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Tell us a little bit about yourself and
your interests in general.
I'm
48, married, I have three kids - Bill, Kat, and Jasmine. Jasmine is 20 months
old, Bill is 21 years, and Kat is 17 years. Quite a spread. My wife is an artist
and a lingerie model - she's appeared twice in GHM magazine, plus been in Femme
Fatales, Play, Mirror, and other magazines. She writes and draws a series called
BANZAI GIRLS and is drawing AVALON
HIGH for TokyoPop, which is written by novelist Meg Cabot of The Princess
Diaries. I love movies and reading.
When did you discover you had a talent
for writing in the comic format? How is writing in that format, different from
other styles of writing? Have you done any professional writing in fields other
than comic books? Do you have a background in art/graphic design?
I'd
wanted to write comics ever since I was a teenager, so I wrote dozens of scripts
that were never published, to learn my craft. I sold my first comics scripts in
1982 and was freelance writing for Superman at DC Comics by 1984. I graduated
with a degree in Communications and had a great rapport with artists in the
advertising field, so it wasn't a stretch to get from there into packaging
complete books and, later, into publishing. I've written advertising, Public
Relations (including for the United Way), magazine articles, book chapters,
interviews, and lots more. My most recent thing is a chapter in the book ON
WRITING HORROR, released last month, about writing for horror comics.
We understand that you founded
Innovation Comics. Tell us what was involved in starting your fledging business?
In
1987, I wrote a business plan for a comics publishing company, and it worked -
Innovation opened its doors in October 1988. It was the usual thing of finding
investors and building a company.
What was the most challenging aspect of
creating Innovations? Of keeping it running?
In
the earliest year, it was forging a company identity so people knew who we were.
That happened when we worked our way into becoming a licensee of novels and
special projects -- Beauty and the Beast,
Anne Rice's novels, Dark Shadows, and
so on.
After
that, it was trying to top ourselves each year, which we did. But by 1993, I
moved on to start Glass House Graphics, my studio & agency. I work with over
100 artists and writers all over the world, handling everything from storyboards
to comics, from web design to videogame concepts.
Can you explain briefly how a comic book
is created? The story, the drawings, the dialogue, the inking, the color.
A
licensed comic such as BEAUTY & THE
BEAST was a special case -- we were only permitted to adapt the shows, so we
received - sometimes -- a shooting script and a videotape of the episode. Then I
would adapt the material into a comicbook script, panel for panel. That was
given to the artists, who would draw it (or paint it), then it was lettered, and
so on. It's sort of an assembly-line process with each talent in the process
doing his or her job. For a licensed property, every step is approved by the
licensing company. In the case of BEAUTY & THE BEAST, that was Republic Pictures and Ron Koslow.
What was your part in the production
process when it came to B&B?
Everything,
practically. I negotiated the license, worked with the licensor, adapted the
scripts, edited the book, wrote the letter columns and text pages. Mike Deodato,
the artist, was my "find" from Brazil. He's gone on to be one of the
most popular artists in the comic book business, drawing such books as
Spider-Man, The Hulk, and The Avengers, even Wonder Woman and Batman.
Whose idea was it to do a Beauty
and the Beast comic?
Mine.
Fortunately, the licensing company was agreeable.
What drew you to the Beauty
and the Beast TV series as a subject for your comics? Were you a fan of the
show?
I
knew someone who was really into the TV show, so I watched a couple of episodes
and was entranced by it. Fabulous show. Then when I realized that Mike Deodato
could paint the book in a soft, airbrushy style evocative of the show, I knew we
could do a good job on it.
Was B&B in any way different from
the comics you usually produced, and
Different?
It was different because we were only ADAPTING the TV shows instead of doing new
stories. When I wrote the DARK SHADOWS
comic book, for example, I would review episodes with a fine-tooth comb, so to
speak - and I would write new stories that explained logic and continuity errors
and made the existing stories even better as a result. I carefully wrote stories
that fleshed out and complemented what the TV series had done. I wish I could
have done the same with BEAUTY & THE BEAST.
Why did you choose to recreate the
existing episodes of Beauty and the Beast, rather than writing new stories with
the existing characters? Is that typical of a certain genre of comics?
No.
NEW stories would've been typical. But as I understood it, the licensor wasn't
entirely happy with the two new BEAUTY
& THE BEAST graphic novel stories that First Comics had published, so
they were only open to us adapting the existing scripts. BEAUTY & THE BEAST is kind of rare in its adapting the TV shows
in their entirety into comics form.
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How did Mike Deodato Jr, the artist for
the Beauty and the Beast comics, come
to your attention, and why did you choose him for the B&B comics?
He
was one of a bunch of artists whose work we were reviewing from Brazil. He stood
out as the most talented of the bunch. In his samples was an airbrushed painting
of a werewolf chasing a beautiful woman through an alleyway. "Hmmm...soft
airbrush...a furry monster...a beautiful woman." It wasn't a big stretch to
comprehend that (another that or just add 'his') one image had all the elements
for BEAUTY & THE BEAST art.
