7 minute read
Under The Microscope
That’s Just Sick!
by Michael T. Gilbert
P
reviously, the “Crypt” put the spotlight on Mad magazine and its many rivals. One of the most successful of these was Joe Simon’s Sick.
Sick began relatively late in the game, with the first issue coverdated August 1960 (sporting a goofy Joe Simon cover). While most of the Mad wannabes tried aping Mad’s humor, Sick took a different approach.
At the time, “sick humor” was the order of the day among the hip. Aging comedians like Henny Youngman and Bob Hope were being replaced by harder-edged funnymen such as Lenny Bruce. Over at the Village Voice newspaper in Manhattan, Jules Feiffer enjoyed popularity with his darkly cynical comic strip Sick! Sick! Sick! And on The Tonight Show, Jack Paar was shocking middle America by daring to reference… toilets, of all things!
Similarly, Joe decided to set his new magazine apart from the other satire magazines by using a more irreverent, sophisticated approach. In later years Sick gravitated to relatively conventional fare, with Mad-style movie parodies and such. But early on, Sick dared to be different.
However, even later, Simon kept experimenting. In Sick #42 (Feb. 1966) Joe tried to cash in on the new super-hero craze by devoting a full 15 pages to a faux fanzine titled “Superfan.” Joe explained the idea behind the feature in the issue’s editorial:
“The inspiration for this issue on comic-book heroes stems from the current ‘IN’ trend that these heroes are enjoying. The collection of comic books is now a big rage in our culture. Old issues are selling for as much as one hundred dollars apiece. There’s even a national Hall of Fame for ‘The Immortals’ who created Paar For The Course them. (Above:) Joe Simon’s organ-grinder monkeys around on World-wide his cover for Sick #1 (Aug. 1960), flanked by a Jack Paar conventions inset. [© Estate of Joe Simon.] are held every year, where collectors get together and compare old memories. The collectors are from every age group and range from college professors and newspaper editors to used-car dealers and chicken flickers.” [MTG NOTE: The national ‘Hall of Fame’ Simon refers to is likely the early Alley Awards given out by “organized fandom.” Joe also did a tip o’ the Hatlo hat to comics fandom pioneer Dr. Jerry Bails.] Joe continued: “Furthermore, these collectors publish hundreds of so-called ‘fanzines’ in which they discuss the old characters as if they had really lived. Many of these fanzines make more sense and are better written than the comic books themselves. An exception to this rule is our parody called ‘SUPERFAN’ which lampoons the rare but schlock kind of fanzine.
Twice-Told Tales!
(Left:) The classic Simon & Kirby origin panel from Prize’s Fighting American #1 (April 1954). (Right:) On the cover of Sick, Vol. 6, #2 (a.k.a. #42) (Feb. 1966), Sick’s mascot, Huckleberry Fink, replaces Nelson Flagg (who, in the original comic, was about to have his mind transferred into Fighting American’s body!). [Fighting American panel & Fighting American TM & © Estates of Joe Simon & Jack Kirby; other Sick art & text TM & © Estate of Joe Simon.]
