© Copyright, 1970, S. Gross. Buy this print here!
A couple of years ago, I was eating lunch with Sam and a bunch of the usual Pergola crowd, and we were talking about interviews. I hadn’t started A Case for Pencils at that time, but I had been thinking about how to go about it. Sam told me that the thing about interviews is that they are basically finished before they start, because the interviewer already knows how they are going to portray you, even before they talk to you. With that in mind, when I finally got around to creating this blog, I decided to go with a survey format. I wanted to do right by cartoonists, and allow them to be the funny, kind, and articulate people that they are, without my bungling things up! Ironically, this interview was done over the phone, so I hope I did right by Sam!
I recommend listening to the below audio clip of our phone call, wherein Sam talks about the difference between drawing funny and funny drawing, before you read this interview, because he is an inimitable storyteller, and I want you to be able to read it in his voice. —Jane Mattimoe
From L to R: Sam Gross, Jane Mattimoe (me/A Case for Pencils), Mort Gerberg, Sidney Harris. The original photo (on the photographed ipad) was taken by Sam’s daughter, Michelle, at Pergola des Artistes in 2016.
Sam: I always wanted to be a cartoonist, and at age six I drew what was possibly a cartoon, on my desk. My first grade teacher was Mrs Levy, and I guess she was my first editor, because she had my mother come in with Kirkman industrial soap, and we had to erase my cartoon from the desk. So, I knew what I wanted to do at a very early age.
Sam: Yes, I am. I am very lucky. My wife was a vocational guidance counselor —she’s retired now. She didn’t have to do too much with me.
Jane: I read somewhere that you started cartooning in 1962. Was it actually earlier than that?
Sam: I was drawing before that, and I had one cartoon that was published in Saturday Review in 1953 when I was still in college. I was doing stuff for the school newspaper— actually very little because Morty Gerberg had a lot on that, and I finally got two weeks in when he was off on something or the other… Morty and I went to the same school, CCNY Baruch… I would say professionally, it was a little bit earlier [than 1962]. I was drawing and getting published in Europe, in France and in Germany, prior to that. We were there in ‘60-61. I began in earnest back here in 1962. That’s when I started earning an income on it.
Actually, the first year I earned $985 in change, and my big client was actually— and I wasn’t doing any drawing… I was coming up ideas— but a greeting card company in Brooklyn called Charmcraft. So, then of course, after the first year I did better.
Jane: You were in the military, right? I know George [Booth] got his start in Leatherneck. Did you do anything like that?
Sam: Oh yeah, as a matter of fact, in the military I was doing cartoons for the HAC Post—Headquarters Area Command — which, I was stationed in Heidelberg, but the newspaper was in Mannheim… and from that I did a book, Cartoons for the GI, which sold very, very well. I was getting statements every month, and I was making more than my Commanding Officer, which pissed him off tremendously. Yeah, I forgot about that book.
Jane: I remember you told me that someone in the military told you that you’d never be able to get a job.
Sam: Yeah, that was my Commanding Officer. He didn’t recommend me for the Good Conduct Medal. He said to me— I was leaving the army by that time—and he said, “Nobody’s ever going to hire you. You’ll never have a job.” And he was right.
Actually, I did work in a legitimate job for six months… and I also…I guess I got a legitimate paycheck at work, you know, like I would have to file a W2 for… When I was first with that job, which actually was as an accountant, and then the other one was—which you can’t call full employed— which was when I was teaching at Pratt three semesters. I would get a paycheck there, but other than that, it’s been freelancing.
Jane: Wow! So let’s see, you’ve been published everywhere of note, written a lot of books, and you were also the cartoon editor of The National Lampoon…
Jane: Did your time as a cartoon editor affect your process as a cartoonist? I mean, did it change how you viewed cartooning?
