My 20th Wedding Anniversary

Twenty years ago today, I married my best friend...and contrary to the lessons learned from comic book weddings, there was nary a super-villain in sight!

Help For Kurtzman Help Documentary

Fellow I.T.C.H. member J J Sedelmaier brings attention to a proposed documentary on MAD and HELP creator Harvey Kurtzman. Here's what Phil Michelson has to say:

I am developing a documentary on MAD Magazine founder Harvey Kurtzman and his influential, early 1960’s humor magazine HELP! Working with fellow producer Terry Gilliam (Monty Python) and director Bruce Sinofsky (Metallica: Some Kind of Monster, HBO’s Brothers Keeper) as well as the cooperation of the Kurtzman estate, we feel that this is an amazing and underappreciated story in American cultural and comedic history.

As this is a film about artists, illustrators and the creative process, I thought that you might know some people who would want to be a part of this film. Right now, our two biggest needs are finding people who either knew Harvey (and were involved with HELP!) and most importantly, that dreaded word that every filmmaker dares to mention: Investors.

We could go the Kickstarter route with this effort, but I feel that there may be enough power in the artist community to bring in the funding we seek. Right now, we are about $250,000 short of our current fundraising goals. If there were people willing to invest, or even make a donation toward this film, it would go a long way to insuring that we get most of the wonderful, talented and sorry to say, old timers on camera before it is too late.

Any thoughts or ideas on this subject are most welcome. Thank you for your continued support for this film.

Sincerely,

Philip Michelson

Moondog Films

phil@moondogworld.com

For those who may be unfamiliar with HELP, it was more of its time than was the original MAD. HELP was influential for its use of new artists, many of whom (Skip Williamson, Gilbert Shelton, Jay Lynch and Robert Crumb to name a few) would go on to be the first generation of the Underground Comix movement. Feminist icon and MS magazine publisher Gloria Steinem learned the ropes at HELP. Her replacement was Terry Gilliam who met John Cleese through HELP which later led directly to his being involved with MONTY PYTHON. The earliest revival of Will Eisner's SPIRIT was in HELP. The Kurtzman/Elder strip that would become PLAYBOY's LITTLE ANNIE FANNY ran in HELP and Kurtzman also pioneered the American usage of photo-comic strips in HELP.

Silver Age Sub-Mariner Splash Page Sundays # 16

Often portrayed as an angry rebel, today's splash page from 1969 is one of my favorite depictions of Namor looking as regal as a Price ought to look! Framed beautifully by Marie (still with Mike Esposito hiding on the inks) and featuring a downright beautiful depiction of Namor's consort, the Lady Dorma, as well, it's a lovely symbolic splash. Of course there's also ol' growly Tiger Shark and a rather disinterested looking gentleman named Professor Newell about whom we will find out more in a few issues. Storywise, Roy hits a good stride here with continuity threads continuing and multi-part stories starting to become more and more the norm.

Another Ghost Rider Mask Ad

Way back almost four years ago, we ran an ad for a GHOST RIDER mask from the 1950's. Well, we've run across another!

R.I.P. James Arness

He didn't really have much of a range as an actor. He could do stoic cowboy, intense cowboy and laconic cowboy...and he could do giant vegetable people. Other than that, he was not so hot. That said, he could do iconic better than most and managed to be iconic as THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD, Marshal Matt Dillon on GUNSMOKE and, as my Swedish friend Andreas tells me," In Sweden he's most known by far as Zeb Macahan in series "How the West Was Won". I kid you not, every Swede over 30 knows who Zeb is. A true television icon." He was and always will be that--a true television icon.

My Movie Firsts

Some random movie firsts from my life:

1^st Dracula Movie—Dracula, Prince of Darkness

1^st Disney Movie—The Absent-Minded Professor

1^st movie I saw without my parents—Double Trouble

1^st movie I had to stand in a long line for—Yellow Submarine

1^st movie I saw with a girl—Chitty, Chitty Bang Bang

1^st James Bond movie—Diamonds Are Forever

1^st adult date movie—Used Cars

1^st X-Rated film—Teenage Cruisers

1^st Marx Brothers film—Animal Crackers

1^st movie on videotape—The Rocky Horror Picture Show

1^st animated feature film—The Jungle Book

1^st favorite film star—Jerry Lewis

1^st film star I got an autograph from—Stefanie Powers

1^st film star I saw in person—Bob Hope

1^st WC Fields film—The Fatal Glass of Beer

1^st M-rated film—The Eye of the Cat

1^st R-rated film—Twitch of the Death Nerve

1^st movie on DVD—The Avengers

1^st blaxpoitation film—Shaft

1^st martial arts film—The Five Fingers of Death

1^st screwball comedy—It Happened One Night

1^st Cary Grant film—Father Goose

1^st Clint Eastwood film—A Fistful of Dollars

1^st favorite actress—Julie Andrews

1^st favorite movie song—Supercalifragilistic

1^st favorite movie cowboy—John Wayne

Bud Collyer and Comics

Bud Collyer, later known as an author of religious books and as a popular TV game show host on shows like BEAT THE CLOCK and TO TELL THE TRUTH, played SUPERMAN on radio throughout the 1940's. Here are a couple of photos of Bud reading a SUPERMAN comic. The cropped one below with the odd expression has been printed many times in many places but I'd never seen the other before with its additional, mint condition National and All-American comics of the day!