DANIEL CLOWES in conversation with Seth, hosted by Mariko Tamaki, Friday (October 21) in the Brigantine Room. 8 pm.
Whenever Daniel Clowes sees an adult smoker on the street, he feels a little sad.
“Most smokers start when they’re 16 or 17,” says Clowes from his no doubt smoke-free home in Oakland, California. “I always think, ‘Grow up!’ It’s like they’re stuck in some sort of adolescent anxiety.”
That’s the sort of dead-on observation Clowes is known for in graphic novels like Ghost World and Wilson.
His latest, The Death-Ray, isn’t about smoking, but its ectomorph adolescent anti-hero, Andy, first gains his superpowers after lighting up a cigarette.
“It seems like the idea of wanting superpowers and thinking about smoking come from the same place,” says Clowes in carefully chosen words, his nasal voice suggesting a kinder Jack Nicholson.
Ironically, Clowes came up with the premise while joking about bad ideas.
“I was talking with another cartoonist and said the worst idea you could ever have for a comic would be to try to do an earnest, non-ironic superhero,” he says. “All the good superhero comics – early Marvel or Superman comics, Plastic Man – had a sense of the absurdity of superheroes. They didn’t take themselves too seriously.”
The more he thought about it, though, the more intrigued he became. What if his superhero took himself really, really seriously?
“I thought back to when I was 15 or 16 years old and writing my own superhero comics that were very clearly ripped off from other comics. I had a character who was a personalized version of Peter Parker, but he also had a ray-gun that would annihilate everyone in his path. There was something about that story that meant a lot to me at that age. I never got around to drawing any of it, but it stuck with me, and later I realized how psychologically naked the whole idea was.”
Clowes uses a variety of graphic and narrative techniques in The Death-Ray, varying his tone and hopping around ambitiously in time. He used a similar mix of styles in his book Ice Haven, which he wrote before The Death-Ray came out in his magazine Eightball.
“Prior to that I’d always gotten stuck in these longer stories like Ghost World and David Boring, where I was married to a certain style and had to forge through with that style over years of work. By the end it always became trying because I’d learned new things and wanted to move on to new ideas. My spontaneity was worn down to a nub.
“With this story and the last few I’ve done, I’ve been able to maintain a level of newness. I don’t know how it affects the reading experience, but it sure makes creating more exciting.”
A film adaptation of The Death-Ray has been in the works for a while, with Jack Black’s production company attached.
“We’ve finally got a draft we’re all happy with,” he says, “and now we’re looking for directors.”
It’d be hard to top his Ghost World collaboration with Terry Zwigoff, which got them a screenplay Oscar nomination.
Drawing comics and making movies: two antithetical activities, no?
“In many ways they’re the opposite, yeah,” says Clowes. “But writing screenplays is very satisfying when you spend so much time doing comics. You can change things so easily. You can cut out 30 pages and it’s no big deal. But cut pages from a comic book you’ve drawn and it’s so painful. There’s been so much labour.”
Interview Clips
Clowes on wanting the reader to do some work to connect his panels:
On how his book tour with Seth is going to be like a band:
On how his open-heart surgery affected his life and work:
On the special demands put on graphic novelists at book signings:
glenns@nowtoronto.com