Sam: No. When you’re a cartoon editor, the only way it affects it is the audience and the direction the magazine is going. I also was cartoon editor at Smoke magazine, and for a very brief time, Parents magazine. Now I’m not gonna go to Parents magazine and try to get a National Lampoon cartoon in there. The only way it’s affected me is by basically the market of the magazine—not the quality of drawing or the writing—but basically I had in mind the readership of these particular magazines.
My well-worn copy of one of Sam’s classic cartoon collections.
Jane: What tools do you use to make your cartoons?
Sam: I use two old Rapidograph pens, a two and a half and a one. They’re color coded— blue and brown. I actually don’t think it’s very important what your tools are as long as you’re doing this thing. I know a number of young cartoonists think that there’s something magical in a particular tool, whatever it is. You work with what you’re comfortable in.
On one occasion, and this was at Saturday Evening Post, a young kid wanted the secret for how to do this thing. He thought the secret was embedded in your tools, so he asked around, “What paper do you use? What pens do you use?” So he asked this guy, John Elcik, who was a cartoonist at the AP, Associated Press, and he asked him, “What kind of ink do you use?” And John answered with a very straight face, “Higgens Gag Ink,” and nobody corrected him because this kid was a real noodge. So it’s a running gag now, with “Higgens Gag Ink,” because it’s so ridiculous to get involved in the tools of this thing. You do what works. And you let go what doesn’t work. Brian Savage, who was living across the street from me on 3rd avenue was drawing with brush and lamp black, and he said “Oh you have to try it!” I tried it, and I was miserable. After a day and a half I figured, this ain’t for me. There are people who instead of working with a pen, they work with a brush. I can’t work with a brush.
I’m working with these busted Rapidographs because they are drafting pens, basically. I’ve learned how to put pressure… alleviate pressure…so I can vary the line with this thing. What I have done since Rapidograph has discontinued this line of pens, and they now have cartridge pens, is… there’s this guy in Pennsylvania… Connecticut rather, who deals in antique pens, and I got enough points and enough pens… cartridges that hold the points… I guess to last me for the rest of my life. I did it just in case they decided to change the pens, which they did.
Jane: I’ve talked to so many cartoonists who are mourning the loss of this Rapidograph pen, Like Marisa [Acocella] goes on Ebay to search for them.
Sam: I’m going to see Marisa tomorrow, and I’ll let her know about this guy.
© Copyright, 1998, S. Gross. Buy this print here!
Sam: I was in Paris, and I wasn’t taking my Rapidographs, because I don’t know where and how I have to clean these things, so I went into this art supply store, and they had a sale on Staedtler pens, and I asked the lady there—because France, and pretty much Europe, is not known for fantastic sales on art supplies— so I asked, “Why is Staedtler being so good to me?” and she said, of course, “Because they’re discontinuing these pens.” I use these pens…they’re waterproof, and they’ve got various points. They’re not as comfortable, but basically if I’m in Europe, I’m not doing any finishes, so I can use them for sketches. If I sell something over there, and they want something immediately finished, I would have to sit down and do it with a Staedtler pen.
Art supplies are diminishing because of the computer. Pretty much every art supplies store in New York is gone. There are plenty of places with art supplies departments, like Staples. The place I go now, on Madison Avenue, it used to be an art supplies and stationary store, and the guy moved over to Lexington Avenue, and he basically had the same thing…and also a printing business…he’s sort of limping along, and I make sure I go in and buy stuff there just to keep him in business, for godsakes!
Jane: You know, running this blog has really driven home that, like you said earlier, there isn’t a magic tool. I’ve interviewed dozens and dozens of people, and everyone has different tools that they prefer. So I agree, it’s just whatever you’re comfortable with…
Sam: You know, I’m not very good with color…Doctor Seuss was not very good with color…among other people— same with Shel Silverstein— they had it added mechanically, and you can see that in the Dr. Seuss books and The Giving Tree. Occasionally, I have to conquer my disabilities— because I’m doing greeting cards or whatever —to work with color. So with that, I guess I use the cheapest watercolors for working this stuff. I also know my limitations on this stuff… and my brushes are for wash and half tones… probably kinda beat up, but they do the job.
