Tom's Mad Blog
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
April 4th, 2016 | Posted in Monday MADness
Television executives weren’t always the entertainment geniuses they are today, where they either endlessly mine comic books and graphic novels for ideas for shows, or just steal ideas from other shows ideas for ideas for shows… or pretend a completely scripted and carefully calculated program is an “unscripted reality show”. As recently as 2007, some TV executives actually thought it was a good idea to create a show based on characters from TV ads, specifically the Geico insurance “cavemen” (psst… it was NOT a good idea). Never one to restrain themselves from shooting fish in a barrel, MAD jumped on this dogpile with the feature… READ MORE
April 3rd, 2016 | Posted in Mailbag
A: Hi Tom! Two questions. First, what mandatory actions will inevitably take place that you feel in your gut will be guided by destiny to sky rocket the popularity of the printed MAD magazine on a path to go above and beyond the highest peak in readership from the 70s to three million readers once again making reading MAD cooler than listening to Led Zeppelin while having sex on a motorcycle that sits on top of a skateboard on fire with a cigarette in your mouth, just like it already is? I am probably not supposed to reveal this, but MAD does have a proposed… READ MORE
April 1st, 2016 | Posted in General
There is an empty lot up on a very busy intersection up near my house that until about a year ago had a BP gas and service station on it. That was razed and the lot still stands empty with no signs on it about what may be coming on the space. At 4 am this morning I put this sign up on the lot. It’s 4’x8′. The only clue it’s a prank is a small Alfred E Neuman face at the bottom right corner. Sadly it’s very windy today, so I have twice been up there to fix the sign. I took this photo… READ MORE
March 31st, 2016 | Posted in MAD Magazine
The legendary Al Jaffee The Lovely Anna and I were lucky to be able to attend a special event last night in celebration of the great Al Jaffee‘s 95th birthday at Sardi’s in New York City. Hosted by DC Entertainment, a crowd of Al’s family, friends and colleagues congratulated Al on seven decades (and going) of work as a cartoonist and on 95 years on the planet. The evening included some big surprises, including Al’s induction into the Guinness Book of World Records and a NYC Mayoral Proclamation. Al and MAD writer Dick DeBartolo More of MAD’s Usual Idiots (Clockwise lower left): MAD photographer Irving… READ MORE
March 30th, 2016 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week
Traveling. Can’t post a fresh sketch today. Here’s a golden oldie from 2007 of Leonardo DiCaprio. READ MORE
