Category: Interviews

Words by Olly MacNamee

With the recent International Comic Expo (ICE) being such a hotbed of comic book talent, I was determined to bag an interview with Iron Man legend, Bob Layton.

Having hotfooted it away from a riveting seminar/workshop on storytelling in comics with Dr Who comic book and storyboard artist Mike Collins, I was already running late, only to find Bob Layton holding court, luckily, with some friends of mine.

Accepting of my apologies, while I grabbed a beer, we somehow started talking about the career trajectory of Ice Cube – after his promising start in such films as Boys N The Hood and into more mainstream, family friendly affairs. Layton, no stranger to Hollywood, had an interesting story to regal us with:

Bob Layton: Well, you know why he did all that, right. The agent I had in Hollywood at the time came to me and David Michelinie and said, “Ice Cube’s interested in doing a superhero movie,” and he was interested in us creating something for him. We did this treatment called, Wheels on Fire, where he’s the world’s greatest car thief but with superpowers; we were working on this at the same time as he was doing a film called Torque.

It was one of the biggest box office bombs in movie history of the year, and after that he swore he’d never do another action picture. That’s why he switched over to doing all these family movies.

Olly MacNamee: You always seem to have been an entrepreneur – organising a comic con as a teen, self-publishing; you’ve always had a good business sense, it would seem. How has that helped you in the industry?

Bob Layton: My mentor, Dick Giordano, always said, it’s the guy that knows the business that will always get the work, even when things get tight and when tastes change. He was absolutely right. It’s been forty years now and I can pick and choose what I want to do.

I’ve exposed myself to every aspect of the business. I do lectures at conventions on the comic book industry and how it works. I threw myself into it, not always knowing what I was doing, because, to me, it was always about whether the next job is going to make me better. Doing another Iron Man mini-series isn’t going to do jack sh*t to my career – that’s a quote from Edward James Olmos (actor, Miami Vice, Battlestar Galactica) by the way.

When I was getting ready to leave comics I was having dinner with him; I was procrastinating over Iron Man and he said, “What’s one more episode of Battlestar Galactica going to do for my career?” And I said, “Well, absolutely nothing,” and he then says, “quit doing Iron Man, then.” And he was right.

Now the average age of a writer in Hollywood is 28 years old, and yet I am, in my fifties breaking into Hollywood as a writer, because I don’t know any better. But it’s also challenging, it’s fun and it’s different, and I still want to grow and learn. And that’s what interests me, and what has always interested me; it’s what’s always kept me working, right back to Dickie’s (Dick Giordano) sage wisdom all those years ago.

I remember sitting on a train with Dick – we both lived in Conneticut and shared the train together into Continuity Studios in Manhattan; this was in the mid-70’s. Dickie’s in his suit and there I am, little Bobbie Layton, reading a comic book, and he reaches over and he pulls it out of my hand. He looks at me and goes, “What are your intentions? Is this going to be your hobby or your job? If you’re going to be any good at it, it can’t be both.”

His word was like gospel to me. So the very next week I sold my comic book collection. I just got rid of it. I knew what he meant. If you want to bring something new to comics it had to come from an, ‘outside world’. If I wanted to shake things up, I had to draw my inspiration from the world around me. It shouldn’t be your main source material.

Olly MacNamee: Did you know at the time you were writing a seminal Iron Man storyline in Demon in a Bottle?

Bob Layton: It’s really funny, because in the mainstream (media) it’s the only comic book storylines that’s always quoted when they’re talking about Iron Man. To me, it’s the ultimate compliment that in the ‘real world’ they know that storyline. But no, at the time it was just another Iron Man story. We wanted to replace his heart problem; even by the mid-70’s heart transplants were commonplace. It seems to me that a guy that was genius enough to build his own suit of armour could figure out a way to fix his friggin’ heart, right?

Dave (Michelinie) and I agreed that we were going to create this whole corporate world for Tony (Stark – Iron Man). This was going to be his empire and he was King Arthur. That’s why he’s not a superhero in the traditional sense because he didn’t go round looking for crime be was basically protecting his empire from the forces that sought to destroy it.

And we felt in that corporate world we needed to give him vulnerability and the best ones always come from the character internally, some kinda character flaw that needs to be contained or controlled. That’s what we were looking for in Tony Stark and that (the alcoholism) seemed to be a logical progression.

It was never, ‘Let’s do something to shake things up,’ y’know. It wasn’t like we said, ‘Let’s make all the Marvel characters raging alcoholics. Let’s have Alcoholic Month at Marvel and have them all puking up in buckets and stuff. Iron Man could be puking in his helmet and have barf coming outta the eye slits.’ I did actually draw that once – only once – but that was it.