© Copyright, 2016, S. Gross. Buy this print here!
Jane: You take a while to do each cartoon, right? You do a lot of cartoons per week, and your cartoons look deceptively simple, but I know you really think about where each line goes. I remember that you gave me some of the best advice I’ve ever gotten for cartooning, which was was that you told me to draw funny, and I think what you meant was to make sure every line help propel the joke, rather than wasting space with superfluous details. Did I interpret that right?
Sam: Well, there’s a difference between drawing funny and funny drawing. Usually a lot of people who can draw very well— really good artists— when they go into cartooning they’re doing funny drawing rather than drawing funny. Because they—I don’t know—in other words they exaggerate the nose…which possibly is not pertinent to this particular cartoon. They’re making funny drawing. Drawing funny is…George Booth draws funny, Bill Woodman draws funny… people say that I draw funny. I guess I do, in a way, but not as funny as their drawing. Sergio Aragonés draws funny… and I take— sometimes, which I’m doing now— I take two three weeks to do a drawing…just looking at it, and deciding… I don’t consider myself a great artist, or even that much of a good artist, but what I consider myself is a really good gag man, a really good person that can tell a joke, that’s what I do. You know, I’m weak in perspective, I can’t draw a horse to save myself…but a lot of other people can’t also— I’m in good company with horses, or lack of ability to draw horses. But I can tell a joke… and it takes a lot of work to do that.
Jane: Some people say either you’re funny or you’re not, but do you think people can improve their ability to tell a good joke?
Sam: Yeah I could see it over the years. Stuff that I did In 1969, when I began with The New Yorker, and getting in jokes…and drawing… to now, you know if I just go back in my files to 1969, I guess the initial reaction would be to hold my head and go, “Oh my God!”, but I’ve developed from there, and I realize that’s where I was in 1969. And there are people, without my saying any names, that have been drawing the same way for 20-30 years, and to me it’s amazing that they can do whatever they did 20 years ago, not that I would want that. You know, I’m very happy that I’ve advanced to the point where my drawings are totally different than I did in 1969, and before that between ‘63 and ‘69… and actually, up until ‘73 or so, when I was doing a lot of gags… writing for Charles Addams…he worked with gag men. I realized—George Price was actually walking around with my wife at a gallery of his stuff, and he was showing [her] various drawings there. And at that particular time, I was somewhat appalled that my idols were using gag men— one of them of course being Charles Addams—and [Price] turned to my wife and said, “you know, I’m not really involved with gags—I’m involved with furniture,” and it really gelled, and then I realized with Charles Addams, he was involved with mood and architecture, and some of these other guys that were buying gags, they weren’t very involved in germinating the idea, but once they had the idea, they could then work with it, and then come out with something really, really good. So some cartoonists are just different. You know there’s one cartoonist that can draw anything, but for the most part he uses set gags
© Copyright, 1991, S. Gross. Buy this print here!
Jane: So I was looking at your Wikipedia, and it says in 2012 you had a total of 27,592 cartoons. What’s the tally now?
Sam: Well what I do is I throw out a lot of gags. I’ve probably thrown out over 5000 gags. You throw out gags cause they’re obsolete. Let’s say the gag —the idea— involves a rotary telephone, which there aren’t any rotary telephones anymore! Or a phone booth, of which there are very few. I think there were two left in New York City on West End Avenue. There was an article in The Times on that. So you throw this stuff out, you throw out stuff that’s obsolete. Including, let’s say five years from now, if I had a gag on Trump, or if I had a gag on McCain… you throw out a gag or idea if it’s lousy, “Oh my god, what was I thinking about?!” Out of 31,500 gags or so, I have duplicates, “Oh my God I did that one, there it is again,” so I throw that out. This keeps me sharp, otherwise I would probably need a larger studio… Yeah, 5000 gags takes up a lot of space.
