Speaker 1: Talk about a way to escape reality for a while.
Speaker 1: The annual comic convention offered plenty of out of this
Speaker 1: world excitement, including far out comic books, souvenirs, and even
Speaker 1: futuristic looking Star Wars computer game.
Speaker 2: Pretty much happened.
Speaker 1: Many were there just to expand their comic book collections,
Speaker 1: while others were there just to gaze at the galaxy
Speaker 1: of characters on hand.
Speaker 3: Welcome to this special San Diego Comic Con episode of
Speaker 3: Amusing Jews, where we celebrate Jewish contributors and contributions to
Speaker 3: American popular culture. With a comic con quickly approaching, it's
Speaker 3: a great time to explore its origins, which happened to
Speaker 3: be pretty Jewish. I'm Jonathan Friedman and I'm Joey Angelfield.
Speaker 3: Producer engineer Mike Tomren is working somewhere behind the scenes
Speaker 3: Amusing Jews as a project of a Dot Kavareem Congregation
Speaker 3: for Humanistic the Jewish Museum of the American West, and
Speaker 3: Atheist United Studios.
Speaker 4: We're excited to talk with Matthew Klickstein, a pop culture
Speaker 4: historian and author of See You at San Diego, An
Speaker 4: Oral History of Comic Con Fandom and the Triumph of
Speaker 4: geek Culture, and Gus Krueger, an art director and designer
Speaker 4: for the theme park industry and son of Comic Con
Speaker 4: co founder Ken Krueger. Matthew and Gus, Welcome to Amusing Jews.
Speaker 2: Thank you forrapping. Well, it's great to be here.
Speaker 4: So I understand that you guys are doing an oral
Speaker 4: history of the San Diego Comic Con on July twenty third.
Speaker 2: What's that all about?
Speaker 5: So, of course we've already actually done the oral history
Speaker 5: now twice. We did a podcast series for Sirius XM,
Speaker 5: although they partnered with us to produce it, and they
Speaker 5: were great and really helping it to become a very
Speaker 5: substantive I don't even really like to call it a podcast.
Speaker 5: It's more of an audio docu series called Comic Con Begins.
Speaker 5: It's available everywhere for free, so whether people are listening
Speaker 5: to it on Spotify or anywhere else, they can listen
Speaker 5: to it there. We did that in twenty twenty and
Speaker 5: then we adapted that into this huge encyclopedic five hundred
Speaker 5: page book called See You at San Diego that Fanographics
Speaker 5: put out in twenty twenty two. So we've done the
Speaker 5: oral history now twice. We've also done a few other
Speaker 5: smaller projects, and we're looking also into developing a documentary
Speaker 5: that we've been putting together for the last couple of
Speaker 5: years as well. And with all that in mind, we
Speaker 5: thought it would be great to do an actual live event.
Speaker 2: Again.
Speaker 5: We've done similar live events before in other places, but
Speaker 5: we've never actually done one at Comic Con proper, and
Speaker 5: we just felt it was time to.
Speaker 2: Really make that happen.
Speaker 5: And Gus, who's the son of Ken Kruger, one of
Speaker 5: the co founders of Comic Con, as you noted in
Speaker 5: the introduction, is generous enough to come and join us,
Speaker 5: and we have about six or seven other what we
Speaker 5: like to call comic con ogs, people who either also
Speaker 5: like Ken, helped to create comic Con, but also a
Speaker 5: few other people who were just there in the early
Speaker 5: days who helped to kind of shape it into it's
Speaker 5: hard to say what it is today, but definitely the
Speaker 5: original spirit of Comic Con went back when it was
Speaker 5: a little smaller, a little more intimate, and there's no
Speaker 5: question that they are all in their own ways, kind
Speaker 5: of creators of what became Comic Con. And we'll be
Speaker 5: there at the panel and we'll just talk about the
Speaker 5: old days of comic Con. People can tell stories, Audience
Speaker 5: members are encouraged to ask questions, and yeah, it's going
Speaker 5: to be great. It's free, it's open to the public.
Speaker 5: You do not need a badge to go to it.
Speaker 5: We are off site. It's going to be about five
Speaker 5: minute walk away from the convention center in the gas
Speaker 5: Lamp district. For people who go to Comicon regularly and
Speaker 5: noticing Diego, they know it's right there. It's basically a
Speaker 5: block away and we're really excited about We're doing it
Speaker 5: at a place called Bards and Carts, and we're doing
Speaker 5: it on Thursday, July twenty third, from two pm to
Speaker 5: three pm.
