Category Archives: To Be Filed

Here's good advice from John Oliver. Come to think of it, any advice from John Oliver is probably good advice…

Jeff W. writes to ask…

I read your rant about how awful the layout and traffic are at the Los Angeles Convention Center. I get the feeling you have an anecdote you're hiding. Would you care to share it with us?

Well, since one of you asked: I think the last time I was down there was about ten years ago for a videogaming convention. I wouldn't have gone but a very nice (I wrongly thought) producer was about to make me a very nice (I wrongly thought) offer to write the scenario for a silly adventure videogame. We'd had two meetings in his office when suddenly he informed me I had to attend a meeting at this con at — shudder, shiver — the L.A. Convention Center. He insisted I be there at 3 PM sharp to meet with others involved in the project.

So I drove down there that day. I left plenty of time (I wrongly thought) to park and get to the meeting but there was no place to park, no how, no way. Every lot was jammed. The only exception seemed to be one lot directly across the street from the convention center but they wanted $50 to park there. Just as a matter of principle, I wasn't going to fork over that amount for a parking space that was usually eight bucks and overpriced at that.

At 3 PM, the producer cell-phoned me: "Where are you? Everyone's here." I told him I was circling the terrain, unable to find a spot to stash the auto. "Find a place," he yelled. "Park anywhere!" I told him the only option was the fifty dollar lot. He told me to park there and he'd reimburse me the money. Well, okay. The principle at stake suddenly seemed to be whether they'd get my money, not his. I parked, I paid, I went in.

It took me an awful long time to find and hike to the place where I could pick up my badge. It took an awfuler, longer time to get to the designated meeting place. One delay en route was a group of lovely young women who desperately wanted to undress me but I was able to avoid that.

The meeting took place in a little conference room built into the side of this particular videogame company's display. Eight people — one of them, me — crammed into a room about the size of one of those little Hershey bars — the kind you give out for Halloween. What was said? I have no idea. I was in the noisiest convention hall in the world with thousands of videogames all being demonstrated at maximum volume. Couldn't make out one word.

Since I heard absolutely nothing. I said absolutely nothing. After fifteen minutes, with my head feeling like Buddy Rich was doing an all-out drum solo on it, the meeting ended. The producer thanked me profusely for my invaluable contribution to the discussion — I think — and promised to be in touch. Three days later, he presented me with the formal offer for my services and I told him the amounts were insufficient by a couple of decimal places. This infuriated him and I not only didn't do the project but he never gave me my fifty dollars for parking.

It was an awful experience and obviously I'm not blaming all of this on the convention center…but the parking thing was their fault and from what others tell me, it's still a problem at times, plus it was a long, confusing walk from one place to another. Bet that hasn't changed either. Anyway, that's what happened the last time I was there, Jeff. Thanks for asking and —

Oh, wait. You're probably curious about the lovely young women who were eager to undress me. I sure would be if I was you reading this.

Actually, they were eager to undress almost any male walking into this convention. There were about half a dozen of them set up in a corridor there — all in their early twenties and looking stunning in cut-off jeans and tight t-shirts that promoted a new line of games. They were there, oh-so-ready to pounce on guys of a certain age. I'm not sure of the exact range but I was in it.

Their mission? To persuade you to remove whatever shirt you were wearing, which they would lovingly fold and pack in a bag for you. Then one of them would put one of their t-shirts — advertising what they were there to promote — on your torso.

The shirt removal and replacement would be done by one of the ladies in a little private tent they had there — just you and her inside. They all made it sound like a much sexier experience than it surely was. The best-looking one of them, selling this promotion a bit too aggressively, winked at me and said, "Who knows? Once we get in there, I may even want to change my shirt, too."

I said to her, "No, you won't." She said, "You're right, I won't. But it gets a lot of fellows into the tent. Don't you want to be alone in there with me?" She made a disparaging remark about my plain, advertising-free shirt and hinted at what fun she would have peeling it from my manly chest.

I said, "I'm sorry. My mother raised me to believe that if a woman ever removed my shirt, I'd have to do the decent thing and marry her."

She laughed and then, making sure no one around could hear, she whispered to me, "Come on…we get a commission for every shirt we get a guy to put on. Once you get inside, you can slip into the men's room and change back."