Jane: Wait so you throw away cartoons? Actual physical drawings that you’ve done?
Sam: Yeah! And there are other drawings, by the way, in my books…and I look at this thing, and it’s my gag, it’s my idea, and I don’t get it. I don’t know where my head was when this thing was germinating in my mind. I have no idea, and I look at this thing and go “huh?!” I just get rid of it.
Jane: So you’re not like Mort who has a storage facility with thousands of cartoons…
Sam: No, no—I’m not gonna have a storage facility. I have a studio down the block from where I am. And actually, since I own it, and I’m paying maintenance on it, I’m probably not paying much more than he’s paying on his storage facility, wherever the heck that is.
© Copyright, 2011, S. Gross. Buy this print here!
Jane: I used to store my cartoons in a stack under my bed in my old apartment, and the mice let me know what they thought of my work by sh-tting all over it.
Sam: That’s another thing by the way, with piles—there’s one cartoonist I know, his system, as far as cartoons are concerned, one pile is horizontals, the other pile is verticals. That’s his system. And what I tell some of these young people at The New Yorker, which you’re aware of, because you were one of them, is to control the volume of this. And one way is to number them on the back, and then every one of them is an inventory number. Otherwise, when stuff goes out to Whoopie magazine or something, you know that you’ve sent this stuff out. Now you push scan and send it out, but you sent out 2831, 3743, with 16000… and you know which cartoons were sent out without having to describe them.
Now what I don’t do, which people think I should do, and I’m possibly gonna have to, is scan these things and put them on a disc or whatever. I really don’t want to do that now, because I don’t want to get into the nitty gritty, and of course I’m gonna have to hire somebody. I’d rather just sit down, draw, and create. And I’ve got this system well enough that if you need something—let’s say it’s a men’s magazine—I go to my “Men’s Magazine” folder, and I pull something out. If you need something for natural history—let’s say turtles — I can pull out something on turtles. As a matter of fact, I had a request a while back for dental cartoons, and I thought I never had that many, and I went into “medical,” and I had enough there to open a full file on dental.
I keep it loose, but not very loose. There is a control. I can go into something, and pull it out,or get it… at worst I think it can take twenty minutes. But there’s a method to this madness.
© Copyright, 1999, S. Gross. Buy this print here!
Jane: So this blog is supposed to be an educational resource for aspiring cartoonists and artists, and I was wondering if you had any advice that you wish you’d been told when you were first starting out, or that you think they should know…
Sam: Yeah, which is something you probably have experienced. There’s no love in this. I tell people, especially these young kids up at The New Yorker… sooner or later, The New Yorker is going to break your heart if you’re going to put all of your effort there. There’s no love there— I don’t love The New Yorker, and The New Yorker doesn’t love me. I’ve had, on many, many occasions… what usually has happened,or actually, what has happened, is that the market that I’m dealing with changes editors, and all of a sudden I’m out, and somebody else is in. I had this happen at Harvard Business Review, and the art director was a guy named John O’Connor, and I was selling to him for… I guess seventeen years, and the magazine was faculty run, which meant that it was run by crazies, because there were faculty wars involved, and those people were thrown in, people were thrown out, and people were in limbo, and John was able to survive for seventeen years, until he finally he became a casualty of the faculty wars there, and somebody else took over, and then I was selling sporadically, rather than the way I was selling before. Then later, I got a letter in the mail, hard copy, and they were informing me that they were buying all rights now. So I wrote them a letter back, or posted it by email, I don’t remember, “Please be advised that all the cartoons that you bought prior to this are my property. And if you get any reprint requests, please forward them to me.”
That’s the other thing by the way. And that’s rights. If you own the stuff, it’ll work for you. And I’m not saying every one of them will, but we call these cartoons that grow us money, we call them evergreens. The champion evergreen for me is the frog legs cartoons. I don’t have to say anything more. Everyone knows that one. The other one is the snail cartoon. “I know she’s a tape dispenser, but I love her.” The reason that these cartoons are paying me money— the frog legs cartoon is 47 years old, much older than you— the reason that these cartoons are generating money is because I own them.