No one sets out to make comic book history. It was just another storyline to us and then we moved on. But it gave Tony that vulnerability and at anytime he could fall off the wagon if we pushed him too far in the comics. Would he ever crumble? But, y’know, there was a subtext to all that at the time. I myself was a raging alcoholic at the time. It was a cry for help. In fact it wasn’t until a few years later that I actually got sober. The reason why the story resonated with so many people is because I knew what he was going through.

Olly MacNamee: So it wasn’t just another comic book storyline then?

Bob Layton: No, it wasn’t just another comic in that sense, at least. And I’ve been sober for almost thirty years now. So, yeah, it did mean something to me. Comics can idealise life, so Tony could overcome it, while I couldn’t. It was cathartic for me.

Olly MacNamee: Ah yes, media texts, unlike life, can give us a solution rightly or wrongly. That’s one of the reasons why people watch soap operas. So why didn’t they follow through in the Iron Man films. At one time, it looked like they were going to play on his alcoholism for it to simply disappear.

Bob Layton: Well, I did have a conversation about that. Robert Downey Jr wanted to do that. That’s his favourite Iron Man storyline for obvious reasons. Part of his attraction to the character in the first place was those stories but attitude to their line (of films) was much more upbeat and light-hearted and Favareau (Jon – Iron Man’s director) said, “It’ll never get done, it’s way too dark.”

It wasn’t the tone they were going for and I understand that. The scene in Iron Man 2, when he is drunk and out of control at his own party, is there to placate Downey, who wanted to play an out of control Tony Stark. I think they wrote that in there to give him a chance to do that, so he could feel like he did a little bit of ‘Demon in a Bottle’.

Olly MacNamee: Moving on to your time at Valiant Comics. You say that you ‘brought your crew’ with you and then, Acclaim (a software company) bought you out. You walked away from $1.7 million?

Bob Layton: Yep. So I’m either insane or my work means more to me than the money.

Olly MacNamee: So what went wrong?

Bob Layton: Acclaim was a terrible company. We were financed by venture capitalists, short-term investors. Once they had made their money – they invested $4 million and made about $120 million from Valiant in the three years after that – then they were done. They ordered the company to be sold, they wanted out. So, we didn’t have a choice and it went to the highest bidder, which were the shmucks at Acclaim.

They were already considered a sleazy video game company anyway. Most of their titles were poor, so to me the writing was already on the wall. That and they wanted us to change our characters to be more like Image. Which explains, after I left, why they did get revamped into Image like characters. I told them that if they did that they’d alienate the readership, which it did. And people left in droves.

Olly MacNamee: So you can pick and choose now? What are you currently working on?

Bob Layton: A series of Justice League covers. This came about because Brian Cunningham is a friend and to me; it was one of those things I could do for fun. I could finally say I’d penciled something for DC Comics and get that monkey off my back. I could write there, ink there, but I could never draw there.

Olly MacNamee: Would you maybe do more for DC?

Bob Layton: No, I’ve pretty much done everything I want to do with comics. If I were to land anywhere, I’d go back to Valiant because that’s a company I helped found. That’s where I’d go.

Olly MacNamee: Any goals in the film industry then?

Bob Layton: Yeah. I’m still trying to get one of my friggin’ movies up on the screen. It’s like, since I’ve been in Hollywood I’ve written seven films and not one has made it to the screen yet. They’ve all been in some kinda development limbo. It takes forever to get something done there. It took Stallone seven years to get Rocky made. Who thought a movie about a boxer was gonna be any good?

Doing an independent film in Hollywood is almost unheard of now. It’s all from a book, a comic or some other thing. If I had the rights to the toy, Slinky, I could make a movie tomorrow!

Olly MacNamee: Well, if you can make Battleships into a movie…

Bob Layton: That’s my point. But if I come with an original idea for a film, to get a major motion picture made is almost impossible. That’s the nature of it now, because it’s so costly to make a film.

Olly MacNamee: You’re still keeping busy?

Bob Layton: Yeah. I’m working on a project at the moment with Michael Uslan (Batman producer) for the UN and UNICEF, featuring some famous old comic book characters. I do a lot of charity work and a lot of work that just interests me, sometimes it’s scriptwriting and sometimes its artwork. That’s why I did Hercules for Marvel…

Olly MacNamee: You must be drawn to drunken idiots.

Bob Layton: I do love drunken idiots, for unloved characters. I just remember reading Thor as a kid and Hercules would just show up and just start beating people up for no apparent reason and I just found that charming. They never really explored him; why didn’t someone do anything with him, y’know? It seemed to me that you could make a book about Hercules and make it popular, so I did it. I could have easily done a regular series, but I had no interest in that.