I don't know why but I said, "Have you got a 3X?" This was shortly before I lost all that weight in 2006. She checked and they were all out. I guess guys who go to videogaming conventions run kind of large. So I was off the hook and I hurried off to locate that meeting where I couldn't hear a damned thing.

On my way out, the same cute lady accosted me again and, forgetting they were out of my size, tried even harder to get me to let her put one on me. She stopped just short of inviting me to remove her shirt. I got out of there, thinking that even if she had offered that, the whole trip down to the convention center wouldn't have been worth my time. Not even if I hadn't had to shell out the friggin' fifty dollars.

Here's the current draft of the annual obit film from Turner Classic Movies. I say "current draft" because they always put these out early in December and then add in other folks who pass away before New Year's Day.

Naturally, the main topic of discussion about these is who was overlooked. Not featured in this are (among others) Martin Milner, Bud Yorkin, Dick Bakalyan and Stan Freberg. Stan was in several movies on-camera and if you count cartoon voicework, hundreds…

I haven't mentioned my knee here lately. It continues to heal, slowly but certainly. I thought I'd be more mobile by this many days since the second surgery but since things are moving in the right direction, I've decided to be fine with it. I get out once in a while but mostly I stay in, writing or visiting with chums who drop by, minimizing my trips up and down stairs, which is the main time I have any discomfort. I have stopped taking the industrial-strength pain-killers and now get by with a minor one that helps unstiffen the joint and make me ow less frequently.

The main concern is whether the infection will return. As you might recall, I picked up some bacillus during my first knee operation that after one month caused said knee to swell, ache and turn not just any pink but that deep, rich Susan G. Komen pink. A second operation was done to cleanse and since then, scientists have been attempting to identify just what it was that was growing inside me. The samples they extracted have stubbornly refused identification. They simply won't grow in the petri dishes…which may be a hopeful sign. If the thing won't grow in the lab, maybe it won't grow again in me.

Encouraging it to not grow within me are antibiotics. I take an oral one (Doxycycline) and then I'm nearing the end of a six-week daily regimen of an intravenous one (Ceftriaxone). Each day, a nice nurse drops by for ten minutes, checks my vitals and infuses me with the latter but that's almost over. So then it'll just be wait 'n' see if the pink comes back. If it does, I'm in for not one but perhaps two more surgeries. If it doesn't…Yay! The odds, I'm told, are in my favor but not by quite as wide a margin as I'd like.

If all goes well, I'll be walking normally by about New Year's, give or take a holiday. I dunno when I'll resume driving but that will be the marker that I'm really over this.

A friend of mine who has been told he needs the same surgery is reticent because of what happened to me. I tell him he shouldn't be. The odds of picking up an infection like this are, like the bacillus in question, very tiny. There's a risk of it in any kind of surgery and that's not a reason to never have surgery. The basic knee replacement procedure is sound and — assuming a skilled surgeon such as I had — not risky at all. Not having the surgery would in my case have been (eventually) a lot more painful and probably even riskier.

Folks ask if I'm angry and upset about all this. I don't see what the point of that would be. It wouldn't make my knee heal any faster. If something spills, you mop it up. If something breaks, you fix it. My knee went bad and I'm doing what it takes to make it and me functional again. And let's be honest: There are worse things that can happen to a guy who loves to write than to have to stay in all day. If and when I need to have the other knee switched for an artificial one, I may try to time it for when I'm ready to finish that novel I've been thinking about for decades.

I think I've been announced as a Special Guest at WonderCon, which is being held March 25-27 at the Los Angeles Convention Center. For those of you who came in late, WonderCon was originally a great con in Oakland, California and then it changed owners, moved to San Francisco and became an even greater con. It would probably still be in S.F. but one year, the Moscone Center in San Francisco did some remodeling and didn't have room that year for WonderCon…so the gathering relocated to Anaheim.

It was only supposed to be in Anaheim for the one year, then it would shift back to S.F. but two things happened. One was that it was an incredible success in Anaheim, more so than anyone expected. And the other thing was that even after the remodel was done, the con organizers had trouble getting workable dates at the Moscone. So WonderCon became an Anaheim convention and the idea was that if and when they could get decent dates in San Francisco, they'd consider having more WonderCons there in addition to Anaheim. That has not happened yet and may never happen.

