Remembering Phil

I have reached that cheerless age when death begins to assert itself in ever more overt and pitiless ways. In the warm blush of youth, it is easy to ignore the lurking spectre of death and imagine oneself immortal. But, gradually, with time and wisdom, death catches up with us. First grandparents go, then parents, and finally friends and colleagues begin to pass out of this life. We are left whistling nervously in the gloom as more and more of that bony, scythe-wielding wraith is revealed by our diminishing numbers.

It has been a bad year for me in that regard. First, my old friend and fellow improvisor Drew Leavy passed away after a long, brave and defiantly humorous struggle with cancer. After that, we lost my uncle Ray, also from cancer, after a major amputation failed to stop the progress of the disease. Then, in December, my terrific father in law, Bill McGillivary succumbed suddenly to failing health, leaving us all without an anchor.

And, just a few weeks ago, came the sad news that a long time professional collaborator, Philip Kates, had died. He was yet another victim of that bastard disease, cancer.

That's Phil on the right. In the company
of pretty ladies, as usual. How did you do it Phil?

Phil was a talented film director, specializing in TV commercials and music videos, and for several years I provided storyboards for dozens of his commercial jobs. He was a great visual thinker, who dreamed up and realized striking cinematic images. He was a lighthearted and hilarious guy, and working with him was always a good time. And, (unlike some directors I could name), he had a great deal of respect for his collaborators. Everything was a team effort with Phil, and he always gave credit where credit was due. He was generous with his time, friendship and talent.

I was working primarily in animation at that time, but I was growing disillusioned with the industry. Another colleague, Chris Minz, had been doing storyboards for commercials at a small production company here in Toronto, but he was heading out of the country for several weeks. He passed my name on to the producers at the company, and shortly thereafter I was called in for a few jobs.

Then I got a call to come in and show samples to a director I’d never worked with. (Yes, this was in the days when you actually made photocopies of your samples and brought them in, in person!)

That director was Phil Kates.

Phil was not a tall man, but his energy and enthusiasm made him seem bigger than life. We were the same age, but if you had asked me that day, I’d have said he was six or seven years younger than me. The guy had an energetic glow, and a real love of life that shone through from the first moment we met.

I hauled out the two commercial boards I’d done, which were both for kid’s toys, and a few pages of an animation board. As I spread them out on the table, it suddenly seemed like a rather pitiful offering, but Phil was very positive and enthusiastic about the samples. Unfortunately, there was a problem. The commercial he was working on was all about sexy girls, and he didn’t see any examples of this in my work. He was very nice about it, and admitted I could likely do the job, but was clear that he’d be looking for someone who could demonstrate advanced cheesecake skills in their samples. Phil assured me we’d work together on something soon, but this wouldn’t be the job.

I admit that burned me a bit.

Hey, I knew I could knock out a drawing of a nice, sexy gal, and nobody was going to tell me otherwise. I went home that night and drew up about a dozen hot chicks and the next day I arrived unannounced to show them to Phil. (Yes, this was in the days when you could walk into almost any production company without going through seven levels of security and a decontamination shower.) The receptionist called Phil out of a back room somewhere and he came out with an expression of concerned confusion on his face, perhaps wondering if I was some kind of nut who couldn’t take no for an answer.

I told him I didn’t want to take up a lot of his time, but I had some cute girl sketches for him to take a look at. He laughed out loud and flipped through the drawings, quite tickled that I’d gone to the trouble. Inevitably, Phil informed me that he’d already hired someone else for the job in question, but that he appreciated the effort. He called me often after that, to create boards for dozens of spots including several requiring drawings of sexy girls, and often sang my praises to other directors.

I’m most proud to say I did the boards for “Saturday Night” a cautionary public service announcement Phil created for MADD. You can see the spot here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LaZNObtJ9VM And compare it to some of the boards, which I’ve posted below. 

Unfortunately, we lost touch after Phil moved out west, and I didn’t even know he was sick until my wife ran across his obituary in Marketing Magazine.

It hit me really hard. Even though we hadn’t worked together for a while, it seemd like I’d seen him only yesterday. This much I know, my career, my skills and my sense of professionalism all benefited greatly from our association.

Thanks Phil, I’ll miss you, man. 

