He's the 'Best Man' in Several Roles

By: Dave Astor Syndicate executive. Comic-strip writer. Actor. Movie director. Movie producer. Screenplay writer. Is this a story about six people? No, it's a story about one man -- John Newcombe.

The director of development at Creators Syndicate recently began writing the "Zack Hill" comic drawn by John Deering. Meanwhile, Best Man in Grass Creek -- the award-winning film Newcombe directed, co-starred in, co-wrote, and co-produced -- is out on video and DVD. Tieing together tinsel and 'toon towns is the fact that Newcombe plays a syndicate salesperson in the movie.

Adam Lewis is the character's name, and he's at risk of losing his Midwest sales territory after not selling the "Kreature Korner" comic to any newspapers. Then, an Indianapolis Star editor Adam barely knows offers to buy the strip (for $500 a week!) if Adam will serve as the best man at his wedding in the tiny Indiana town of Grass Creek. The problem is, Adam has a major phobia about nuptials because of being stood up at the altar three years before.

The romantic-comedy film is set mostly in Grass Creek, but there are several early scenes that are syndication-related. For instance, the movie features a very rah-rah motivational session for the syndicate's salespeople. "It's a little bit over the top, but not much," said Newcombe, when asked to compare the scene to real life. At one point, the syndicate head shouts: "I want to see it ['Kreature Korner'] in no less than 200 newspapers by Christmas!"

That's a tough order for any new comic in this economy, and "Kreature Korner" doesn't even seem to be that good a feature. Adam is shown calling newspaper editors from his cubicle as he vainly tries to sell the strip. Rejection "is daily fare for the average syndicate sales rep," observed Newcombe, who, as Adam, vents his frustration by putting a noose around the neck of a plush-toy version of the comic's main cow character.

There's also a scene in which the syndicate's salespeople are asked to walk barefoot over hot coals as a confidence-building exercise. Creators Syndicate, Newcombe is happy to report, "does not make us walk over hot coals!"

Best Man in Grass Creek -- shot on a shoestring budget of just under $1 million -- was theatrically released in Illinois and northern Indiana during 2001. It has also been distributed by PorchLight Entertainment to Australia, Belgium, Brazil, China, Indonesia, Italy, the Middle East, North Africa, Poland, South Africa, Thailand, and the United Kingdom. Newcombe is hoping for future deals that will bring the movie to American cable and broadcast TV.

The film has also been seen at a number of festivals -- winning the "Crystal Heart Award" at the Heartland Film Festival in Indianapolis and the "Best Feature Comedy" category at the Santa Clarita (Calif.) International Film Festival -- and has received positive reviews from Jeffrey Lyons and Michael Medved, among many others. It co-stars Grace Phillips (Quiz Show), Megan Mullally (Will and Grace), Oksana Fedunyszyn (The Fugitive), and John Hines (The Tao of Steve) as the Indianapolis Star editor. Hines co-wrote the film -- which also features Grass Creek locals in smaller roles -- with Newcombe.

The 43-year-old Newcombe has since written another screenplay -- a coming-of-age comedy set in Chicago. He grew up there (son of a Chicago Sun-Times and Chicago Daily News executive), and went on to attend the Goodman School of Drama and earn a bachelor's degree in theater from DePaul University in Chicago. He has acted in theater productions in Chicago and Los Angeles, where Creators is located. His brother, Richard Newcombe, is founder and president of the syndicate.

Creators launched "Zack Hill" this March, and John Newcombe started formally working on the strip soon after in collaboration with Deering -- whose "Strange Brew" comic and Arkansas Democrat-Gazette editorial cartoons are also syndicated by Creators. How does penning a comic compare to penning a movie script?

"In some ways it's harder. It's a conveyor belt moving all the time," replied Newcombe, referring to the need to come up with 365 ideas a year. But he enjoys it.

Newcombe worked at Creators from 1988 to 1995 and then returned in 2000 after completing most of the work on Best Man in Grass Creek.

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Many Don't Like Pulling of Comic

Say 'W. Post' Should Have Run 'Boondocks'

The Washington Post's decision to drop the Oct. 13-18 sequence of "The Boondocks" was criticized by the newspaper's ombudsman, readers, and others.

National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice was the target of Aaron McGruder's strips. In the Oct. 14 comic, for instance, a character noted: "Maybe if there was a man in the world who Condoleezza truly loved, she wouldn't be so hellbent to destroy it."

Post Ombudsman Michael Getler wrote Oct. 19 that the sequence was "within the bounds of allowable satire. I don't know a thing about Rice's personal life, nor do the characters in the strip, and I think readers understand that. 'The Boondocks' characters, and their creator, were being mischievous and irreverent, in their mind's view of the world, about a high-profile public figure, and that seems okay to me."

One Post reader wrote: "'The Boondocks is not 'Cathy' and it is not 'Hi & Lois.' It is as overtly political as 'Doonesbury' or any of the editorial comics you carry and should be treated as such." Another reader wrote: "Poking fun at a public figure such as Condoleezza Rice may not be high political commentary, but neither is speculating about President Bush's intelligence, Vice President Cheney's health problems, or President Clinton's extramarital affairs -- all topics of previous comic strips, all of it legitimate political satire and, to many readers, very humorous."

Richard Blow, in a piece published Oct. 17 on TomPaine.com, wondered if the Post yanked the sequence because the paper felt McGruder was implying Rice is gay. "When you look at it this way, the Post's decision is not just wrong, it's offensive. ... A 'liberal' paper like the Post should know better ... ."

A Post spokesperson said the paper pulled the strips because it was not convinced they were accurate or relevant (Syndicate World, Oct. 16).