Speaker 3: That's such a short timeframe.
Speaker 5: In all fairness, they're actually giving us an hour and
Speaker 5: a half. And if you can believe it, a lot
Speaker 5: of the Comic Con og speak even more than I do,
Speaker 5: so I wouldn't be surprised if we go a little
Speaker 5: bit longer. But that's the time that we've kind of
Speaker 5: put aside to do it because and this is something
Speaker 5: we could talk about a little bit more and people
Speaker 5: go to comic Con. No, there's so much that's happening
Speaker 5: at Comic Con. All the time I'm literally going to
Speaker 5: be coming from a signing. We have a couple of
Speaker 5: people on our panel who have to leave, like right
Speaker 5: away because they've got another panel. One thing that you know,
Speaker 5: some people have some issues about what Comic CON's would
Speaker 5: come today, just how big, how loud, how overstimulating, how overwhelming,
Speaker 5: and in some ways, you know, very very commercial, and
Speaker 5: that kind of thing. But one thing that hasn't changed
Speaker 5: is there's so many different cultures and passions that are represented,
Speaker 5: and there's a lot to do. So yeah, you know,
Speaker 5: it'd be great to do something for five or six hours,
Speaker 5: but the reality is there's so many.
Speaker 2: Other things going on.
Speaker 5: And one other thing I do have to say, just
Speaker 5: because it's so important anyone else who's tried to do
Speaker 5: something like this, we are extremely lucky and grateful to
Speaker 5: Bards and Cards that they're letting us do this at all,
Speaker 5: even for an hour hour and a half. I'm not
Speaker 5: exaggerating when I say that all the other venues that
Speaker 5: I was calling that were a bit bigger or more
Speaker 5: public or that kind of thing. I one of them
Speaker 5: asked for one hundred thousand dollars, another asked for fifty
Speaker 5: thousand dollars. Even the public library nearby wanted to do this,
Speaker 5: but they just with budget cuts, they really had to charge.
Speaker 5: It would have been probably at least ten thousand dollars
Speaker 5: for an hour or two, because these are places that
Speaker 5: are used to opening up space for activations and things
Speaker 5: for Marvel, for Universal, for these companies that have, you know,
Speaker 5: millions and millions of dollars to blow on stuff like that.
Speaker 5: So yeah, yeah, an hour might not seem like that long.
Speaker 5: But boy, I'm just grateful that we even get it
Speaker 5: at all, and that we got it for free because
Speaker 5: none of us have any money, so we wouldn't have
Speaker 5: been able to pay a hundred thousand dollars for it.
Speaker 3: And Gus, you were there at the beginning with your dad,
Speaker 3: how do you feel about the way that it's become
Speaker 3: so commercial and so difficult to book these things. I
Speaker 3: think in the old days it would have been a
Speaker 3: lot easier to have a panel like this.
Speaker 6: Yeah, it's funny because my first comic con I was
Speaker 6: literally a baby. So my first comic con was nineteen
Speaker 6: seventy three, and I'm just a baby. My dad here's
Speaker 6: the first chairman of comic con, so he kind of
Speaker 6: was the guy that helped facilitate all that, but he
Speaker 6: also sold at the show. He was more of a
Speaker 6: bookseller than that a comic person, but he had a
Speaker 6: shop that sold comics. And it's all in the book.
Speaker 6: I'm sure they'll cover it.
Speaker 2: Including pictures of baby guests. They are also.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, So it's it's funny because so many of
Speaker 6: my stories were just like, I'm just a little kid
Speaker 6: watching people do stuff.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 6: So I think comic con has grown bigger because the
Speaker 6: acceptance of pop culture has grown bigger. And it's not yes,
Speaker 6: in anything that grows bigger, there's corporations that want to
Speaker 6: make money on it, and that's the bottom line. These
Speaker 6: people are all there because the companies you know, are
Speaker 6: doing that. So for me, I think it's a natural
Speaker 6: progression of what it was. Unfortunately, I think because of that,
Speaker 6: there are certain aspects of what it was that.
Speaker 2: You know, it used to just be like, you know,
Speaker 2: it was a lot.
Speaker 6: Easier for people to just go and hang out with
Speaker 6: their friends and sit in the corner and like rummage
Speaker 6: through long comic boxes and just spend hours doing that.
