MADness #155- Comedy Cover!

Time for another step along the quickly shortening path looking back at my work for MAD Magazine. We really are catching up to present day, having started this journey way back in November of 2020, when it looked like I may have done my last job for MAD. Fast forward five years and MAD has started having more frequent new material, so as it turns out that road hasn’t quite closed down yet.

But I digress… in this episode we look back at what is (so far) the last job cover I did for the magazine. The theme of the issue was “comedy” but more specifically stand up comedians. The original cover concept was to have been titles “MAD BOMBS COMEDY” having Alfred on stage with a cartoonish round bomb or stick of dynamite with a lit fuse, and other comics with him on the stage looking in horror. This was quickly scrapped because even considering the term “bombing” is used in reference to a stage act being received badly by an audience, the idea of bombs going off in the middle of crowds isn’t so funny these days.

Gears were switched and the title “MAD ROASTS COMEDY” with a visual from the famous Friar’s Club roasts was decided on. The crowd of comics were to include Jo Koy, Katt Williams, Dave Chapelle, Amy Shumer, Ricky Gervais, Tiffany Haddish, Ali Wong, Matt Rife, Natasha Leggero and Bert Kreischer. I’ll let you figure out which is which.

I did two concept sketches, one pre and one post Alfred lighting the grill…

#2 was the winner, and it was MAD Grand Poo-Bah Suzy Hutchinson who suggested adding the rubber chicken on the grill, which was a great touch. Here’s the final pencil:

This was my seventh cover for the actual magazine, which believe it or not makes me the 14th most frequent cover artist in MAD history. I’ve done a number of covers for special editions. I’m sure I’ll get a crack at another cover sometime. In the meantime we are closing in on present day, and the next piece I share was only published a year ago!