Rants & Raves

WORKING WITH DISNEY

Working with Disney: Interviews with Animators, Producers, and Artists (210 6x9-inch pages, b/w, no illustrations; University Press of Mississippi, hardcover, $55; paperback, $25) was assembled by the self-proclaimed ultimate Disney fan: Don Peri, a Baby Boomer who’s watched Disney films all of his life, met 30-year Disney veteran Ben Sharpsteen in 1974 and collaborated with him on his memoirs, which, unpublished, resides in the Walt Disney Archives. Peri then began interviewing other graduates of the Disney Studio who had known and worked with “Uncle Walt.”

The University Press published the first collection of the Peri interviews in 2008, Working with Walt: Interviews with Disney Artists, and we reviewed it at the Usual Place, Rants & Raves, Opus 225. This volume publishes another 15 interviews, including those Peri conducted with Frank Thomas, Ollie Johnston, and Marc Davis — three of Disney’s legendary Nine Old Men of Animation — Dave Hand (first director, “after Walt,” of short-subject cartoons and of “Snow White”) and cast members at Disneyland on opening day, a couple of Mouseketeers, and others, among them Walter Lantz, who never worked for Disney but was a contemporary in early animation.

The interviews, in addition to offering deep insights into Disney and the operations of his Studio, are laced with other fascinating tidbits.

The Walter Lantz interview sheds new light on the incident of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, the Disney creation that was stolen by Charles Mintz, who had insinuated himself into the Disney operation by marrying Disney’s distributor, Margaret J. Winkler, and then, in 1928, finessing Oswald away from Disney by claiming that he, Mintz, owned the Oswald copyright.

Not so, said Lantz: the Oswald copyright was always owned by Universal, for whom Disney as well as Mintz was producing animated cartoons. Devastated by what he supposed was the loss of Oswald, Disney invented Mickey Mouse. “Universal didn’t want any part of it,” Lantz remembered, “ — they said that mice wouldn’t go.”

But Universal wanted its own cartoon department and asked Lantz to set one up. Lantz, who by then had ten years experience in animation, said he would, “providing I could redesign the rabbit. I made him a white rabbit, which is not the Disney rabbit at all.” Disney’s Oswald was all black, and he was reincarnated in Mickey but without long ears.

OLD FARTS

 

Old Farts Are Forever (128 6x6-inch pages, b/w; Andrews McMeel paperback, $9.99) by Lee Lorenz presents the New Yorker cartoonist’s view of aging, gracefully or not. Lorenz introduces this collection with this: “Just as people begin to look like their dogs, cartoonists begin to look like their people. This notion hit me one day when I looked in the mirror and discovered that, after so many years of drawing old farts, I had become one.”

I like Lorenz’s style as much as Sidney Harris’, and in the selection arrayed hereabouts, we can watch as he administers his energetic brush in an increasingly slapdash manner as time weaves its way. But vintage or recent, the pictures are a delight to behold.

FORGOTTEN FANTASY: SUNDAY COMICS 1900-1915

 

 

 

 

Sunday Press is back with another in its landmark vintage newspaper-sized reprints, Forgotten Fantasy: Sunday Comics 1900-1915, compiling runs of beautifully rendered strips usually overlooked by fanciers of the funnies — such as Lyonel Feinigner’s Kinder Kids, Winsor McCay’s Wee Willie Winkie, and George McManus’ Nibsy the Newsboy, plus Naughty Pete, The Explorigator — all beautifully drawn and handsomely printed in those golden years of yore, and now painstakingly restored digitally and reincarnated by the man who loves four-color beauties, publisher Peter Maresca

ARCHIE BABIES

Calvin Reid at publishersweekly.com reports: “For the first time in its 70-year history, Archie Comics will publish an original graphic novel later this year — a major change for a company that still leans heavily on newsstand sales of single-issue comics and digests for the lion's share of its revenue. The new graphic novel, Archie Babies, will be written by Mike Kunkel, who wrote and drew the first issues of Billy Batson and the Magic of Shazam! for the DC Comics' DC Kids line. The artist for the project is Art Mawhinney, who has worked for DC, Marvel, and Nickelodeon. The book will be distributed by Random House. Archie Babies was originally announced as a monthly series, but Jon Goldwater, co-CEO of Archie, said the company is putting renewed emphasis on graphic novels since signing a distribution deal with Random House last September. ‘We are going to put a lot of emphasis on our graphic novels,’ he said. ‘It is a very, very important part of our business here at Archie Comics.’”

Archie’s latest foray into the future resulted in digital versions of its comics being online the same day as print editions hit the newsstands, reports George Gene Gustines at artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com. Postings began in April, but already comic shop retailers began raising a ruckus before that, fearing the web exposure will sabotage sales in their stores. Archie titles in print have been published in many different languages, but the digital variety started offering some titles in Spanish, reported the Associated Press. Said Goldwater: “We have an incredible number of fans—not just domestically—who speak Spanish.”

Archie is getting so up-to-speed that politics have intruded into the otherwise balmy afternoons at Riverdale High School. In Archie No. 616, Archie and Veronica are depicted talking environmental issues with President Obama, and Reggie gets his photograph taken with Sarah Palin. “Both political alliances are used for Archie and Reggie to further their campaigns for student-body president,” said Ken Tucker at EW.com’s Shelflife blog.Firmly in the stampede of a hard charge into modernity, Archie launched a mini-series starring the gay character, Kevin Kelly, who was introduced last spring.