Olly MacNamee: Are some characters simply destined to be second-stringers, mini-series only kind of characters? Or are all characters redeemable?

Bob Layton: Well, didn’t James Gunn prove that with Guardians of the Galaxy? Did anybody even buy a Guardians of the Galaxy comic before that? It’s always about how you approach a character. It’s how much thought you put into it.

Olly MacNamee: You’re right. None of my friends even knew a single one of them before the movie came out.

Bob Layton: Yeah. It’s just a matter of approach. That’s what we did with Iron Man. They couldn’t see what they had there and he was treated like the ‘red-headed stepchild’ at Marvel. It was a book people did to pay the bills and hopefully to get onto bigger titles like The Avengers.

Olly MacNamee: One last point then. Beyond Demon in a Bottle, what were your other highpoints in the comic book industry?

Bob Layton: It has to be Valiant. It came form nothing and I worked so hard there too; I put myself in hospital twice because of exhaustion. I was working 17 hours a day, seven days a week because I had a vision of what Valiant could become. And it did, it became the third largest company and, even now, we still keep in contact with each other.

We looked after each other, we were like a family. We would have editorial meeting and include everyone, people in accounting, the secretarial staff, they could all talk about the books and what they thought of them. It was an open forum. I used to hold workshops and bring in people like Barry Windsor-Smith or Dick Giordano and teach classes every Wednesday after work; I could teach them how to balance a checkbook because many of them were straight out of college. We used to take vacations together; whole groups of us would run off to Puerto Rico or something.

But we worked very hard too because we all had the same goal in mind. So, as far as accomplishments go, it just didn’t get any better than Valiant. I can be a hard-nosed SOB, but they put up with it. And most of the people who started with Valiant today are still working in the industry. That’s something to be proud of too. The legacy is being kept alive.

I have two major legacies in my career, Iron Man and Valiant.

For more on Bob Layton, visit http://www.boblayton.com/

For more details on the International Comic Expo (ICE), visit www. internationlcomicexpo.wordpress.com

Words by Ed King / Pics by Jonx Pillemer

Nicky Schrire plays at Cherry Reds, John Bright Street, on Sunday 14^th June – as presented by Best Seat Sessions. For direct gig & venue info, visit http://www.cherryreds.com/events.html

“It’s all very new for me. It’s a different community, a different group of musicians, and also different audiences. I’m excited. I’m just rolling with it.”

Nicky Schrire is no stranger to the stage, but her two album portfolio represents a lineage of Jazz schooling, composition and performance. An Education EP however, Schrire’s latest notch on the sound desk – released on 15^th June through Wild Sound Recordings (and being showcased at Cherry Reds the night before) is not Jazz. It’s Folk, with a traditional tint. And an endeavour of pure storytelling over the sound of six stings and four.

“I appreciate people recognising the lyrics,” explains Schrire, “in the Jazz world there’s a lot of emphasis staked on original music; you have a lot of original instrumental music, and the whole reality of where vocalists sit within Jazz is very… it’s sort of a contentious thing, they’re not at the centre of it. Whereas with a lot of Folk it’s about telling a story, so it’s about words and as a result the singer is important.”

Five tracks of original Folk songs, An Education EP was written whilst Nicky Schrire was back in Cape Town, her home city, after graduating from the Manhattan School of Music. They are stories and they are personal, telling in part, and with tongue often in cheek, of her journey from the classroom to the wider world of creative endeavour.

And featuring her childhood friend and cellist Ariella Caira, who also plays in the prominent South African ‘instrumental Pop group’ Sterling EQ, An Education EP is Nicky Schrire’s first public step away from the international Jazz community that have, to date, been her musical peers.

“I see it (An Education EP) as an extension,” describes Nicky Schrire, “I don’t see it as a finite resting point. Jazz is a difficult genre, very niche, but I was able to find a school that offered a Jazz programme and the opportunity to study it. So that’s what I did. I was never going to become a professional classical musician, I was never going to become a concert pianist, and I love Jazz. But I have now come to the realisation, six years after I left South Africa, that I don’t know if I’m a natural fit.”

And how about her audience; after a series of well received self releases, in an arguable ascent of Jazz standards to original compositions, will they be scared of the jump? “I wrote a lot (in Jazz) but my music was becoming perceivably more and more Folkish,” tells Schrire. “People started comparing me to Folk singers instead of Jazz singers, partly because of what I was writing but also vocally I’m not aligned with Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughn or Carmen McRae.