Originally how many issues based on Beauty
and the Beast were planned and what happened that only six comics were
published?
I
left Innovation in March of 1993 to found Glass House Graphics. Though only 6
issues were published, I had completely written at least nine issues. A cover
for #7 was done, but I don't recall any interior pages being completed.
Innovation published #6 in December of 2003, I think, and they closed their
doors before the next issue was substantially drawn. Those scripts are in a file
in my basement somewhere.
We've heard that there is a piece of
cover art that was finished for the seventh issue. Do you still have it and can
you share it with us?
Yes,
I'm happy to share it with you.
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Click on the picture to see a full-size image of the cover.
Were those comics a good selling
product? As far as you know, was it only the fans of the show who purchased the
comics or did they appeal to a wider market?
We
sold an awful lot of books to a female readership and a gay readership - which
"wiser heads" at the super-hero companies claimed didn't exist for
comics. I was happy to prove 'em wrong. BEAUTY
& THE BEAST sold well – and would have done far BETTER had we been
permitted to create new stories.
When you think back on the Beauty
and the Beast Innovations Comics, what do you remember most?
How
Mike Deodato kept getting better each issue. Every time I show people his work
on that project, I pull out issues #5 and #6 to show.
Do you still have any connections to Beauty
and the Beast – attend conventions or correspond with any of the creators,
writers, cast or staff from the show or with the show's fans?
I
hear from a couple of the fans on occasion, and someday I'm hope someone'll give
me a Christmas gift of the whole series on DVD.
If the opportunity arose to do another Beauty
and the Beast series of comics with the shows original characters, would you
like to be involved?
YES!
No question. If someone wanted to continue the adaptations, I have several
unused scripts to get 'em started. AND I would especially love to do new stories
with those wonderful characters.
Were your other Innovations comics also
artistic recreations of other types of existing work or did you work with others
on original story lines?
Dark Shadows,
Lost in Space, Quantum
Leap, and all the others were NEW
Tell us how you search out your
artists/illustrators? What are you looking for?
Four
things: An ability to draw well, an ability to tell a story in pictures, an
attractive style editors are willing to buy and a professional attitude that
includes constant and clear communication.
Is it important to match an artist's
style to the type of comic?
Of
course!
How did you decide which literary-film-tv
shows would make good comic tie-ins?
Gut
feelings. To hell with market research. Innovation proved all the market
research wrong. I had people telling me, for example, Anne Rice's The
Vampire Lestat, a 400-page novel being adapted as a 400-page comic story,
painted, serialized across 12 issues and two years, would fail miserably. It was
our biggest success.
You've been a writer and co-writer for a
wide variety of comics. Is there one that stands out in your mind and for what
reason?
HERO ALLIANCE,
because it was my first creator-owned super-hero property and broke a bit of new
ground. LOST IN SPACE because it was a
property everyone said was dead, and I figured out how to make it vital again. EXPOSURE,
because I got to do X-Files-type stories which I love to do.
Which of your comic book series do you
like best and why?
It's
always the NEXT thing I'm working on - which in this case will be THUNDERSAURS,
coming out late in 2007, an all-ages series involving a brother, a sister, and a
world of dinosaurs and deadly trolls and a mysterious underwater race. It's all
great fun, and beautifully drawn by Tina Francisco, a discovery from the
Philippines.
What do you like to hear from someone
reading your comics? What would you consider your greatest compliment?
"I'm
looking forward to reading your next issue."
Today you oversee offices in various
countries, coordinating art from nearly 100 revolving talents worldwide. Is
there anything you miss about running a smaller company like your Innovations
Publishing?
The
only thing I miss is not working on BEAUTY
& THE BEAST, LOST IN SPACE, DARK
SHADOWS, and HERO ALLIANCE. I don't miss the spreadsheets and investor meetings
and everyone trying to second-guess my plans.
Do you ever get the itch to write again?
I've
never stopped writing.
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Do you have any advice for people who
might want to get into the comic book market, either as a writer or an
illustrator?
Yes!
Visit my website. I've devoted a huge section to
helping talented people break in to the business. I've included sample plots and
script for writers to study; I've uploaded all sorts of artistic information and
advance on preparing portfolios, specific samples, even information on scanning
and coloring techniques.
What is it about the comic book/graphic
novel media that appeals to you strongly enough to make it your career?
It's
a miniature version of movies - without the incredible budget. You can tell any
kind of story in comics form, just as any kind of story as a film. It's a matter
of learning the process.
What are you working on now?
I've
worked on THUNDERSAURS for the past
year, and I write lots of things for our clients. And, of course, I'm finally
writing THE ULTIMATE GUIDE TO CREATING
COMICS & GRAPHIC NOVELS, based on the Seminars I teach all over the
world.
Do you have anything you would like to
say to the readers of this interview about yourself, Beauty and the Beast, your work or to fandom in general?
Thanks
for reading and enjoying.
