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David Poland

By David Poland poland@moviecitynews.com

Posted Wednesday, August 23rd, 2006 - Comments Off on Reeler Pinch Hitter: Bill Plympton, Filmmaker
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Reeler Pinch Hitter: Bill Plympton, Filmmaker

[Note: Reeler editor S.T. VanAirsdale is taking the week off, but the blog is in the good hands of trusted friends and colleagues; click here for other entries in the series. Bill Plympton is the Academy Award-nominated, New York-based filmmaker behind animated works including Your Face, Guard Dog and Guide Dog. He sent along this postcard from his trip to this year’s San Diego Comic-Con.]
So, what’s all this hype about the San Diego Comic-Con? And why do I keep going every year? Isn’t it just for “comic geeks”?
Well, it used to be just for comic geeks, but since the blockbuster success of comic-based films such as X-Men, Spider-Man and Sin City, the “Con” is now the place to launch a film, and consequently one sees all the movie stars and directors there: Hilary Swank, Samuel L. Jackson, Guillermo Del Toro, Quentin Tarantino, Bryan Singer, Robert Rodriguez and the Wachowski Brothers.

Bill Plympton (R) with Claymation pioneer Will Vinton at the 2006 San Diego Comic-Con (Photo: Bill Plympton)
I just returned from the 2006 Con, and besides having a booth there, I was involved with a number of events:
–I did a panel discussion and signing of the 3rd volume of Flight, a huge
graphic novel containing work from many artists, such as Jeff Smith. I did an 8-page story called “The Cloud.”
–Nickelodeon had a presentation of their new crop of pilots from Frederator Studios, mine is called Gary Guitar. They showed a few others that were knock-outs. The Spike & Mike Festival had their annual late-night screening of Sick and Twisted shorts, where the audience’s applause (or boos) decides the fate of some untested cartoons. About 4,000 rabid cartoon geeks were looking for blood. They showed a film called Spiral, directed by reclusive animator W.P. Murton and produced by my studio; happily, it didn’t get rejected.
–A presentation of the new Animation Show. I was joined by Robert May, Don Hertzfeldt and Mike Judge. My film Guard Dog was shown, as was Don’s ever-popular Rejected,” to an equally large and rebellious crowd.
Beyond these events, I had a table to sell my merchandise–CDs, posters, books, T-shirts, sketches and mostly DVDs. The great part for me is an opportunity to meet my fans and talk to people about independent animation.
This year, the convention seemed to be twice as busy as last year, and I also got to hang out with such animation directors as Will Vinton, Aaron McGruder (The Boondocks), Mike Mignola (Hellboy), Geoff Darrow (The Matrix), Danny Antonucci (Ed, Edd & Eddy), the Adult Swim guys and, of course, the aforementioned Mike Judge and Don Hertzfeldt. I also encountered Eric Goldberg, Matt Groening, Art Clokey, Tom Warburton, Craig McCracken, Robert Smigel and Ray Harryhausen.
Programs included sneak previews of Brother Bear II, Open Season, Ant Bully, Happy Tree Friends, plus Jerry Beck’s Worst Cartoons Ever Made. How many animation festivals can compare with that line-up?
The good news is that NYC will host the New York Comic-Con next February; I happily predict they will have equal success in attracting the large animation crowd–and I recommend that you attend. For more information, check out NYComicCon.com.

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It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?

So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.

And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.

There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.

I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.

So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.

But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”

My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher

“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.

~ David Simon