But so far my experience outside of the Jazz world, and in the Folk world or in the singer/songwriter world, has just been far more positive. The whole environment and the people I’ve met (in the Folk scene) have been incredibly welcoming and generous; they’re less politically inclined, in terms of how they receive people or how they listen to music. That’s why I’m happy to delve further into it and build upon it.”

Nicky Schrire’s sophomore album, Space & Time (2013) – a collection of contemporary and classic tracks, was released whilst she was still considered very much a Jazz artist. However Schrire’s cover of Massive Attack’s ‘Teardrop’ could be a page ripped from the Tori Amos handbook; whilst including a beautiful Jazz  piano solo, the homage is delivered with an inescapable Folk narrative.

Schrire’s subsequent To the Spring EP (2014) evolved the shift. The opening track, ‘Traveler’, is a laconic rib tickle at life, and partnerships, on the road – set to a melodic and accessible piano, but with the narrative, and vocals, as the song’s unapologetic lead. And aside from the occasional 60 second noodle, the rest of the EP seems to sit somewhere between the two genres – as if Marlene is sitting on her wall, after being dropped off by the big yellow taxi she caught in Berkley Square.

“I left New York in April 2014 and bought the guitar as I left,” explains Nicky Schrire – talking about the change from keys to string that also underpins her latest EP. “Then I went back to Cape Town and wanted to use it as a different writing tool, because I always wrote on piano.” With every previous release featuring Nicky Schrire on piano, what compelled such a baptism of fire? “I didn’t play (the guitar) and I was interested in writing with an instrument and not being as concerned about if what I was doing was technically right or wrong – as long as I didn’t hurt my hand or wrist, or develop any nasty habits.

I had one lesson with a friend and asked them to let me know if I was doing anything with my posture that would cause me problems down the line, and otherwise I didn’t want to know. And it worked as writing tool; it helped me to focus just on that fact that, you know, a song has a beginning, middle and an end. It simplified my thought process. Plus I love the mobility of the guitar. It’s much easier to find a place to play.”

And with an international tour to promote An Education EP, taking Nicky Schrire across the UK and back to Cape Town, it’s easy to see the lure of less baggage. But there’s also less to hide behind, with the first two UK dates being just ‘girl & guitar’ performances; the very first solo endeavour at Cherry Reds, John Bright Street, on Sunday 14^th June.

“They’re also totally acoustic, which is really cool,” describes Schrire, “I’m feeling excited because it’s the purest form; the whole kind of kernel of the singer/songwriter Folk music. I often get stressed out over amplification, the placing of the microphone; it’s incredibly liberating to just take a guitar on a train, get off, and just play and sing out.

I like the intimacy as well; it’s definitely suited to the music and it’s a fun context in which to share (music) with people. So I’m looking forward to it, but perhaps ignorance is bliss.”

Nicky Schrire releases An Education EP through Wild Sound Recordings on Monday 15^th June. For more on Nicky Schrire, including online purchase points, visit http://www.nickyschrire.com/

Nicky Schrire plays at Cherry Reds, John Bright Street, on Sunday 14^th June – as presented by Best Seat Sessions. For direct gig & venue info, visit http://www.cherryreds.com/events.html

For more on Wild Sound Recordings, visit http://www.wildsoundrecordings.com/

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For more from Cherry Reds, including both the York Road & John Bright Street venues, visit http://www.cherryreds.com/

For more on Best Seat Sessions, visit https://www.facebook.com/bestseatsession

Above pic by Imogen Frost / Below words & pics by Ed King

“Vodka bottles and cupcakes; one symbolises what people think you are, and one symbolises what you really are.”

Kirstin Barnes explains the ‘girl next door’, a persona she felt when “I was leaving a school and everyone was expecting this that and the other from me,” and one of the four characters in her new project, StereoMe. 

“When I started (StereoMe) I wanted to look at the different stereotypes that women fall under,” tells Barnes, talking to me at the end of TwoReflecT’s opening night at Vivid Projects, “especially through dating games such as LovePlus, where you ‘groom’ a girlfriend. The premise of the project was to look at how people can now go ’OK, I don’t want to have a real girlfriend; life would be easier if I had a computerised girlfriend. And now I can choose her.’” 

StereoMe invites its audience to do just that, asking you to choose one of four Kirstin Barnes characters from a mobile phone touch screen – with the selected persona then projected onto the walls of a secluded room.

Three of the characters are personifications of stereotypes, identities Barnes has felt both herself and women have been surmised by: the good time girl, the career girl, the girl next door. The fourth option is ‘me’, a character based on her current and self perception. Once chosen each character evolves a story, with Kirstin Barnes featuring in series of static poses amidst further audio and imagery – reaching out to the audience through soundscapes and 3D mapping.