Blow continued: "Now, to be fair, 'The Boondocks' strip is also a little offensive. Whatever it might hint about what gender, if any, Rice likes to sleep with, the idea that a woman just needs to get schtupped to be happy is laughably sexist. But, then, laughably is the key word. This is a comic strip after all."

In concluding, Blow said: "Ultimately, there's one quite serious reason why the Post's decision is wrong. In his own style, Aaron McGruder is getting at something important -- the idea that the pyscho-sexual histories of our leaders can affect their decisions regarding war and peace. To any historian, this is hardly a radical idea."

And Boston Globe media columnist Mark Jurkowitz wrote Oct. 22: "They used to be called the funny pages. But it's no laughing matter for editors deciding whether such edgy and politically tinged strips as 'Doonesbury,' 'Boondocks,' and 'Mallard Fillmore' violate boundaries of taste. Nor for readers who often respond to decisions to omit strips with angry cries of censorship since they can now go online to see what they were missing.

"At the core of the issue is a bit of a paradox. While many observers believe the provocative strips belong on the comics pages, the consensus is that they are subject to tighter scrutiny because they appear in a more benign environment than the more freewheeling opinion pages. And some industry officials wish newspapers would be more willing to push the envelope when it comes to humor."

The Post was reportedly the only one of 250-plus "Boondocks" clients to pull the Rice sequence.

McGruder's comic is distributed by Universal Press Syndicate.

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'Twas the Day of the Weasel

Bush Among Winners of 'Dilbert' Poll

Is George W. Bush's middle name "Weasel"? That was the thought of many of the 35,874 people voting in a Dilbert.com "Weasel Poll."

Bush was named "Weaseliest Individual" in the survey. Winners of the other five categories included politicians ("Weaseliest Profession"), France ("Weaseliest Country"), Microsoft ("Weaseliest Company"), the Recording Industry Association of America ("Weaseliest Organization"), and blaming fast-food restaurants for making you fat ("Weaseliest Behavior").

In the last category, religious extremism finished second. Which led "Dilbert" creator Scott Adams to jokingly tell E&P Online that Al Qaeda might kill more Americans if it opened some artery-clogging fast-food restaurants.

Among the other runners-ups were the U.S. (in the country category), lawyers (profession), and Halliburton (company). That firm, which Vice President Dick Cheney has close ties to, has been criticized for profiting from Iraq's reconstruction.

If fictional characters were allowed in the "Weaseliest Individual" category, might the winner have been the employer from hell in "Dilbert"? "I'd like to think the pointy-haired boss would have been number one, but it's hard to compete with the head of the civilized world," said Adams.

This was the second annual "Weasel Poll," and it received nearly double the votes garnered by last year's version of the unscientific poll.

Why the poll? One reason, said Adams, was a tie-in with Dilbert and the Way of the Weasel, the HarperBusiness book released in paperback Oct. 21. "But the macro reason is, almost all the news now is about someone being a weasel," he added.

Do winners receive any kind of citation? "I could mail something to France, but I don't know where they'd hang it," replied Adams.

Adams -- who said he doesn't personally agree with all the winning choices -- admitted to some weasel-like behavior himself by having five guest cartoonists do the Oct. 20-24 "Dilbert" strips. The first comic was by "For Better or For Worse" creator Lynn Johnston. Since "Dilbert" and "For Better" each run in 2,000-plus newspapers, Adams believes Johnston became "the most widely read cartoonist in the history of planet Earth" for a day.

The United Media creator added that the guest cartoonists were allowed to do anything in the Oct. 20-24 comics, including killing a character. Reportedly, one cast member did get knocked off, giving Adams the challenge of resurrecting that person starting Oct. 25.

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'Luann' TV Show in the Works

Dick Clark Productions Buys Rights

Dick Clark Productions has acquired the rights to a live-action, half-hour TV show based on the "Luann" comic, according to an Associated Press story.

"Luann," which stars a teen girl, is by Greg Evans of United Media.

Clark said, in a statement, that Evans' comic "is set apart from others in its genre by its cliffhanging stories, social relevance, and the keen character humor displayed not only in Luann's persona but in that of her family and friends."

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Et cetera ...

Three books by Creators Syndicate columnists recently made the top eight of The New York Times' bestseller list. They include Who's Looking Out for You? by Bill O'Reilly, Bushwhacked by Molly Ivins (with Lou Dubose), and Persecution by David Limbaugh.

"Baldo" is part of a bilingual public-awareness campaign encouraging people in and around Dallas to walk more. Characters from the comic -- by Hector Cantu and Carlos Castellanos of Universal Press Syndicate -- appear on decals and billboards.

"George" comic creator Mark Szorady of DBR Media has started the "George's Word Ladder" game for that syndicate. Szorady also does "Double Take" and "Word Pile" for DBR.

The dog Fang from "The Duplex" comic by Glenn McCoy of Universal is making a guest appearance in the Oct. 22-23 "Shoecabbage" comic by Teresa Dowlatshahi and David Stanford of uclick, Universal's online sibling company. "Shoecabbage" explores words in other languages, and Fang will introduce a word meaning tooth or fang in Alamblak (http://www.ucomics.com/shoecabbage/2003/10/22/).

To mark the 30th anniversary of the comic's founding, ECW Press is publishing Herman Classics, Volume One. It includes watercolored cartoons on glossy paper and a biography of "Herman" creator Jim Unger of United Media.

An exhibit of Morrie Brickman's "The Small Society" comic will run Nov. 2 through Feb. 27 at the Ohio State University Cartoon Research Library. To mark the opening of the show, Jules Feiffer is scheduled to speak Nov. 2.

United Press International recently relocated the majority of UPI Arabic Service's editorial-production unit from London to Beirut.