Tom's Mad Blog
April 12th, 2016 | Posted in MAD Magazine
From MAD #84, Photo: Lester Krauss The Usual Gang of Idiots lost a beloved member on Saturday with the news that former MAD production manager and art director Leonard “The Beard” Brenner passed away. The above image is one of many photo gags and fake ads in which Lenny appeared, so MAD readers were familiar with his bearded visage even if they were unaware of the contributions he made behind the scenes. Lenny was with MAD from 1958 until he retired in 1995, and during that time there were very few pages of the magazine that he did not work on in some capacity. Layouts,… READ MORE
April 11th, 2016 | Posted in MAD Magazine
I was asked by some readers to share the process of creating the cover art for MAD #539, so although there is really not that much to it, here you go: I was thrilled to get a call from MAD art director Sam Viviano asking me if I was willing to do the cover art for the next issue. Actually it was more like him asking if I could possibly fit it into my schedule, since he was well aware I was in the middle of doing the art on MAD‘s parody of “The Force Awakes”, which was nine pages and the longest parody in… READ MORE
April 10th, 2016 | Posted in General
Q: Congrats on doing your first cover for MAD, but my initial reaction to seeing your post was “this was his FIRST cover???” Why did it take so long for you to get a cover? A: MAD has always tended to use different illustrators for the covers than they do interiors. Norman Mingo, Richard Williams, Kelly Freas, and a host of others, most recently Mark Fredrickson, have done basically nothing but cover art… but a lot of it. Mort Drucker and Jack Rickard are the only two regulars from the interior of the magazine that have done 30 or more covers, and their styles were… READ MORE
April 8th, 2016 | Posted in News
This two page splash of MAD’s “House of Cards” parody is up for auction… Just a reminder: the online auction to raise money for Glenn Ferguson, the caricature artist who was brutally attacked on New Year’s Day by a disgruntled former co-worker and severely injured, ends Sunday at 10 pm Eastern time. This auction is being organized by the International Society of Caricature Artists, an organization I was once president of. Glenn is doing well in his recovery but has a very long road ahead of him. He’s been home for a couple of months and is doing all his therapy and rehab on an… READ MORE
April 7th, 2016 | Posted in Illustration Throwback Thursday
I used to do fairly regular work for National Geographic Kids magazine (later National Geographic World), mainly spot illustrations but occasionally half or full pages as well. They were an interesting client to work for because they were real sticklers for historical and scientific accuracy when it came to the artwork. I would be given very specific references for things like the type of clothes or accessories someone from a certain place or time would be wearing. I’m not sure when I stopped getting calls from them but I have not done anything for National Geographic World for a few years now. This 2004 piece… READ MORE
April 6th, 2016 | Posted in MAD Magazine
Newsarama posted a sneak peek of the cover feature and cover art from MAD #539 recently. As you can see, MAD spoofs the “adult coloring book” craze with a 4 pager with art by Timothy Shamey and cover by… me! Yes, my first official issue cover. I did two covers for the now defunct MAD Kids, one for a “Superman” special issue and two of the most recent “Bookazines”, but this is first time I got to do the cover of the actual magazine. Covers are rare birds for several reasons. First, there are only six a year. Second, they are usually of the hyper-realistic… READ MORE
April 5th, 2016 | Posted in MAD Magazine
My pal and writer extraordinaire Mark Evanier recently wrote about Al Jaffee’s entry into the Guiness Book of World Records (and I was not surprised to find out that Mark was one of the experts consulted to verify Al’s record), and as often happens on Mark’s wonderful blog one thing led to another resulting in his taking a poll on what people consider the correct stylistic way to write “MAD” along with the “magazine” after it… what do you capitalize? What do you italicize? He lists four possibilities: MAD magazine MAD Magazine MAD magazine MAD Magazine Mark polled his readers, many of whom are editors,… READ MORE
April 5th, 2016 | Posted in News
For some reason the image of this on the auction site is really bad, so here’s a better look… There is an online auction of various caricature art going on RIGHT NOW to raise money for my friend and fellow caricaturist Glenn Ferguson, who was brutally attacked on New Year’s Day by a disgruntled former co-worker and severely injured. You can read all the details here, but the short version is that Glenn sustained significant brain damage and is in for a long and hard fight to regain his ability to do some of the things we take for granted every day, and especially his… READ MORE