Star Factory

The winners deadline for the Toronto Star Short Story Contest has come and gone, and since I didn't receive a call to go in for my author's photograph and monster cheque, I think it's safe to assume my story didn't win one of the coveted cash prizes.

Obviously, winning is a long shot, so I didn't really hold out that much hope that I'd be chosen from the hundreds (possibly thousands) of entries the contest receives every year.

Still, it stings a little.

What can I say, I'm a cockeyed optimist.

I think it's one of the better stories I've written, but, depending on how one interprets the story, it does have the faintest touch of a genre breeze blowing through it. The tiniest scent of the supernatural contaminating its otherwise gritty, literary feeling. Genre stories are seldom chosen by the judges and powers that be at the Star contest, so I knew going in it would be an uphill battle. I knew I'd be up against the sheer volume of submissions, the undoubtedly high quality of many of the entries, and the general preference for the literary style. Particularly those which have the feeling of being a "true story" which many of the past winning stories have had.

Oh, well.

Next year I'm gonna kick that football to the moon, Lucy Van Pelt!

Is submitting stories to contests akin
to Charlie Brown's clinical inability to
accept that he will never kick that football?

In the meantime, although some actual paying work is slowing down my rewrites, I have three stories that are only a few scant hours of polishing away from being ready to send out. Since the reply system of the publishing business as it stands is so interminably slow, I'd like to get those stories in the mail before we hit the middle of the year.

Plus, I need to find a new place to submit my fantasy story, "The Weed" which was unable to find a home on its first trip out.

Lots to do, better get on it!

Ghostly Sketches From The Past

Something haunting happened to me last fall at the Fan Expo event here in Toronto. I’m still thinking about it, and wondering what happened, exactly.

            The Fan Expo is an enormous event, a multi-geek-fandom affair featuring horror, anime, gaming, sci-fi and, of course, their poor country cousin, comics. Thanks to my old buddy James Armstrong, I always have a table in artist’s alley.

The Toronto Fan Expo

Home away from home for
the Geek hordes.

Over the years it isn’t uncommon to have a friend or acquaintance from the dim dark past recognize my name and stop by my table to say howdy. It happened a few years ago with a gent named Joe Arena, who was actually the first man to publish my comics, way back when I was a cocky, seventeen year old wanna-be with a very long way to go. I also had the eldest son of my old shop teacher, Ross Andrews, come up with greetings from the old fellow himself. Mr. Andrews (as I still think of him) was the first person to encourage my drawing when I was just a goofy, long-haired thirteen year old, trying to construct a box from tin sheets in his grade seven shop class.

            Usually meeting an old friend is a rather pleasant experience, catching up with people, (or the sons of people) who played some role in my past life is nice now and then. However, last year a chance meeting with a former buddy of mine went rather a different way.

            I only knew Fletch for a few years.

In my hometown of Tillsonburg there weren’t too many comics freaks. This was the seventies, and the exploding collectors market was still more than a decade into the future. The grand master of comic collecting in our town was a guy named Mason Armstrong. He was older, in his mid twenties, and he possessed an impressive collection. (His Fantastic Four collection started with issue #9!) Mason was a tall, sandy haired, soft-spoken guy, with thick glasses, who worked in his parent’s drug store. He’d stake out the comic spinner in the store and make contact with the town’s other budding comics addicts, like myself. There were only four or five of us. A few desperate, continuity starved, square pegs who made the rounds of all the drug stores and convenience stores in town, vainly seeking to satisfy our personal four color addictions from the titles available from the spotty local distribution.

It was Mason who first introduced me to Fletch. Fletch was about my age, but taller and more athletic, and much more conscious of his appearance and looking ‘cool’. He was pure 70’s, while I was clinging to the fading hippie aesthetic. (A look I still haven’t abandoned!) We were both into comics and rock music and drawing. At that time, Fletch was probably a better artist than I was. He seemed to have a keener grasp of anatomy and proportion, whereas I was a little better at storytelling and continuity. (I wish I still had some of his drawings to post.)

We did what most fifteen year-old boys in Tillsonburg did. We fought valiantly against the crushing boredom! We hung out, listened to The Stones, Alice Cooper, and Aerosmith, swilled down crap like potato chips, Oh Henry bars and Coke, and schemed to meet, and theoretically date, girls.

