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Robert Ullman: SBC Q&A

Posted: Tuesday, December 2
By: Tim O'Shea

Robert Ullman is a dream interview on multiple levels. He provides interesting answers and his site supplies his bio. That means the intro will be simple and we can move on to that actual interview with less babbling from this SBC Q&A guy. “His first graphic novel, Grand Gestures, was published in 2003 by Alternative Comics. He's produced seven issues of the acclaimed mini-comic From the Curve, as well as numerous other zines, including Atom-Bomb Bikini and Lunch Hour Comix, since 1994. His spot illustrations appear all over the place, including weekly in the Washington, DC City Paper and Westword. An Addy Award-nominated graphic designer by trade, Robert has also illustrated several educational children's books for McGraw-Hill. Robert lives with his wife and their dog in lovely Richmond, Virginia.” SBC was recently able to discuss Grand Gestures and his other work with him.

Tim O’Shea: Grand Gestures "focuses on three post-collegiate buddies and the romantic relationships, or lack thereof, which lend conflict and comedy to their lives." Is this semi-autobiographical, and if so how do your friends feel about appearing in the book?

Robert Ullman: Well, a few of the bits in Grand Gestures are semi-autobiographical, but for the most part, it’s straight fiction. Hopefully, all of the aspects that I lifted from real life are disguised enough that they bear only the slightest resemblance to actual events. Protect the innocent, and all that. Honestly, most of the parts that ARE based on people I know are meant to be tributes, rather than embarrassing exposes…for example, the scene where Brady and Ken are watching Spenser: For Hire is based on an old roommate who watched that show every weekday morning before work. The house the guys live in is based on the house we shared, too.

TO: I was struck at how easily you introduced the characters in the opening scenes. How many false starts did you get on the opening before getting it just right? How long did it take to put Grand Gestures together and will there be more work with these characters?

RU: The opening was surprisingly easy to write. I had an idea who these characters were, and I just figured “this will be the most effective way to introduce them and get into what their motivations are.” I’ve done so many shorter pieces, five or six page strips, that I’ve gotten pretty good at describing what a character is about in just a few pages.

I’m still on the fence as to whether I’ll do anything else with these characters…Brady’s personality definitely lends itself to some comedic possibilities down the road, and it’s convenient to have each of them as a potential stand-in for myself at some point. I also think it’d be cool to use other characters from the same “world”, like maybe do a story about Hallie, the girl Ken has a crush on or some girl that Brady hits on who shoots him down.

TO: Did the scenario with Jenna in Grand Gestures happen to someone you know, or is that purely a fun piece of revenge fiction?

RU: Again, pure fiction…I thought it would be a nice bit of over the top comedy to go with the much more muted events that are happening with Ken and Perry. True, I’ve been in the situation a couple times where I’ve thought that maybe some ex-girlfriend might plot to get even with me for some insensitive thing or another that I’d done…but it’s all made-up.

TO: What made you dedicate the book to your Uncle Joe and where did the nickname “Chappy” originate?

RU: My Uncle Joe is my mom’s brother. He read comic books when I was a kid, and was a bit of a packrat, so he always had lots of old comics around the house that I’d read whenever I’d go to visit. He was collecting in the 60’s, so he had tons of great old stuff to read that I couldn’t see anywhere else. Also, his wife is a librarian, and I could go to the library where she worked to check out books and never have to pay any late fees. I’d have five or six old Peanuts paperbacks at my house at any given time and I could keep them as long as I wanted. It was pretty great. I guess in a lot of ways he got me into comics, so to thank him I thought I should dedicate my first real comic to him.

The nickname Chappy…that’s a long story. It comes from a strip by Drew Friedman, Comic Shop Clerks of North America which was in the Warts and All book, I believe. There are portraits of six guys, supposedly comic shop owners, drawn in that disgusting Friedmanesque style, the most disgusting of which is a toothless old coot with stink lines coming off him named “Chappy”. Anyway, I was working at a comic shop called “Watch the Skies” in Kent, Ohio, back in the early 90’s, and the owner (comic artist Jay Geldhof) liked to give everybody derogatory nicknames. We were constantly cutting each other down in every way possible…it was totally juvenile , but fun. So he’s looking at this book, sees the strip, and says “Chappy! That’s your new name! Chappy!”. And so he tells everyone to call me Chappy, and it gets under my skin, which just eggs him on, and eventually I just have to accept it, ‘cause there’s no way it’s going away. I actually think it’s kinda funny now.

TO: In addition to your comics work, you have also illustrated several educational children's books for McGraw-Hill. Are there ways in which the educational illustrations work helps you improve as a storyteller?

RU: Well, the children’s books helped, but I actually haven’t done one in quite awhile…what’s been very beneficial to my recent work my are the spot illustrations I do regularly for the Washington City Paper, Westword, and a few other clients. Doing the spots often involves conveying the story in a single panel, and it keeps me drawing every single week whether I feel like it or not. Cartooning is all about practice and deadlines, and I’ve found having regular assignments to be very helpful.

TO: OK, I have to ask as a fan of pinups, will there be an Atom-Bomb Bikini 3?

RU: There is an Atom-Bomb Bikini #3…it debuted at SPX about a month ago, as a matter of fact!

TO: How did you come up with the concept of Lunch-Hour Comix and how often will you be publishing issues of it?

RU: Lunch-Hour Comix are really just a continuation of a strip I used to do called My Noise for my college newspaper, the Daily Kent Stater, back in 1994. It was sort of a cross between American Splendor and Jim’s Journal, and it ran four times a week for about a year, and then weekly in several other papers after that (Plug: Many of those strips are available in Signifying Nothing: The Collected from the Curve http://www.lurid.com/rob/comics.html). I stopped doing it because it was taking longer and longer to complete the strips and I felt like my time would be better served working on longer stories. The material was so self-indulgent and light…I just couldn’t justify the time anymore.

Then, a couple years ago, I started sketching out these little four panel strips, and inking them as fast as I could with a brush pen. It was fun, and I’d missed doing them…I figured if I could challenge myself a little bit by doing them in just an hour and keeping the style loose and the (needless, really) details light, they might be a cool little exercise from time to time.

Still, I don’t think it will ever become a daily thing…although they’re fun, there are probably too many “journal comics” out there already. I’ll probably put out a mini-comic collection every now and then, and that’ll be about it.

TO: How have you improved as a storyteller when comparing the earlier From The Curve to Grand Gestures?

RU: My drawing has greatly improved, and therefore the “world” the characters inhabit is more real. I feel like I’ve settled into a style that works well for long narratives. I’ve found tackling bigger stories to be a challenge compared to the brief, five and six page stories I’ve done for the majority of my career.

Also, I think that in the past I’ve had a tendency to try to do too much in too few pages…I truly believe that less is more, but sometimes it’s a good idea to space things out and let the pages breathe a bit. I tried to keep this in mind as I laid out Grand Gestures, and for the most part, I was pretty happy with the results.

TO: What's on the creative horizon for you in 2003 and beyond?

RU: I want to do a book of sketches, spot illustrations and pin-ups…something along the lines of Atom-Bomb Bikini, only professionally printed. It will probably be a flip book with Jay Geldhof.

Other than that, I’m just considering what my next book will be. In some ways, I feel like Grand Gestures is the final word on this stage of my career…like I’ve done all there is to do with the twenty-something, “lonely and looking for love” genre. I think it’s time to tackle some different themes. Now I just need to figure out what they are going to be.