Speaker 6: And now you spend hours trying to find a place
Speaker 6: with long comic boxes at the show. To be honest,
Speaker 6: it's it's it's a different thing, but I still go
Speaker 6: and I still like it. Although I will it is
Speaker 6: a very different experience, and I think that I'm just
Speaker 6: sort of very accepting of change in the way it is,
Speaker 6: so instead of bemoaning what it's not, I kind of
Speaker 6: just appreciate what it is having grown up around it.
Speaker 6: I just love going to San Diego. It's a great
Speaker 6: excuse every year to go to San Diego and sort
Speaker 6: of relive the feelings I had as a kid going
Speaker 6: to that and being able to go with my dad.
Speaker 6: Unfortunately he's no longer with us, but just going makes
Speaker 6: me feel closer to him and to the event. So
Speaker 6: it's it's you know, it's it's hot and cold the
Speaker 6: way I feel on it. But at the end of
Speaker 6: the day, I couldn't imagine missing it. I just could not.
Speaker 6: I've been able to unfortunate enough to take my kids
Speaker 6: now they're fourteen and eleven, and I think they've maybe
Speaker 6: missed two cons their entire life, Like I've been able
Speaker 6: to take them and bring them up in this, so
Speaker 6: their oppression. What Comic On has become is going to
Speaker 6: be totally different than what mine is. Yeah, I'm very
Speaker 6: zen about it, but I do realize that for a
Speaker 6: lot of people, it's a lot. Man, it's a lot
Speaker 6: enjoining the show, click like and subscribe.
Speaker 3: I know that. Unfortunately in Matthew you might talk about this,
Speaker 3: but the comic on itself isn't necessarily interested in its
Speaker 3: own history. So gus, do you get like a free
Speaker 3: pass or do you have to sign up like everybody else?
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 6: I'm fortunate enough to have been through my father, I
Speaker 6: was able to get into one of their gold badges,
Speaker 6: is what they call it. But I do have that,
Speaker 6: so I'm able to take care of myself and my family.
Speaker 6: So I don't have that, but I have the same issues,
Speaker 6: Like I have to worry about my hotel. I'm on
Speaker 6: my own. Like the only thing I don't have to
Speaker 6: worry about is actually getting into the show because I'm
Speaker 6: a they call it is always approved professional. That's their
Speaker 6: designation for it, which which is great because I don't
Speaker 6: have to worry about credentials and all.
Speaker 2: Of that stuff.
Speaker 6: But yeah, you know, we're all still in the same fight.
Speaker 6: We've got to get unless we're a guest of a
Speaker 6: certain level. Through the con. We've got to figure out
Speaker 6: our own hotels. We've got to do all this stuff.
Speaker 6: And luckily, I've been fortunate with the Comic Cons hotel
Speaker 6: lottery system, so I've been able to get close. But
Speaker 6: I'm just like everybody else. I'm fighting to get into
Speaker 6: the off sites. I'm fighting to get anything else. But
Speaker 6: you know, there's that one perk, and I'm very grateful
Speaker 6: that I still have that ability to do so.
Speaker 5: Gus makes a good point that there is that perk.
Speaker 5: I was gonna say there are some perts. Really, it
Speaker 5: seems like it's just the one that there is something
Speaker 5: called the gold badge that a few of the old
Speaker 5: timers are able to get, but also some of them don't,
Speaker 5: and it, even to an outsider like myself, sometimes feels
Speaker 5: a little bit arbitrary. And the other aspect of it
Speaker 5: that Gus just brought out is not only true for
Speaker 5: a lot of these people, but anybody, I mean anybody
Speaker 5: will tell you that one of the hardest things about
Speaker 5: going to Comic Con is finding.
Speaker 2: A place to stay.
Speaker 5: Yeah, he's for those who didn't hear it, he used
Speaker 5: the word lottery. I mean, it's not just about paying
Speaker 5: for the rooms, which are extremely expensive because all of
Speaker 5: the hotels and everything in the area, you know, double triple,
Speaker 5: quadruple their costs. But that's true with all the restaurants
Speaker 5: in the area, all the coffee shops. I mean, it's
Speaker 5: like going to you know, Coachella or some other big
Speaker 5: music festival or anything else.
Speaker 2: I mean it's seven.