This year though, they couldn't get good dates and ample room at the Anaheim Convention Center because it's being expanded. They're adding 200,000 square feet of additional exhibit space and there are also major upgrades to the parking situation and other improvements. If they could find a way to move it even farther from Disneyland, it would be even better but I guess that wasn't an option.

These renovations are expected to be completed in Summer of 2017, which causes us to ponder: What does that mean for that WonderCon 2017? Your guess is not only as good as mine but probably better. Some onlookers are suggesting that if the L.A. Convention Center works out next year, history will repeat itself and that is where WonderCon will stay. I have no opinion on this other than that I've always thought the L.A. Convention Center is a real terrible place with a confusing and fragmented floor plan, horrible parking and ghastly traffic for some distance in any direction.

I offer the following to give you pause on those last two points. To get to the convention center and park, you have to compete with those trying to get to and park for the Staples Center next door. The Staples Center seats 19,000 people and on March 25, there's an evening basketball game — the Lakers versus Denver. On March 26, there's an evening hockey match (Kings vs. Edmonton). And on March 27, there are two basketball games (Clippers vs. Denver in the afternoon, Lakers vs. Washington in the evening). So if any game is sold out, you have to avoid 18,999 people plus Billy Crystal.

Which would be bad enough even if the Staples Center was the only thing down there that attracts crowds. It isn't. Next door to that is L.A. Live, a huge entertainment complex that includes six live entertainment venues, a fourteen screen cinema and the Grammy Museum. There are also twenty restaurants, most of which are expensive and hard to get into during events. Does any of this sound a wee bit crowded?

Nonetheless, I will be there for WonderCon and I'm trying to decide whether to arrive by Uber or drone. The folks who run WonderCon put on really, really good conventions — they're the same people who bring you Comic-Con in San Diego — and it's always worth whatever hassle is involved in getting to one of their cons. I'm just anticipating way more than there should be.

Speaking of Comic-Con in San Diego! As you may know, there are always these issues about whether Comic-Con will stay there. The current contract runs through Comic-Con 2018 so we'll soon be hearing predictions it will move and rumors that other cities have an "in" to steal it away…and I'm sure there'll be those who think that larger facilities in L.A. or Anaheim will win the day. It will take a lot more of that than we've ever seen to get me to budge off my prediction that Comic-Con will remain right where it is for a long, long time.

But there have been problems as a planned expansion of the San Diego Convention Center was killed. Recently, a group unaffiliated with the con has been gathering signatures for a proposed ballot measure that would raise the city's hotel room tax to 15.5 percent. This initiative is being advertised as a way to fund the expansion, thereby keeping Comic-Con in S.D. It's a nice thought but there's some question as to whether the increased revenues it would bring in would actually go for that. On Friday, the convention issued this statement…

Comic-Con is not a party to the initiative and its passing will have no effect on the organization's decision to remain in San Diego. Comic-Con has stated in the past, and continues to believe, a contiguous, expanded convention center is one that will benefit the city best. It appears this ballot initiative does not favor that scenario.

In other words, while people are adding their names to petitions thinking they're keeping Comic-Con from moving away, they may be empowering other causes. Let the signer beware.

Each year, Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS does many events to raise funds for its most worthy cause. My favorite — and I always wish I was in New York when these happen in December — is the annual Gypsy of the Year Awards show. There are only two performances mounted — at odd hours because most of the folks involved in this show are doing eight performances a week in some ongoing Broadway show. But they devote their so-called "free time" to writing and learning and performing special material for these two special performances, which are done largely for an industry audience.

Here's the opening number from this year's Gypsy of the Year Awards presentation. It's a very cute little dance number that I'm sure you'll enjoy…

Hey, can I bring up the Bill Cosby matter again? Cosby probably owes Donald Trump many thanks for grabbing all the headlines away but recently, this caught my eye. In the New Yorker recently, Jeffrey Toobin was listing some of the big legal stories to follow in 2016. This was one of them…

The comedian's reputation has been destroyed in the course of 2015, as dozens (dozens!) of women came forward to say that he had drugged and sexually assaulted them. Cosby's lawyers have denied most of the charges, when they have addressed them at all. But, in 2016, Cosby will suffer a lot more than bad publicity. A criminal investigation and multiple civil lawsuits are moving forward against him. The statute of limitations has been Cosby's ally throughout his legal troubles, but the number and magnitude of the allegations should overwhelm him this year. It's a good guess that Cosby will end 2016 in prison — and that he will end his life destitute.

