http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1438570989/when-we-went-mad-a-documentary-of-ecch-ic-proportiThis looks like a great project.

My name is Alan Bernstein – I am the Co/Producer and Director of the movie When We Went MAD! a documentary that explores the history and influence of MAD Magazine. Whether you grew up reading MAD, had a brother or sister who read it, or remember a parent who proclaimed it “pure trash” – chances are you have a connection to MAD. We already have twenty interviews shot featuring current and former MAD artists, writers, and editors.
To continue production on the project, When We Went MAD! is raising capital with a crowdfunding campaign through Kickstarter until February 9, to raise funds to cover the cost of travel, equipment rental, and post production. Everyone who pledges will be acknowledged with a certificate of recognition and insider updates regarding the film’s release. Larger contributions can include perks such as DVDs of the movie, T-shirts, posters, and the highest level includes an Executive Producer credit on the project. Kickstarter is an all or nothing service – it we don’t meet our goal, everyone gets their money back.
The best way for us to be successful is through word of mouth. Thus, this email I am sending out. Even if you choose not to contribute, would you please share this with your friends? Forward this email, post a link to us on Facebook, talk it up at parties. Ask your friends where they were when they first read MAD. The conversation (and the intangible benefit of participation in this project) can go on and on. And you can proudly claim, “What, Me Worry?”

Only 10 days left and it’s only hit the half way point. Great incentives to donate.

The original Mad men were a group of subversive cartoonists and writers poking fun at anything that carried the slightest hint of authority. Today’s editorial crop have a much harder job–satirizing folks who have grown up with Mad and are in on the joke. On a tear of shameless shilling for its new 60th anniversary coffee table book, Totally Mad, editor John Ficarra weighs in on how the iconic magazine has kept up with the times.

Nice slideshow of covers over the years.

Via Tom Richmond.

We are announcing this morning an important development at Newsweek and The Daily Beast. Newsweek will transition to an all-digital format in early 2013. As part of this transition, the last print edition in the United States will be our Dec. 31 issue.

Meanwhile, Newsweek will expand its rapidly growing tablet and online presence, as well as its successful global partnerships and events business.

Newsweek Global, as the all-digital publication will be named, will be a single, worldwide edition targeted for a highly mobile, opinion-leading audience who want to learn about world events in a sophisticated context. Newsweek Global will be supported by paid subscription and will be available through e-readers for both tablet and the Web, with select content available on The Daily Beast.

There will be some layoffs. We’ll have to see if they continue to print editorial cartoons each week. Better yet, commission original editorial cartoons. But I’m not holding my breath on that.

The New Yorker has a Facebook page, which a lot of you like, or maybe it’s just one person with a lot of time on their hands, liking the page over and over again. But in any case, it’s a whole lotta like. We like that.

What we don’t like is that we got temporarily banned from Facebook for violating their community standards on “Nudity and Sex,” by posting this Mick Stevens cartoon:

Facebook’s policy specifically bans “female nipple bulges” but also says “male nipples are ok.”

John Read, the publisher of Stay Tooned! magazine, has applied for a grant by Chase and LivingSocial for $250,000 and would like your support to qualify. To lend your support, visit missionsmallbusiness.com and login (they make you use your Facebook credentials which means they will have access to certain information about you such as your email address, your likes such as music, tv, movies, books, quotes). Once logged in, search for Madison, Mississippi and then scroll down to Stay Tooned! and vote. That’s it.

John tells me he’ll be using the money to keep publishing Stay Tooned! and allow for some advertising and promotion of the magazine to a wider audience.

As you watch a movie, are you keeping count of the gags and writing ideas down?

Yeah, and after I see the movie, I write a whole outline of it, and then I go through it again and I mark up the panels—the must-have panels. Those either carry the story, or the audience had a big reaction to that scene, which means you really have to include it because people are going to remember that particular scene. And then I’ll tell the editor, I can do a nice five pages on this because I have thirty good panels.

Do you see a movie more than once?

Not usually.

Really? That surprises me.

To tell you the truth, I usually take a tape recorder to the movies—an audio-tape recorder—because sometimes, especially in a James Bond movie for instance, it’s very hard to remember the sequence in which things happen. We also realize that sometimes other people can’t remember that, either. So occasionally, for speed, we’ll rearrange the movie or leave out a couple of key scenes and just cover it with dialogue.

Last night the National Cartoonists Society gathered in Las Vegas for their annual Reuben Award banquet. The top honor for Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year went to MAD Magazine cartoonist Tom Richmond. Tom started his career doing caricatures and freelance work for magazines, publishers and advertisers. As a caricaturist, he has been honored by the National Caricaturist Network in 1998 and 1999.

After a couple of years of trying to get into MAD Magazine, he finally got his break in 2000. He’s been a regular in the magazine ever since. Tom has won the NCS Advertising Illustration division award in 2003, 2006 and 2007 in 2009 he won the Newspaper Illustration division award.

He became the NCS’ president in 2011.

The other division award winners were also presented. Here are the winners:

TELEVISION ANIMATION
Erik Wiese – Production Design on The Mighty B – Nickelodeon

FEATURE ANIMATION
Mark McCreery, character design: Rango

NEWSPAPER ILLUSTRATION
Bob Rich

GAG CARTOONS
Zach Kanin

GREETING CARDS
Glenn McCoy

NEWSPAPER COMIC STRIPS
Glenn McCoy – The Duplex

NEWSPAPER PANEL CARTOONS
Mark Parisi – Off the Mark

MAGAZINE FEATURE/MAGAZINE ILLUSTRATION
Edward Sorel

BOOK ILLUSTRATION
John Rocco – Blackout

EDITORIAL CARTOONS
Mike Ramirez

ADVERTISING ILLUSTRATION
Nick Galifianakis

COMIC BOOKS
J.H. Williams- Batwoman

GRAPHIC NOVELS
Ben Katchor- The Cardboard Valise

ON-LINE COMIC STRIPS
Jon Rosenberg Scenes from a Multiverse

This is what I love about Blown Covers, the new book by The New Yorker’s art editor, Francoise Mouly. Despite the title of the book, it is about more than just rejected covers. It gives us a peek into the process: creation, selection, and the decisions as to how a cover gets to be a cover.

The review posted on Forbes.com has several interesting covers that were never run.

Andrew Farago, the curator for the museum writes:

Love MAD? Our next exhibition is going to be the greatest collection of MAD art ever assembled, going all the way back to MAD #1. Kurtzman covers! Elder splash pages! Aragones! Berg! Richmond! Viviano! Mingo! Drucker! Davis! Jaffee! Martin! Get yourself to San Francisco between April and September, or kick yourself later!