Teenager food.

            And we drew piles of superhero pictures.

Batman, Superman, Conan, the Incredible Hulk, and the amazing Len Wein Dave Cockrum re-launch of the X-Men were our bibles. We copied poses, and fearlessly attempted our own pin-ups and pages. We debated the relative merits of our favorite characters and companies. He was a DC man, and I was a Marvel fan, he liked Batman, and I liked Conan. I remember that the great Jim Aparo was Fletch’s favorite artist, while I preferred the comics stylings of John Buscema. (In retrospect we had both chosen great role models, though I admit the fact that Aparo penciled, inked and lettered his own work was unique at the time.) It was a productive rivalry. 
We had great fun, pushed each other to do better, and dreamed of drawing comics for a living.

Similar poses from two comics giants.
(Click for larger image)

We were thick as Zamorian thieves for a few brief months.

I never got a clear picture of what was happening, but Fletch began to have a lot of trouble getting along with his parents. We started to meet exclusively at my house as tensions rose between he and his folks. They were one of the wealthier families in town, and perhaps Fletch’s career aspirations, or lack of them, were a sticking point. I honestly don’t know. We got together less and less frequently, and then I heard nothing from Fletch at all. It was Mason who told me, some weeks later, that he was no longer living at home. I don’t know if he left, or his parents threw him out. I later heard a vague rumor that Fletch had some sort of unpleasant brush with the law, but I can’t confirm the truth of this.

I tiptoed gingerly around my parents for a few months after that.

About two years later I saw Fletch for the last time. I was about to head off to college and this was my last summer of freedom. Mason and I were about to make a final trip into nearby London Ontario, to visit some great comic shops and used bookstores there. Mason mentioned that we were also going to pay a visit to Fletch.

Naively, I brought along a stack of my drawings. I still hadn’t fully grasped the fact that Fletch was out on his own, and had more pressing concerns than doodling Batman poses. I foolishly assumed he had been drawing the whole time.

Aparo was the king of
drawing spooky mists.

We met Fletch at his apartment, which he shared with a few other guys, and was a bit of a mess. He seemed really excited to see us and we yakked about nonsense for a while. He mentioned he was working at some sort of manual labor job, construction, or public works, I can’t recall what, exactly. Finally, Fletch pointed to my portfolio and asked to see my drawings.

Due to the exceptional art classes I’d been taking at College Avenue Secondary School in Woodstock, I’d made a lot of progress. I proudly yanked out my artwork. Not just comics pages, but life drawing, portraits and caricatures, as well.

Fletch looked it all over in silence, and then looked back at me and said: “Wow, you’re like, really good now.”

He handed back the stack of drawings and I put them in the portfolio. I asked if he had any new drawings.

“No, man, I been too busy working.”

I was aware enough to realize that the mood in the room had changed, but not quite sensitive enough to understand why. Fletch put up a good front, but after a few minutes he cut things short, claiming he had to get to work.

Then, last year, over thirty years later, he showed up at my table at the Expo.

I was working on one of the many commission sketches I drew that afternoon, when I noticed a rather imposing looking dude stopped a few yards away from my table. He gave me an intense look. The guy was tall, very muscular and beefy, wearing a body hugging T-shirt, and jeans. He looked at me, and then up at the big name tag behind me a few times, and finally approached me.

“Dude, you’re from Tillsonburg!”

I laughed and admitted I was.

“It’s me, Fletch!”

Suddenly, I could see the face of my teenaged friend through the wrinkles and graying hair. I was thrilled to see him. He was very excited at first, and we did the catching up thing.

“Dude, I knew that was you,” he said, “I can’t believe you still got all that hair!”

“I would never give up my hair, man! You got some real muscles there, Bro, you must do a lot of weight training.”

“Nope, just from working,” he answered.

It was nice for a couple minutes.

Then he started looking at my drawings. He seemed to become more pensive.

“This stuff is great, man. You’re working in comics now?”

“A little. I worked in animation for a long time. Now I mostly do storyboards for movies and TV, but I do a bit of writing and drawing for the comics when I can.”

He got this very distressed look on his face.