Toobin's no dummy but prison and poverty sure have never seemed likely or even possible to me since the revelations started. Regarding the latter, Cosby has a net worth that's been estimated at $400 million. I would think you could pay a helluva lot of legal fees and outta-court settlements and maybe even endure one big loss to Gloria Allred and still have a nice chunk of that wad left over. But perhaps not.

As for what would land him behind bars, I'm assuming Toobin is thinking of the Chloe Goins matter. Her allegations of rape against Cosby apparently are not mooted by the Statute of Limitations but for a while, legal analysts were speculating that some of her own problems, including a reported arrest for prostitution, would cloud that matter and allow Cosby to skate by. Does Toobin now think that will not be the case? Does he think that public outrage over all the crimes that cannot be prosecuted will create a tsunami that will force the Goins case to go against Bill?

I have a hard time seeing all this happening but if Jeffrey Toobin thinks it is — well, maybe…

This is the next-to-last entry to Mark Evanier's list of the twenty top voice actors in American animated cartoons between 1928 and 1968. For more on this list, read this. To see all the listings posted to date, click here.

Most Famous Role: Yogi Bear.

Other Notable Roles: Huckleberry Hound, Dixie the Mouse, Mr. Jinks, Hokey Wolf, Quick Draw McGraw, Baba Looie, Super Snooper, Blabber Mouse, Augie Doggie, Snagglepuss, Wally Gator, Elroy Jetson, Lippy Lion, Captain Crunch and hundreds of others.

What He Did Besides Cartoon Voices: Not very much. Daws co-starred with Stan Freberg on Time for Beany, the groundbreaking puppet show on early TV.  Later, he was heard on Freberg's radio show and many of his records, some of which Daws co-wrote. Daws was also heard on hundreds of commercials, many of which he also wrote.

Why He's On This List: A lot of voice actors would tell you Daws was the best practitioner of their craft.  The Hanna-Barbera empire was largely built on his ability to make a character funny and expressive even when the script and animation didn't.

Fun Fact: Daws was one of the most beloved figures in the animation business and a very fine teacher of his profession.  Don Messick was once asked how he learned to do cartoon voices and he gave a very simple answer: "I worked with Daws Butler." Daws gave lessons for years in a little workshop out back behind his home. Many of today's top voice actors studied with him and the ones who never had that opportunity envy the ones who did.

Jonathan Chait thinks Republicans should encourage Donald Trump to run as a third-party Independent. The possible scenarios he lays out are interesting but I don't think anybody can guess what would really happen other than that the split of the right-wing vote would benefit the Democratic nominee. Then again, I don't think anyone can guess what would really happen if Trump were to not run as a third-party Independent…

Without comment…

Nate Silver and his crew over at fivethirtyeight.com discuss the possibilty of a brokered Republican convention, meaning that no candidate has a winning number of delegates by the time the party convenes in Cleveland and they fight it out there. That would be enormously entertaining. So would the scenario where Trump storms out of the G.O.P. and makes a third-party run. I don't see either of these things happening.

Once upon a time, political conventions weren't coronations and infomercials. Unless there was an incumbent up — and even occasionally when there was — everyone showed up with some delegates but not enough. There were plenty of delegates who were unpledged to a candidate or were pledged to a "favorite son" candidate so, at the opportune moment, they could shift their votes to a real candidate and give him enough to win. Then, once the nominee was selected, that person had a matter of hours to settle on (and insufficently vet) a running mate. It was all exciting to watch but I'm not sure it ever served the party or the country.

Any time I get the urge to try cooking anything, I can always make it go away by watching TV chef Alton Brown. I find him quite entertaining even though the subtext of most of his segments is that everyone on the planet except Alton Brown is too friggin' stupid to be allowed near a kitchen. He sure convinces me I am.

