, 2021 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week
I had to draw rock legend Charlie Watts for the “Sketch o’the Week” after he passed away yesterday at age 80. What an amazing legacy he left behind. I was never a Rolling Stones fanatic but I’ve always been a rock fan, and you can’t love rock and roll and not appreciate how great the Stones are. RIP. READ MORE
August 24th, 2021 | Posted in MAD Magazine
Yesterday’s Monday MADness featured one of only two pieces piece I ever worked on for MAD that was (partly in this case) written by the late, great John Caldwell. John was a phenomenally funny cartoonist who sadly passed away in 2016 from cancer at the much too early age of 69. Former MAD editor John Ficarra recently wrote this article remembering John. Go read it. READ MORE
August 23rd, 2021 | Posted in MAD Magazine
It’s Monday! That means it’s time to deal out another look back at my work for MAD Magazine, and this hand is definitely a 7-2 off suit. Today we have a look at “A MAD Peek Behind the Scenes at Celebrity Poker Showdown”, which took not one, not two, not even three, but FOUR people to write… Desmond Devlin, Steve Rosso, John Caldwell and David Shayne, and appearing in MAD #452, April 2005! Honestly, not my favorite MAD job. Not that it wasn’t funny, I just don’t give a &*%$ about poker, and find it all extremely boring. I don’t know anything about it, and… READ MORE
August 22nd, 2021 | Posted in Mailbag
Q: How do you determine which job solicitation is worth pursuing? I’ve inquired about jobs to a few artists I liked, only to be told they didn’t accept any freelance jobs or they were too busy, etc… never getting to a price. How do you know which job is worthy? Is it the initial approach of the potential client? A: Sounds to me like you might be a little frustrated that you cannot find an artist to take on whatever project you are looking to have done. I can understand that. I don’t know the specifics of what you are looking for but I can… READ MORE
