Just a little behind-the-scenes with Sparky Schulz. (I keep wanting to add a "t" to that last name, and I'm kind of amazed that everyone pronounces the name as if it were there. Ah, German.) Interesting that while the Peanuts characters could express themselves with the erudition of a college graduate--something Schulz pioneered in the comics--they were still very much drawn as children in terms of shape and dimension.
I don't know if he had a barber father like Charlie Brown did but he looks it.
2 comments:
This is a sweet little video of a genius at work. Any number of people have noted that Charles Schulz wasn't a gifted artist, but what he did so well went far beyond excellence as an illustrator. His drawings are his signature and his characters are full of contradictions, with their own internal conflicts. He introduced emotions to the comics - tenderness, melancholy, isolation, frustration, joy, and fury - and that wasn't just Snoopy.
Thanks for finding this one.
It was a process with him. He started off with a strip called Li'l Folks, which had a number of the elements he'd be known for later, including a boy who loved Beethoven. Then in 1950 he started Peanuts proper, although he didn't like the title. A couple of years into that is when things really started to click, with him developing the characters more. As you say, there's more going on with them than is immediately obvious on the surface, and yet he makes you see it.
I was happy to find it and to share it.
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