“The interest in comic book superheroes has already been recognized by many of the big national magazines which have written features on them. Recently, Playboy published a condensed version of a new Jules Feiffer book on pop culture in which our own Bob Powell… emerges as a prominent figure. Even ye olde editor is mentioned in the listings of the great. On the cover of this magazine
by Stanley Kauffmann
Stanley Kauffmann
INTRODUCTION: Stanley Kauffmann (1916-2013) was a renowned New York theatre and film critic. A 1935 graduate of New York University, he began writing novels—his first was published in 1941—and also spent a brief period in the prospering comicbook industry, first at the B.W. Sangor Shop (1942), then as an editor at Fawcett Publications. But his true passion was drama, theatre, and film. In 1958 he was hired by The New Republic to write movie reviews, a position he held with them right up to August of 2013, just weeks before his death at age 97. Kauffmann’s novels included The Hidden Hero (1949) and The Philanderer (1953); his later books were comprised of critique collections: A World on Film (1966), Living Images (1975), Regarding Film (2001), and two memoirs: Albums of Early Life (1980) and Albums of a Life (2007). In this issue of FCA (and concluding next issue), we excerpt a chapter from the latter memoir titled “Album of Comic-Book Life,” in which Kauffmann delightfully describes his succinct time in the comics field, primarily with Fawcett, where he immediately became one of their top editors. In an effort to “protect the innocent,” Kauffmann had used pseudonyms for all places, people, and things throughout this chapter. (Fawcett was called “Tappan”; Captain Billy’s Whiz Bang was referred to as “General Jack’s Jamboree”; Captain Marvel became “Major Mighty”; Captain Midnight was “Nick Noonday”; Editorial Director Ralph Daigh was re-named “Horace Knight”; chief comics editor Rod Reed was simply called “Hap”; editor Jane Magill became “Peg Molloy”; editor Henry “Lynn” Perkins was rechristened the notorious “Colin James”; and so on.) For the benefit of our readers, I’ve taken the liberty of including the characters’ true names in brackets following the false ones; all information between brackets in what follows has been added by Ye FCA Editor. Aliases aside, Stanley Kauffmann’s chronicle of his time during the Golden Age of Comics is a candid, precious look at that celebrated bygone era. The text is © 2007 Stanley Kauffmann,
in a 1957 photo (taken by Richard Avedon)—flanked by C.C. Beck’s cover for Captain Marvel Adventures #26 (Aug. 1943) and that of Kauffmann’s 2007 memoir Albums of a Life. Since the celebrated stage and film critic reports that he was employed as a Fawcett (well,
okay, “Tappan”) comics editor and is reprinted with permission of Stanley Moss/Sheep beginning in December 1942, Meadow Press. It was edited slightly, as per above, for a CMA issue with such a date this edition of FCA by —P.C. Hamerlinck.]
might well include some of his
earliest efforts there… though the Grand Comics Database lists Rod PART 1 Reed as editor through #29, Will Lieberson for #30-33, and J.B. [or sometimes “Janice,” a.k.a. Jane] Magill starting with #34. Some of I became a success in December of 1942. For the previous ten months I had been an editor and staff writer for a small company [the B.W.
IF YOU ENJOYED THIS PREVIEW, the GCD’s editorial data is clearly Sangor Shop] that supplied comic-book pages,
CLICK THE LINK TO ORDER THIS inaccurate, since the contents all lettered and ready for engraving, to a magazine ISSUE IN PRINT OR DIGITAL FORMAT! page of CMA #34 lists “Stanley publisher [Better/Nedor/Pines Publications]. We Kauffmann,” not Magill, as line were subcontractors.
editor. [Photo © Richard Avedon;
Shazam hero TM & © DC Comics.] Now, after less than a year in the business, I had been hired as an editor at Tappan [Fawcett] Publications, a huge firm whose comic-books, which were just one division of their line, were among the biggest in the field. My friends in the comic trade were agape. Not only had I zoomed to the top in less than a year, I wouldn’t even have to write scripts any more. This was prestige—just editing. I was given three magazines at Tappan [Fawcett]: Major Mighty [Captain Marvel Adventures], which was one of the big three in the country, Nick Noonday [Captain Midnight], which was a runner-up, and another one [Wow Comics]. And, said my trade pals, I was still in my twenties. What would I not accomplish! ALTER EGO #179 Celebrating the 61st Anniversary of FANTASTIC FOUR I liked their wonderment all the more because this was #1—’cause we kinda blew right past its 60th—plus a sagacious only the secondary part of my life, as a few of them knew. Every salute to STAN LEE’s 100th birthday, with never-before-seen highlights—and to FF #1 and #2 inker GEORGE KLEIN! Spotlight morning I got up at five-thirty and for a couple of hours worked on on Sub-Mariner in the Bowery in FF #4—plus sensational secrets writing of my own before I went to the office. I arrived at nine or behind FF #1 and #3! Also: KIRBY cover, and more! FCA, MICHAEL T. GILBERT, a JACK so feeling invigorated because I had got up early and had already (84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $10.95 done some of my own work. And here I was, sparkling at my (Digital Edition) $4.99 Number Two job, pushing ahead of people to whom it was Number
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