MAD Magazine
March 13th, 2021 | Posted in General
The words “legendary” and “genius” get thrown around an awful lot these days, but if there is anyone in the world of cartooning to whom these words truly apply it would be the great Al Jaffee, who turns 100 years old today. MAD Magazine has had many artists work for them whose level of talent and skill have been off the charts: Jack Davis, Mort Drucker, Wally Wood, Harvey Kurtzman, Will Elder, Sergio Aragonés, Don Martin… the list keeps on going and going. Some were incredible visual artists like Drucker, Wood, Elder, and Davis, some were unique combinations of written and visual humor like Kurtzman, Sergio,… READ MORE
March 8th, 2021 | Posted in MAD Magazine
We continue our Monday MADness chronological crawl through my work for MAD with a look at my 16th appearance in the magazine. This was another “sports” (specifically baseball) related piece written by Scott Lieberman for MAD #421, Sept 2002. It’s also the third (and last) feature I did in black and white for the magazine until the “retro” spoof I did of “Bounty Law” from “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood” just a few years ago. I have to say I am embarrassed by that first panel. This might have been done 20 years ago and racial stereotyping was something no one was very conscious… READ MORE
March 5th, 2021 | Posted in MAD Magazine
Apparently if you ever aspired to be one of “The Usual Gang of Idiots” at MAD Magazine, being born in March raised your odds at bit. It seems like a lot of UGOI have birthdays this month, notably Al Jaffee who turns 100 on the 13th, Bill Gaines (March 1st), Ray Alma (March 4th), Sam Viviano (also March 13th), and Mort Drucker (March 22nd). I’m probably missing a few. Another longtime member of the Usual Gang’s birthday is this month… this day, in fact! Paul Coker Jr. turns 92 today. I’m told Jaffee always refers to him as, “that kid.” I’ve always felt that Paul… READ MORE
March 4th, 2021 | Posted in MAD Magazine
The Chicago Reader’s Jake Austen has a terrific article about new MAD Fold-In Fiend Johnny Sampson, which also serves as a pretty good snapshot of the state of the magazine today. Definitely worth a read. READ MORE
March 1st, 2021 | Posted in MAD Magazine
We continue our Monday MADness chronological crawl through my work for MAD with a look at my 15th appearance in the magazine, and my first “Superhero” movie parody. This is a spoof of the first Tobey Maguire Spider-Man film, written by Dick DeBartolo and appearing in MAD #418, June 2002. I remember I inked a lot of this job while I was attending a National Caricaturists Network convention in Las Vegas in 2002. That splash page features a lot of cameos of people I know. From the far left, the guy in the blue shirt is my pal Jim Batts, the little girl with the… READ MORE
February 22nd, 2021 | Posted in MAD Magazine
We continue our Monday MADness chronological crawl through my work for MAD with a look at my 14th appearance in the magazine, and my third movie parody. This one was a spoof of the Wes Anderson film “The Royal Tenenbaums”, written by Arnie Kogen and appearing in MAD #417, May 2002. This was (and remains) one of my favorite movie parodies I did for MAD. It’s not a favorite because of the work I did on it…I was still learning the ropes of doing these continuities. I loved working on this one because it was one of the most unique movies I ever got to… READ MORE
February 15th, 2021 | Posted in MAD Magazine
My next assignment for MAD appeared in issue #416, May 2002. It was a return to a sports-themed feature called “Their Team…& Your Team…” written by John Prete. I started for MAD at almost exactly the time it switched to a color format. In fact a big part of why I started getting work from them was that they were planning the switch to color and I did my own digital coloring. In the 20 years I did work for the magazine, I only ever did four jobs in black and white. This was one of them. This was, however, the first black and white… READ MORE
February 14th, 2021 | Posted in MAD Magazine
Q: This question is prompted by your recent Care Bears post … I haven’t seen you talk in your blog before about pitching your own ideas to MAD. Did you do this often, and did many get picked up? A: Actually that may have been my first and last pitch for a completely independent piece for MAD. I do not remember ever doing that before or since. It never really occurred to me to even try pitching my own features or gag ideas to them, because I was usually very busy doing the art for features they assigned to me that others wrote. I regularly… READ MORE