“I’m getting a bit freaked out here,” he said. “I feel like I’m gonna cry… I gotta go.”

“Come back later,” I called after him, as he moved off into the crowd.

“Yeah, man,” he called back.

But, he didn’t.

I don’t know for sure why Fletch got so emotional.

It could be because I had industriously traveled a road he’d once considered for himself. Or, perhaps he wondered what his life might have been like if his parents were a bit more supportive of his interests. Hell, maybe he just missed drawing.

As the afternoon wore on, and it became clear he wasn’t going to come back, I began to feel very sad about it.

If he had come back, I’d have told him some important things.

First, I never realized any of my most prized goals. I wanted to draw for Marvel and DC and I never did. I wanted to animate for Disney, and I never did. I wanted to write and perform television comedy, and, so far, that hasn’t happened either. I’m glad I attempted all these things, and I try never to regret my life choices, but man, I can tell you, failing hurts like a sumbitch.

Second, I made choices in my life too. A few were good choices, but many were extraordinarily bad. Yes, I stuck to my path, and I worked hard and I had a few successes here and there. I’ve had some flush financial booms, and a few creatively rewarding experiences. But, I’ve also many periods of hardship, including right now.

Fletch, you lived your life. You made your choices, for better or worse, and you’re still here. You survived. For a human being, that’s plenty.

            I really hope you come back to the Expo again this year.

I miss you buddy.

One of my Batman sketches, in honor of
Fletch, Danny, Albert and all the other lost
comics buddies from my past.
(Click for larger image)

Of Apes and Men

If you are a Planet of the Apes fan, (and who the heck isn’t), here’s something nifty you should check out, Timeline of the Planet of the Apes, and the recently released Lexicon of the Planet of the Apes.

More fun than a barrel of... well, you know...

            These two tomes of delicious Apey goodness were written by a rather mad genius named Rich Handley. Rich, who can only be described as an extreme Planet of the Apes fan, has compiled the definitive timeline of all things Apes, and a compendium of all the remaining elements of the Apes sagas. It encompasses all the movies, TV series, comic books and assorted ephemera that have borne the name. It’s a daunting task, to be sure, and one that has been performed with great precision and unmatched dedication by the industrious Mr. Handley.

            But the most fun thing for me is, I’m kinda in the books! As part of a short lived Canadian comic book publishing company called Mr. Comics, (AKA Metallic Rose), I wrote and drew a short, five-page backup story for issue #4 of their mini-series Revolution On the Planet of the Apes, edited by Toronto comics maven Ty Templeton.

            And such is Rich Handley’s obsession for minutiae and unassailable accuracy that he has included my little story and its characters in both books. Hell, the dude even includes references to a story I roughed out for the comic, which was rejected in favor of the published story! How delightfully compulsive is that? But Rich didn’t stop there. He shared the roughs of that unpublished story with a UK periodical named Simian Scrolls, who liked it so much they published it in issue #16 of their magazine.

Thanks for helping that story see the light of day Rich.

            Rich Handley first became obsessed with all things Ape after viewing all the Apes movies during a week-long afternoon film festival on ABC in the late ‘70’s. As a precocious ten year old with an already overdeveloped love of movies, he was doomed from the moment the first gorilla appeared on screen.

            Shortly after the millennium ticked over, Rich began a website featuring a rudimentary version of his Apes timeline entitled “The Hasslein Curve”. Science fiction writer Ed Gross approached Rich about turning his web site into a book. Unfortunately, after compiling the timeline, Ed Gross was unable to follow through on the publishing. Rich then teamed up with his good friend Paul Giachetti, and the diligent duo deftly decided to publish the book themselves. And thank goodness they did, because this stuff is just indispensable for any self respecting Apes aficionado.

            Rich currently lives on Long Island with his wife Jill, their two kids Emily and Joshua and their skittish cat Newton. Rich is busy working on some new books, including two Apes novels with co-writer Drew Gaska and some other top secret stuff.

            Check out Hasslein books at the URL below, or be forever banished to the Forbidden Zone.

http://www.hassleinbooks.com/

            And, since this is my blog, I’ve included my own little Apes stories, published and unpublished, for your enjoyment and edification.

The unpublished story.

The published story.