Alexander bids for Superstar status
October 31, 2009 in General
Alexander Matthews has made it to the final of a worldwide comic strip competition. The Professional Cartoonists’ Organisation member has made the final ten of Amazon’s Comic Strip Superstar, with a strip entitled Evil Twin
According to the site, “Evil Twin is the story of twins Myron and Ludwig, two 10 year-old boys who, like most brothers, are engaged in a constant battle of one-upmanship. They trade insults, devise devious schemes, and have a vivid fantasy world”. You can see ten daily strips and two colour Sundays here: Evil Twin.
Amazon.com and US comic publisher Andrews McMeel Publishing launched the contest in August. There were expecting around 5,000 entries. Following two elimination rounds, a panel of comic strip luminaries including Doonesbury‘s Gary Trudeau selected ten finalists. The winner, who will be picked in a vote by Amazon customers, will receive a publishing contract, a $5,000 (approx £3,000) advance and a monthly stipend to develop 20 further strips.
Bloghorn, our chests heaving with pride, asked Alex, left, about the competition. What’s the story with Evil Twin, Alex?
“I came up with the idea by wondering how to get my monkey characters from my previous strip King Monkey into two human characters. I was really happy with that strip and I thought it was the funniest stuff I had done, but it didn’t feel somehow commercially viable. Then the idea of twins came to me, and I suddenly realised how I could get a bit more reality into a strip. I was able to base a lot of the ideas on antics that my brother and I would get up to when we were kids. It felt to me that it might really connect to an audience with that kind of grounding in actual things we did and said. I think it’s important not to over-think a strip and overload it with characters and a too-clever scenario.”
You’re also making a name for yourself as a magazine gag cartoonist. Without wanting to get into a Harry Hill style “Which is best?” fight, do you prefer creating gags or strips?
“Gags, definitely. They take so much less time to draw! I can come up with strip ideas more easily, but good gags are much tougher. The characters in a strip allow you to hang a joke on something more tangible, but that rewarding effort of coming up with ideas added to the ease of drawing, makes gags win every time. I love that feeling of thinking up what I hope is a winning gag idea (happens all too rarely!) I’ve always wanted a published strip, though, and I don’t want to let go of that dream.”
Bloghorn hopes the dream comes true for Alex. You can vote for your favourite Comic Strip Superstar entry at the website, all you need is an Amazon account. Voting ends November 6.
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by Alex Hughes
Cartoonists crack Eggheads
October 30, 2009 in Comment
The Eggheads (Chris Hughes, Daphne Fowler, CJ de Mooi, Barry Simmons, Judith Keppel and Kevin Ashman) by Cartoonists' team member Chris Burke
The Cartoonists, a team put together by the Professional Cartoonists Organisation, stormed to victory on the TV quiz show Eggheads last night, after winning each of their head-to-head rounds. Egghead Kevin Ashman described it as “the most comprehensive defeat we’ve ever had”. Here, team captain Alex Hughes explains how it all happened
A little over a year ago, I was approached by the makers of BBC quiz show Eggheads and asked if I’d like to put together a team of cartoonists for the upcoming series. I’ve done the odd pub quiz in the past, so accepted the offer and duly went about recruiting a team from the ranks of the Professional Cartoonists’ Organisation – a team comprising myself, Chris Burke, Robert Duncan, Graham Fowell, Royston Robertson and Martin Rowson. We sailed through the December audition and subsequently were invited to record the show in January of this year.
For the uninitiated, Eggheads itself is a fairly straightforward quiz. Each day, a new team of challengers goes up against the Eggheads, a team comprising past winners of other TV and radio quizzes such as Who Wants to be a Millionaire, Mastermind, Fifteen to One, The Weakest Link and Brain of Britain – the cream of British quiz talent.
The Cartoonists (Alex Hughes, Royston Robertson, Robert Duncan, Graham Fowell and Martin Rowson)
For our bout, the Eggheads team comprised Kevin Ashman, CJ de Mooi, Daphne Fowler, Chris Hughes and Barry Simmons. Judith Keppel was waiting in the wings and Chris Burke was the stand-in for the Cartoonists.
The first four rounds are a series of head-to-head questions from a given category, where we pick one of our team to go up against our pick from the Eggheads. The contestants then go into the “question room” (in reality, a bench behind the main set) and are given three multiple choice questions each. If there’s no outright winner, it goes to “sudden death”.
The winner of each round is “safe” and allowed to compete for their team in the final round, whilst the loser is not. The final round is a general knowledge team round with the surviving challengers competing directly against the surviving Eggheads for the prize money, which, if it’s not won is rolled-over to the next day.
The Cartoonists (Alex Hughes, Robert Duncan, Royston Robertson, Chris Burke, Graham Fowell and Martin Rowson) outside BBC Television Centre
On the day of the filming we arrived bright and early on a crisp January morning with, as requested, a selection of light, brightly coloured non-patterned shirts at BBC Television Centre in White City, London. After resting in the former Top of the Pops Green Room we were ushered into the studio, which is when the nerves kicked in. Make-up was applied, microphones were attached and we met host Jeremy Vine.
There wasn’t much time for chit-chat though (up to five episodes are shot per day), so we went straight into the contest …
…and we won! We were only the sixth team out of the ten series to beat the Eggheads in each of the first four rounds. But to top that, we are the first team to have beaten the Eggheads outright, winning in every single round plus the final – we only got three questions wrong between us in the whole show.
And best of all, the last question, which surviving Egghead Kevin Ashman could not answer, was a cartoon question.
So, well done, team, we did brilliantly! Congratulations to Robert, Royston, Graham, Martin, and Chris in reserve. And our thanks to Al Capp‘s Shmoo…
The editor adds: The BBC iPlayer recording of the show should be available online until November 5th 2009.
Tags: Al Capp, Alex Hughes, BBC, BBC TV, Chris Burke, Eggheads, Graham Fowell, Jeremy Vine, Martin Rowson, quiz, Robert Duncan, Royston Robertson, Shmoo, win, winners 10 Comments »