I had a friend of mine who was selling to Mad magazine, and he got very involved, and he was selling there for years and years and years… and one day he walked in there, and they told him he was too derivative, whatever the hell that means, and that they were no longer buying from him.
Sam: Well, this happens. He was lamenting to me, “Thirty-five years! Thirty-five years, and I’ve got nothing.” You gotta be very careful with where you’re selling. I was stuffing an envelope in 1977 for Playboy, and all of a sudden this light bulb went off, and I said, “Hey wait a minute! They’re paying three hundred and fifty dollars, but buying all rights,” and I said, “I can’t make any money on them. I’m gonna get the three hundred and fifty dollars, and that’s it.”
If I had sold all rights on that frog legs cartoon, which came out in December 1970, they bought it for one hundred dollars, and that’s what I would have made on it. One hundred dollars—that’s it. Now, this thing has made thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars. I had a lithograph, which I think I made fifteen thousand on—just on the lithograph.
That’s the other thing— all my cartoons are inventoried and posted in an index, and when a cartoon makes money, for whatever reason, I post it, to the nearest dollar, how much money this cartoon has made. And for the frogs leg cartoon, and the tape dispenser cartoon, I had to add a page with all the action that went on with it.
It’s very very important for you to retain your rights, cause otherwise you’re not gonna last. There are just so many variables going. I just sold the frog legs cartoon to a movie company, and they just came out with a movie about The National Lampoon on Netflix. It’s a prop. I think it’s hanging on a wall that somebody walks by. And I billed them $150 for it.
© Copyright, 1998, S. Gross. Buy this print here!
Jane: Oh, sorry, I was just listening!
Sam: So again, rights are very important. Ownership is very important. If you feel like, “Well, I’ll do it just once or twice,..I need the money… I’m desperate,” they feed on you. Basically, their attitude towards you is that you’re the shmuckartist—that’s one word-—shmuckartist, and they take advantage of you. Usually, I just had it recently again, when this woman said to me— and I won’t say what the market was—“We only have the best interest at heart.” When somebody tells you that, they’re trying to screw you. The same thing when they begin the conversation with “You gotta understand,” that’s another rotten deal they want you to go into, okay? I did this cartoon, actually it almost happened to me that way, where you walk into an office, and there’s this guy behind the desk, and every chair in the office is occupied, so you can’t sit down, so you’re standing in front, and there are guys there ( and in this particular case it was all guys)… and I got a cartoon out of it that was in The New Yorker. Basically, you’re supposed to stand at the desk and pull on your forelock and hunch over. I did this gag, with this big corner office,with the big desk, and there’s four- five guys sitting in chairs, and the guy behind the desk… and this poor shlump is standing in front of the desk, and the guy behind the desk is saying, “Work with us, we’re trying to screw you!” I got a gag out of it, finally after these many years, because this happened when I was selling to girly magazines, back in the ‘60s, and sometimes something germinates after 50 years.
Jane: So you’re saying if someone has to tell you that they’re being nice to you, they probably aren’t?
Sam: Well, probably not. Look at it this way, this is a person at Condé Nast— not at the magazine, but dealing with another department —my feeling is, if she’s telling me, “We only have the best interest at heart,” this is not true, because being employed by Condé Nast, she’s gotta have Condé Nast’s interest at heart ahead of mine, because if she doesn’t, she’s gonna get fired. So of course, it’s bullshit.
© Copyright, 2009, S. Gross. Buy this print here!
Jane: I remember you would tell me and other cartoonists to be like a street rat. Could you explain that a little?