Here, he rails against what he calls "unitaskers," which is cooking equipment that only does one thing. What's kind of funny about this is that if you ever watch him cook, you'll probably see him use twenty-three instruments and utensils that you don't own and he does. I watched his show once when he was teaching people how to make mashed potatoes and the main thing he said was never to use a potato-masher. You must squish your spuds by using a food mill.

I don't have a food mill. If I went out and bought one, it would almost surely become a "unitasker" in my kitchen because I'd probably never use it for anything except for mashed potatoes. Mr. Brown though cooks so much, that he probably has a half-dozen other uses for a food mill. I'll bet he even has eight different uses for that fire extinguisher on his wall, including having it separate egg yolks.

Anyway, here he trashes some unitaskers, many of them on the say-so of reviewers on the Internet who can't spell and who probably are just the kind of people Alton Brown thinks don't know the first thing about cooking. But I still find him entertaining…

Since the other day when I posted those cover sketches I did for Gold Key Comics, I've received a number of e-mails like this one from Don Baynor…

Those drawings you did looked pretty good. I didn't know you drew and I wonder why you don't draw more. If not, why did you give it up?

Well, I never really thought of artwork as a career. Since about age six, I wanted to be a writer — and that's really all I ever wanted to be or felt I could be. I drew because it was fun and because when I came up with ideas, there was no one else who'd draw them. Back when I was younger, I used to make up adventures and put on puppet shows…but I never really thought of becoming a professional puppeteer. It was just a way of presenting my stories since no one else was going to perform them in any way. Once others were around to "present" my stories, there was less reason for me to do it.

For my first decade or so in comics, I kinda thought of myself as a writer who could draw a little when necessary. When I edited comics, I did the art direction, lettering corrections, some logo design, some art fixes, etc. Once in a while in a pinch, I'd draw a cover or ink part of a story. I did the pencil art on a number of covers like these two — though I protected myself by assigning the inking of them to Scott Shaw!, knowing he could make anyone's art look good…

I also did all the hand-lettering you see on the covers including the title logos. I used to joke that was because I was the editor so there was no one around to stop me but really, it was mostly because I didn't have anyone else available to me I trusted to do those things the way I wanted.

Still, I was aware that I was pushing the upper limits of my ability and that I did so little drawing that I was always rusty. To be even a mediocre artist requires a lot more hours than I was willing or able to put into it…and I could practice forever and not be a hundredth as good as some of the artists who I could get to draw for me like Dan Spiegle, Owen Fitzgerald, Pete Alvarado and Scott. I've just never been one of those "I can do anything if I put my mind to it" kind of guys. I find it more workable in life to be at least somewhat aware of my limitations, especially since there seems to be no limit as to my limitations.

The more I was around people like Jack Kirby and Sergio Aragonés and Dan and Scott and Alex Toth and Mike Sekowsky and so many others, the more I realized that my drawing did not come from an organic place within me. It was natural to those guys. It was labored and forced and unnatural to me. Those cover sketches I ran here before took me a long time and a lot of erasure…and of course, the two I ran here were the two best ones I had. On the covers above, Scott was there to rescue me.

I see so many creative people around me who don't seem to be aware that they can't do anything. It's fine to try and stretch and to do things you've never done before. Some people are multi-talented and it would be a shame if they limited themselves to only one of the many things they can do. But some people do one thing a whole lot better than they do another…and are oblivious to it. I'd rather minimize the chance of me being one of those folks. I prefer playing games where I figure I have a decent chance to win.

So basically, the answer to your question is that writing feels to me like something I should be doing whereas drawing never really did, even if now and then someone would pay me to do a little of it. And it's more fun when I do it now because I'm only doing it for fun.

Daniel Larison notes how John McCain — who, let us remember, could have been our president — seems to endorse every conceivable U.S. military action. If McCain had won, we'd commit to invading everywhere and keeping ground forces there forever.

This is the time of day when I look around for interesting links to offer to you, my fine readers. Today, I think I'll try to find some that don't involve Donald Trump. And I'll start with my friend of 45 years, Joe Brancatelli, who (as I always tell you) knows more about the airline industry than anyone on the ground or in the air…

Oh, wait. Joe's latest column is about how Donald Trump loves Muslims…when they stay at his hotels. Rats.