Today.com has profiled Gil creator Norm Feuti about the launch of his new feature and how it compares to other family strips.
The cartoonist finds it a bit surprising that it’s taken newspaper comics so many years to deal with divorce head-on. “It’s sort of an odd thing where we’re afraid to show real life,” he told TODAY.com. With roughly half of U.S. marriages ending in divorce, he asked, “how can you not know someone who’s divorced?”
Still, despite his own parents’ divorce, “I had a great childhood,” Feuti said. “We didn’t have everything, but we weren’t poor.”
And maybe that’s the way in which the cartoonist is the most like his own creation: They’re both optimists. ” ‘Gil’ is about the resiliency of childhood,” he said.
My Three Sons, The Lucy Show, Julia, Courtship of Eddy’s Father, Flipper, Family Affair, The Andy Griffith Show…single parent families ruled in the 60’s. It only took comic strips 50 years to catch up!
I myself came from a single parent home. My dad took care of my brother and I. It’s good to see a comic strip like Gil.
The Chicago Tribune is slated to carry the strip after the results of the Broom Hilda/F-Minus comics carousel results get announced the first week of Feb. 2012.