My Beautiful Career Installment 7

With trepidation, I left my job at Norton Simon. I’d been afraid to quit previously, and averaged 4 hours of sleep per night for the past 2 months. Also, my relationship with Denys was on the skids. I broke up with him in October, right after my father died of his third heart attack. I moved to Silverlake, and my life truly began.

At D.I.C., I realized I could DO this, that I actually had the stuff to make it as a cartoonist. During my 8-month layoff, I’d come to doubt it. One of my fellow new-hirees at Ruby-Spears was a character designer the crew nicknamed “Scruffy” behind his back; he was clearly self-deluded about his abilities as an artist and the question was why he got hired in the first place. Was I self-deluded like Scruffy? What was MY secret nickname? My self-esteem was so low that, at D.I.C., when anyone complemented my boards, I wondered if they were playing a game on me.

I became Bernard’s fair-haired boy; he was my mentor. He saved my life, even if he didn’t know it.

I also acquired a work ethic; eight months of no work put the fear of God in me. Before the layoff, I would step away from projects when I ran up against something I didn’t know how to draw. It took me forever to accomplish anything. Now my attitude was, “Tough, draw it anyway”. I worked 60-hour weeks, grateful for the chance to prove myself.

My Beautiful Career Installment 6

I finally got a freelance board in April ’84, from D.I.C., on the “Rainbow Brite” TV show. D.I.C. was the first American animation studio to use Japanese animation; it was a 3-way partnership between American, French and Japanese corporate interests. My director was Bernard Deyries, part of the French contingent. When I showed him my roughs, he asked if I wanted to do the changes. I said “yes”; what I really meant was, “YES, PLEASE, THANK YOU!” I’d been working blind at Ruby-Spears and Hanna-Barbera, receiving no instruction or feedback beyond, “long shot-medium shot-close up”, “don’t jump cut” and “don’t flop screen direction”.

Bernard changed 2/3rds of my first board, mostly to play out the action, accentuate the mood, and make it more cinematic in general. I’d been trained in the flat, left-to-right H&B style, and indoctrinated that the script was sacred. I objected, “It wasn’t that way in the script”. “But is this not bett-air?” he rejoined.

The light went on in my head. “Wow—I get to actually make this good”. My dawning awareness seemed to work for Bernard as well; he only changed a quarter of my second board, and then offered me a staff position.