I’ve been meaning to read The Boss Is Crazy, Too since hearing about it decades ago in the brilliant fanzine Promethean Enterprises put out by Bud Plant and friends. Bud Plant is the wonderful bookseller through who I’ve found SO many incredible volumes for my collection and reading pleasure—I encourage you to do the same. And Bud, and Carolina his terrific associate, are putting together a signed edition with a special bookplate for Arf Museum. Anywho, I finally got to curl up with The Boss this past weekend.

This is a novel by Mell Lazarus who you probably know is the cartoonist behind the daily strips Miss Peach and Momma. It’s interesting to see Joseph Heller give Lazarus props on the front cover as the book does read like Catch 22 with its, for sure, crazy characters The Boss Is Crazy, Too has a zany, very Producers-esque plot (if I was Lazarus I’d be pretty miffed about that). In fact you’ll note that the bottom of the front cover says, “Soon to be a Broadway play and major motion picture”. As far as I know that didn’t happen.

Comic fans will like the setting of the sleaze magazine/comic book publishing house, Fineman Publications. The mags in Fineman’s line include Unadulterated Crime Magazine, Fake Love Stories, The D.A.R. Jokebook, True Fantasies Monthly. The Comic books the fictional publisher produces are def ones I’d like to read: Poopy The Bear Comics, Trial Marriage Comics, Communist Love Tales, Overage Romances, Skinny the Human ICBM, Werewolf Fun Comics, Rex Oedipus, Boy Lover and Supreme Court Comics.

Boss is a real fun read, worth tracking down. Actually, Bud, in addition to his friendly staff offering current cool and hard to find books, has a used and rare book business specializing in illustrated books and comic art oriented titles. So you might start with him. And, Bud, can you find me a copy of Rex Oedipus, Boy Lover?

In Arf Museum there’s a chapter I am really excited about: “Tattoons.” Here are a few that didn’t make the cut…

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“Oscar Winning” is a title that can now be added to John Canemaker’s many other accolades. Heartiest congrats, John! He won last night the Animated Short category for his film The Moon and the Son: An Imagined Conversation (see image above) and in his acceptance speech said that this proves hand drawn animation can still pack an emotional wallop. Hopefully that didn’t fall on ears that are deaf. John did the self-portrait below for me back in 1991, and as you can see in addition to being an animator he has authored many books. There’s a great one on Felix and there’s John’s classic on Winsor McCay that has just been revised and re-issued.

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One more thing that John did which I’m personally very grateful for is telling me that I must send samples of my art to MTV. He was sure they would have me do a station I.D. I never would have thought of it or done it without John’s insistence.

John was right, they called me the day they got the samples and assigned me my first animation which I did with the super J.J. Sedelmaier studio. The I.D. debuted on the MTV award show, became one of their longest and most frequently run I.D.s and won numerous awards. But it sure didn’t win a fucking Oscar—that honor goes to John Canemaker who certainly is one of the most talented and nicest guys I know.

Click the image to watch the cartoon.

Here’s another interesting Picasso/comics connection. I picked up this brochure for the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund at the NY Comicon. It’s a comic oriented pub with Picasso on the cover! It seems that an Atlanta comic book retailer inadvertently passed out a free comic that had pics of Picasso nude to a nine year old boy on Halloween. The comic was Alternative Comic #2 and it depicts, in an excerpt from Mick Bertozzi’s The Salon, the first meeting between Georges Braque and Picasso. The initial charges for this boy seeing a drawing of a weinie (there was no sexual situations) have now been reduced from 2 felonies and 5 misdemeanors to 2 misdemeanors. The trial is set for the Spring and the CBLDF has spent $40,000 bucks to date.

Here’s a Picasso-riffed cartoon that I didn’t have room for in the upcoming Arf Museum. It’s by Richard Quincey Yardley and appeared in the Baltimore Sun circa early 1960′s. Yardley was known as “one of the biggest men in cartooning”-at 250 pounds and a towering 6 foot 3 inches. He was nicknamed “Moco” acording to his bio “an obscure Eskimo character in an obsolete comic strip”. Do any of the Arf Lovers out there know what this is refering to? HIs bio also gives the intriguing info that legend has it that Yardley was discovered by H. L. Menken.

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Do you look forward to WWWWWW’s as much as I do? Please, no cat calls today like “This Wonder Woman is a real dog!” Arf! Arf!