Speaker 5: Dollars bottles of water and twenty dollars sam which is
Speaker 5: and every place has a specialty menu that they have
Speaker 5: just for Comic Con. And I don't begrudge the businesses.
Speaker 2: I mean, more power to them.
Speaker 5: As we all know, it's difficult to keep independent businesses going,
Speaker 5: and to their credit, a lot of them are. It's
Speaker 5: not just chain restaurants and stuff there. As Gus said,
Speaker 5: one of the great things about going to Comicon is
Speaker 5: San Diego, especially downtown San Diego and Gas Lamp is
Speaker 5: so vibrant and eclectic. There's all different kinds of bars
Speaker 5: and restaurants, and many of them have been there for generations.
Speaker 2: I would say.
Speaker 5: Most of them are independent and our local, so it's
Speaker 5: not just a bunch of you know, Applebee's and things
Speaker 5: like that, which is a great part about going to
Speaker 5: Comic Con. So you know, they're doing what they can
Speaker 5: the same business. I know for a fact that a
Speaker 5: lot of them they make all their money for the year,
Speaker 5: you know, during Comic Con, during COVID, whenever this got
Speaker 5: shut down. It was really hard for the whole downtown area,
Speaker 5: not just because of COVID itself and everything else that
Speaker 5: was going on, but to not have Comic Con for
Speaker 5: a couple of years was devastating to a lot of
Speaker 5: the businesses in that area because that's what keeps them going.
Speaker 5: And I know a lot of them are still playing
Speaker 5: ketchup from that from a few years ago. So it's
Speaker 5: it is difficult that even with a.
Speaker 2: Badge, it's very hard to go to comic Con.
Speaker 4: Reflecting back on something that Gus was saying, and also,
Speaker 4: you know something I saw in the book, which is
Speaker 4: a really you know, wonderful oral history, is some people
Speaker 4: kind of described it as a religious experience and you know,
Speaker 4: wouldn't miss Maybe Matthew you Can started by talking a
Speaker 4: little bit about, you know, the Jewish connection that is
Speaker 4: sort of there in comic Con.
Speaker 5: Well, it was definitely a Jewish connection to Comic Con.
Speaker 5: The most obvious one is that some people didn't particularly
Speaker 5: like him.
Speaker 2: Some people did.
Speaker 5: Like him, shel Dorf, who's considered kind of number one
Speaker 5: founder along with Ken and a few of these other people,
Speaker 5: just because he came from Detroit where they were doing
Speaker 5: something called the Triple Fanfare, and that that really was
Speaker 5: kind of the kernel that became the popcorn of comic Con,
Speaker 5: along with you know, people helping out like Ken and
Speaker 5: Richard alf and people like Scott Sean, a few others
Speaker 5: that are still around, Dave Clark, Roger Freedman and Mike
Speaker 5: Towery and a few of these other people, most of
Speaker 5: whom will be on our panel, by the way. But
Speaker 5: Shell was people would say, kind of like number one
Speaker 5: in his own way. And he was Jewish. He was
Speaker 5: a religious jew. He had a religious funeral, They put
Speaker 5: the pebbles on the tombstone, the whole deal. He was
Speaker 5: going to synagogue at the end of his life, from
Speaker 5: what I understand, and no, Gus, you might know better
Speaker 5: than I, but I understand he kind of stepped in
Speaker 5: and out. But by the end of his life he
Speaker 5: definitely was very religious, and you know, so there's that
Speaker 5: Jewish connection also kind of spiritually and on kind of
Speaker 5: the celebrity side at least in the early days. A
Speaker 5: lot of people would say that there were probably three
Speaker 5: visionaries in the industry so to speak, who really helped
Speaker 5: to support and inspire comic Con at the very beginning,
Speaker 5: and that was Jack Kirby, Ray Bradberry, and Forrest Ackerman.
Speaker 5: And those three, Jack Kirby and Forrest Ackerman were Jewish
Speaker 5: and particularly Jewish. It's one of the things that you know,
Speaker 5: is really strong about Jack Kirby's legacy is his connection
Speaker 5: to Jewish culture and everything else, and of course his
Speaker 5: connection to another very prominent Jew in the community, Stan Lee.