“I was looking at Japanese dating games,” explains Barnes, “and the fact that pregnancy levels have dropped (after the release of LovePlus) to the point that it’s now considered a national problem. Most of the characters you can choose are in school uniform and aged between 14-17, so now you’ve got 60 year old men in ‘relationships’ with a digital schoolgirl. From that I began to look at how people can choose a stereotype.”

One ‘gamer’, known by the username Sal9000, even married his LovePlus digital partner in 2009. And if you need further reference points to this relationship dystopia, beyond the snowballing world of virtual reality Vs insanity, Google ‘man marries’ and see what comes up. But are these not isolated instances, albeit abhorrent and headline worthy, and just an unfortunate manifestation of modernity?

“I started with Darwin’s theory that men will look at a women as a fertility object,” continues Barnes, giving further background to StereoMe. “It may not be their intention to do so, but they (men) ask is she young, is she nubile, has she got child bearing hips, is she going to be a potential mother? 

And now we have all the social stereotypes. So the ‘girl next door’ is more likely to make a great mother, whereas the ‘good time girl’, the same woman – fitting under a different stereotype because of the way she’s been socially viewed, might get put on the sideline as a potential mating partner.”

The content of StereoMe is a clear challenge to one of the biggest divides in gender politics, perception. But the narrative remains just as clearly personal; Barnes proffers candid snapshots of her own life to illustrate her point. Every character seems to carry a double edged sword too, outside the confident imagery of ‘me’, as the surface perception masks both the woman and potential turmoil underneath.

“And now we go to ‘good time girl’,” introduces Kirstin Barnes with a slight laugh. “This is the girl that’s at every party, is seen everywhere, seems to be having a wonderfully fun time but actually, I was ready to implode.” The jumps from first to third person continue to pepper our conversation. “That’s why there’s little fire balls; it’s like a time bomb ready to go off. Although there’s this fun exterior inside I’m probably my most miserable.”

“And this is when I did what everyone wanted me to do and got a proper job,” describes Barnes as we select ‘career girl’ from the handset, “I earned loads of money and was really not happy. That was also the main time in my life where I wanted children, but because my boyfriend earned lots of money and saw me as a money earner too, I wasn’t seen as a potential mother.”

As we run though all the characters, StereoMe begins to feel more cathartic – a way, perhaps, of Kirstin Barnes owning something that once owned her. Reassuringly the ‘me’ character is by far the strongest, where hearts symbolise finding love in oneself and another. But whilst StereoMe is rooted in a much bigger debate, its immediate power comes from the inescapable self analysis. Is it hard to be so candid, to put a life so literally on display?

“I think it’s actually just the easiest way for me,” admits Kirstin Barnes, “I think my art is my own therapy. It’s my way of going through stuff and saying ‘oh, this is why I did this, this is why I’ve done that, and this is why I’m here now’. A lot of my stuff is more personal and confessional.

And I put myself forward as the stereotypes because by putting someone else in that shoe box I would be stereotyping too; I would be picking someone out and going, ‘you’d fit just perfectly as the ‘good time girl’’, ‘you look like you could run an office’ or ‘you look like you’ve wanted kids for years’. If I did that I’d be just doing what everyone else is doing.”

The gallery has shut, TworeflecT‘s opening night being a two hour window and the start of a three day run. I still need a picture to run alongside the interview, and with gun-to-a-knife-fight embarrassment all my (writer’s) pics are “horrible, you can get better. Higher up, no chin please.”

Mercifully, for all involved, Imogen Frost eventually takes the camera and responsibility of representation out of my hands. As something usable gets taken, I ask why, especially after baring so much soul in her exhibition, Kirstin Barnes can still be self conscious whilst having her picture taken.

“Of course I’m still self conscious,” she responds with another laugh, “I’m still human.” And there was me thinking an ‘artist girl’ wouldn’t be camera shy.

StereoMe features as part of the TwoReflecT exhibition, alongside work from Imogen Frost. TwoReflect runs at Vivid Projects in Minerva Works/Warwick Bar, on Fazeley Street (Digbeth) until 2^nd Jun – open between 12noon-5pm.

For further info on TwoReflect, visit https://www.facebook.com/events/765696583538472/

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For more on Kirstin Barnes, visit http://www.kirstinbarnesphotography.com/

For more on Imogen Frost, visit http://imogenfrost.com/

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For more on Vivid Projects, visit http://www.vividprojects.org.uk/