Sam: Yeah, well, you should figure out where else you’re gonna survive with this thing. For instance, I guess this was the 1980’s, when William Shawn was under tremendous pressure to resign, which it took a while… For some reason, he didn’t take a shine to me, and I couldn’t sell him for a period of 14 months, but I was up there every week, running cartoons through, and then selling to Good Housekeeping, Cosmopolitan, National Lampoon… Basically, I was running this stuff through The New Yorker, and knowing, knowing, that this thing is not going anywhere at The New Yorker. However, I have this stuff, I’m setting it up through The New Yorker… having this stuff now salable for other magazines. It looks pretty good— “Hey let’s go to Cosmo. Let’s go to… I guess at that time, True magazine.” So yeah, you gotta be a street rat. People come up to The New Yorker— “What are you gonna do with this next?” and they go, “I dunno!” Well if you don’t know, you’re not gonna survive.
Jane: Can I tell you a story about the first time I went into The New Yorker?
Jane: It was when they were still at 4 Times Square, and I was scared to death, but I remember specifically that you were extremely welcoming, and made me feel like it was okay that I was there…and you invited me to Pergola [des Artistes] with all of the other guys, and you even drew a map for how to get there, which I later hung up on my wall… I just wanted to say, thank you for making me feel like it was alright for me to be there.
Sam: Of course it was alright for you to be there!
Jane: A lot of times as a young woman, especially in comedy, you don’t get welcomed at all, so it really meant a lot—from you, especially.
Sam: It’s such a tough business, that to be a hard-on in this business is disgusting, for want of a worse word. You try to make it easier for anybody and everybody, because I didn’t know what your work was like—you were there, which was important to you.
Jane: Yeah, and you were just nice regardless, and that says a lot about you as a person.
Sam: Well, thank you. I went through my first first showing, it was at Saturday Evening Post, and I still remember Henry Boltinoff, a cartoonist there, had a sign-in list, so you signed in, and I was behind George Wolfe, and I sat down, and I was so scared. I didn’t ask “Who is George Wolfe?” I just sat there, and Henry Boltinoff walked up to me and said, “Hi I’m Henry Boltinoff,” and I said, “Hi I’m Sam Gross,” and he said, “You’re after that elderly gentleman there—ugly old gentleman there” (they were good friends), “that’s George Wolfe.” So you know, after that, I showed up again—street rat—I showed up every week. I never was a really big seller at Saturday Evening Post. And I got in my studio… I think it was Sidney Harris, no it wasn’t Sidney, it was Art Pottier…. he had taken two signup lists, he kept them, and he sent me two photocopies. Very interesting who was on there, including a couple New Yorker cartoonists. One of them was Alan Dunn, which was a big surprise, because he was a big star at the New Yorker. He at one point had sold more cartoons than anybody else, like 1200 cartoons. But, you know, there’s never a reason for being a putz.
The map Sam drew for me, in case the other cartoonists left for lunch while I was showing my cartoons.
Jane: Is there anything else you wanna say to aspiring cartoonists?
Sam: Again, I guess one thing is the business is changing. The whole publishing business is changing. You’re going up to publishers now, like The New Yorker, and there’s a desert of cubicles. There’s new technology going— for instance, now, I’m involved with cartoon festivals… in the old days, being two weeks ago [laughs] no, more than that… you would have had to send in an original. You would have to pack it, you would have to insure it, you’d have to worry about it coming back. Now you scan and send, and you don’t have to worry about any of this stuff, and this stuff is hangable, and people wanna buy it—they can buy the original. If people wanna buy prints, which is what I prefer, they’ll buy prints…and even submitting to magazines now, The New Yorker, which I”ll do tomorrow, is scan and send. I basically don’t have to go in. Usually I do go in, because one, it breaks up the week… and I have lunch with cohorts. It’s changing, and what it’s changing into I don’t know, but I am aware of it. Listen, there are very few magazines that I’m dealing with now. A lot of people I’m dealing with, in a way, are kinda desperate with what’s going on. It’s going on for them also— it’s going on for us and it’s going on for them, these monumental changes. My only advice on this is to be aware of it. I can’t give you advice for how to act upon it. I guess that’s it!
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