Speaker 5: Although Ray Bradbury was not Jewish, he's, like Gush and
Speaker 5: some of these other folks, kind of an honorary jew
Speaker 5: just because so many of his friends growing up were
Speaker 5: Jewish and he was very close with people like Forie
Speaker 5: Ackerman and many of these others. So, yeah, there was
Speaker 5: always a lot of Jewish culture in comic con, not
Speaker 5: to mention just the staples that really helped to create
Speaker 5: the pop culture machine of comic Con early on, all Jewish,
Speaker 5: Rod Serling for Twilight Zone again, Kirby and stan Lee,
Speaker 5: obviously the Superman Boys, Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster.
Speaker 2: You know all these various people.
Speaker 5: I mean, comics itself really came out of you know,
Speaker 5: Italian and Jewish young boys and a few gals in
Speaker 5: New York and certain places the Midwest. But there's a
Speaker 5: lot of Jewish heritage there as well as the science
Speaker 5: fiction world and the pop culture world that really helped
Speaker 5: us spawn the fandom that drove comic Con and that
Speaker 5: propelled it. And so yeah, there's a lot of Jewish
Speaker 5: DNA in comic Con and in fandom writ large, and
Speaker 5: in pop culture at large. And I think it's important
Speaker 5: that we don't forget that, and we support and acknowledge
Speaker 5: and recognize that as well.
Speaker 3: Yeah, two people who are featured very prominently in the
Speaker 3: oral history that come to mind of Jewish persuasion are
Speaker 3: Trina Robbins and Lloyd Kaufman. And certainly when I was
Speaker 3: younger and the comic Con was different back in the
Speaker 3: early nineties, the Lloyd Kaufman table was the place to go.
Speaker 3: You know, that was kind of the centerpiece of the
Speaker 3: whole event for me. I don't know if it still
Speaker 3: has that place. I know he still goes there. Is
Speaker 3: what's the vibe around Lloyd Kaufman at comic Con these days.
Speaker 5: Lloyd is a very emblematic of some of the changes
Speaker 5: that we've been talking about and that we discuss a
Speaker 5: lot in the podcast, in the book, that we'll talk
Speaker 5: about in the panel. Again, I try to be very
Speaker 5: diplomatic about the way that I talk about this, but
Speaker 5: the reality is that anybody could say, you know, comic
Speaker 5: Con started with one hundred people, then three hundred people,
Speaker 5: then thousands of people, and now it's hundreds of thousands
Speaker 5: of people. It brings in more revenue every year than
Speaker 5: the Super Bowl as far as advertising and that kind
Speaker 5: of thing is concerned. So it's of course a very
Speaker 5: different beast than it was back in the day. And
Speaker 5: as Gus said, he's right, Look, there's gonna be changes
Speaker 5: that are going to happen, whether we like it or not.
Speaker 2: We can't not do that.
Speaker 5: I mean, they can't hold comic Con at you know,
Speaker 5: a little hotel basement again anymore.
Speaker 2: It's not gonna work, obviously.
Speaker 5: So there have been a lot of changes that happen,
Speaker 5: and part of that is people like Lloyd Kaufman, who
Speaker 5: was really an early adopt you know, adapter to comic
Speaker 5: Con back when the Film Studios didn't come back when
Speaker 5: there really wasn't a lot of Hollywood or film, even
Speaker 5: in dependent film like lloyd presence and represent representation there.
Speaker 5: It is a misconception for people who think that Comic
Speaker 5: Con used to just be about comic books, and hey,
Speaker 5: it used to be about comic books. Why isn't about
Speaker 5: comic books anymore? Well, from day one, it was always
Speaker 5: about everything, and that's really important to remember. Gus said,
Speaker 5: his first comic Con was in nineteen seventy three. Comic
Speaker 5: Con started in nineteen seventy. By seventy three, there already
Speaker 5: was special areas just for Star Trek, for example. There's
Speaker 5: science fiction, there's King Kong, there's Universal Monster movies, there's animation,
Speaker 5: Chuck Jones, June Foray, Bob Clampett. You know, it was
Speaker 5: always about all these different kinds of things. But you know,
Speaker 5: the film studios didn't have the same kind of representation
Speaker 5: that they have there now or what some people would say,
Speaker 5: somewhat rightly so kind of dominating the comic con in.
Speaker 2: The way that they have over the last few years.
Speaker 5: Lloyd was kind of this early guy to come in
Speaker 5: with Trauma Films, Trauma Studios, Troma entertainment, and so it
Speaker 5: was really exciting for people to have, Hey, now there's
Speaker 5: you know, more movie people coming and that kind of thing.
