News
April 3rd, 2015 | Posted in MAD Magazine
Tom Koch, a veteran writer for MAD and yet another of the “old guard” I never got a chance to meet, passed away back on March 22nd. I’d have posted about this earlier but I didn’t seen any decent obits about him until today. Tom was a comedy writer for television and performers, and worked in the 50’s with the well-known comedy team Bob & Ray. His first few assignments for MAD were for the short-lived “Bob & Ray” feature in the magazine, featuring some of the earliest MAD artwork from a young, up-and-coming artist named Mort Drucker, back in 1957. He continued to write… READ MORE
April 2nd, 2015 | Posted in News
An old pal of mine, Jeremy “Jert” Townsend is having an art show called “People Ruined the Internet” this Saturday, April 4th, at the Hodgepodge Coffee House and Gallery, 720 Moreland, Atlanta, GA. The show will feature a lot of Jeremy’s terrific, eclectic, whimsical, and sometimes downright creepy, illustrations as well as a selected number of the works of others, including a little piece of mine. A sizable portion of the sales of any originals there will be going to The Center for Children and Young Adults. This is the original I sent down there for the show: I wish I was going to be… READ MORE
April 1st, 2015 | Posted in News
The National Cartoonists Society just posted the 2014 nominees for the “Silver Reuben” Divisional Awards. Here’s the complete list with nominees in alphabetical order: Advertising Illustration Kevin Kallaugher Ed Steckley Dave Whammond Editorial Cartoons Clay Bennett Michael Ramirez Jen Sorensen Gag Cartoons Liza Donnelly Benjamin Schwartz Edward Steed Magazine Feature Ray Alma Anton Emdin Tom Richmond Newspaper Illustration Anton Emdin Glen LeLievre Ed Murawinski Newspaper Strips Brian Bassett (Red and Rover) Stephan Pastis (Pearls Before Swine) Glenn McCoy (The Duplex) Book Illustration Marla Frazee “The Farmer and the Clown” Yasmeen Ismail “Time for Bed, Fred” Shaun Tan “Rules of Summer” Online Long Form Vince Dorse… READ MORE
March 21st, 2015 | Posted in MAD Magazine
MAD cover art by Mark Fredrickson From the MAD Magazine Website: At 6 PM on April 20th, the guest editor of MAD #533, “Weird Al” Yankovic and MAD Editor John Ficarra will be at the Barnes & Noble¬¨‚Ćat 33 E 17th St in NYC to sign autographs and meet fans! Mark your calendars! Enter the coordinates into your GPS! Moisturize and manicure your hand-shaking hand! It will be fun to see this issue. Weird Al got worked into the piece I did for #533, and I am sure other features will have him involved in some way. This “guest editor” thing is a great idea.… READ MORE
March 19th, 2015 | Posted in News
I just read on Mark Evanier‘s blog that longtime MAD writer Lou Silverstone passed away this past Monday, March 16th at age 90. I never met or worked with him, he having left MAD in the early 90’s and going over to Cracked to write and eventually become an editor there, But I always enjoyed his work on MAD‘s TV parodies. He teamed up a few times with Mort Drucker and especially often with Angelo Torres on many, many classic MAD spoofs. Some of my favorites were “Bats-Man”, “Clodumbo”, “Miami Price” and “The Greatest American Zero”. So long, Lou. Thanks for the many laughs! READ MORE
March 19th, 2015 | Posted in News
I’m off to the Toronto ComiCon! You’ll find me at the NCS booth (117) doing caricatures/commissions and with plenty of original MAD pages, prints, and books for sale. One new wrinkle: Exclusive ComiCon stuff! I will have an updated James Bond #007 caricature 6×9 postcard print and a MAD Alfred/Joker variant cover 6×9 postcard print for sale for $5.00 each CHEAP! These will not be for sale anywhere but when I have a booth at a comic book convention. Not online, not via mail. Zip. Gotta come see me! READ MORE
March 13th, 2015 | Posted in News
Can you believe I have basically lived my whole live almost a stone’s throw from the Canadian border, and have never been to Canada! Well, that all ends next week when I invade the Great White North for the Toronto ComiCon. I’ll be appearing all three days of the show at the National Cartoonists Society booth, space #117. Also appearing there will be the creator of the syndicated comic strip “Between Friends” Sandra Bell-Lundy, and possibly some other NCS cartoonists. I’ll have my usual plethora of original MAD artwork, prints, copies of my book, some new mini-prints (!) and other fun stuff… plus I’ll be… READ MORE
March 12th, 2015 | Posted in News
Back in 1962, MAD‘s Mort Drucker illustrated a satirical coloring book about the Kennedy clan called the “JFK Coloring Book”. It was a brilliant piece of satire written by Paul Laikin and Jackie Kannon, making fun of a president who was wildly popular and bucking conventional wisdom. It spent 14 weeks on the New York Times Best Seller’s list. Then came the assassination, and the book was pulled from bookstores and never saw print again… until now. Actually the reprint took place last September, but I just found out about it through a MAD fan group. I have a vintage copy I got from eBay… READ MORE