Speaker 5: So he was a bit of a godhead at comic Con,
Speaker 5: you know, in the in the early eighties and that
Speaker 5: kind of thing. It was very exciting for him. And
Speaker 5: as he put it, you know, every year they kind
Speaker 5: of pushed his table back and back and back and back.
Speaker 2: And now, you know, when he.
Speaker 5: Does his panel about trauma, it's Saturday night, which anybody
Speaker 5: who knows the comic con cycles is not really a
Speaker 5: great time. A lot of people are already going home,
Speaker 5: a lot of people are burned out from doing it
Speaker 5: for a few days, a lot of people are are
Speaker 5: at parties and things like that. Saturday night is kind
Speaker 5: of a booby prize night. And I've been to the panel.
Speaker 5: I've been on the trauma panel. Yeah, you're lucky to
Speaker 5: have you know, maybe fifty people come, and it used
Speaker 5: to be maybe five hundred people would come. The point though,
Speaker 5: that Lloyd makes that I think is important not just
Speaker 5: for trauma but for that kind of thing, is those
Speaker 5: fifty people who come really love trauma. So it might
Speaker 5: not be the quantity, but it's the quality. So he's
Speaker 5: still grateful that he gets to go to Comic Con
Speaker 5: every year. But yeah, he's got a tiny little booth
Speaker 5: that's hard to even get into, that's called sort of
Speaker 5: smoshed into this area with a bunch of other horror
Speaker 5: film stuff and whatnot. And he used to have much
Speaker 5: grander representation there, and you know, he's one of the
Speaker 5: people who's kind of gotten shoved a little bit to
Speaker 5: the side, but he still goes and he still gets
Speaker 5: to do his panel, and there are people like yourself,
Speaker 5: Jonathan and others who go to see Lloyd. There's always
Speaker 5: a long line, so the people who want to be
Speaker 5: there for Lloyd and trauma are there, and he definitely
Speaker 5: gets the love there. It's just kind of in a
Speaker 5: little tiny corner now where it used to be a
Speaker 5: much broader space that's now been taken over by you know,
Speaker 5: Disney and Universal and everything else and you know, Netflix
Speaker 5: and whatnot.
Speaker 2: You know, what can you do Amazon?
Speaker 3: Well, as it happens, producer engineer Mike Tomarin and I
Speaker 3: were there. We saw a preview showing of Sergeant Kaboogie
Speaker 3: Man NYPD and that was a very kind of seminal
Speaker 3: Comic Con experience for me.
Speaker 5: They did allow Lloyd to be part of the Toxic
Speaker 5: Avenger remake pan that was in HALLH where for people
Speaker 5: who don't know Comic Con, that's where like the big
Speaker 5: events happen, where you have your Robert Downey juniors and
Speaker 5: your James Guns and such, and it is very overwhelming.
Speaker 2: It's huge.
Speaker 5: There's metal detectors outside, there's lines that go for three
Speaker 5: or four hours just on that one day, let alone
Speaker 5: other times and whatnot. It's like the big arena. It's
Speaker 5: called HALLH in part because it's Hollywood. And so Lloyd's
Speaker 5: up there on the panel with Peter Dinklice and with
Speaker 5: Elijah Wood and Kevin Bacon and writer director Macon Blair.
Speaker 5: He's on the jumbo tron and the whole thing. And
Speaker 5: as somebody who's worked with Lloyd and loves him and
Speaker 5: knows him and grew up on trauma and has worked
Speaker 5: with Lloyd and Trauma for the last twenty plus years,
Speaker 5: it was really touching to see that. And you could
Speaker 5: tell from his face and just I know him that
Speaker 5: he was really honored to be able to be part
Speaker 5: of that, and even if anything, actually a little overwhelmed
Speaker 5: because it is very overwhelming, So Comic Con did at
Speaker 5: least respect him in that regard, although I will say
Speaker 5: I think that had a lot more to do with
Speaker 5: the fact that it was legendary pictures that make all
Speaker 5: those big movies and Godzilla and everything less than that
Speaker 5: it was a remake of.
Speaker 2: A trauma movie.
Speaker 5: But still, that was really cool to see that and
Speaker 5: that Lloyd got to have that experience at comic Con.
Speaker 4: Gus, do you think growing up around the early days
Speaker 4: of the comic con and that creative energy might have
Speaker 4: led you to the career that you're in now.
Speaker 6: I came to my career the weirdest way possible. I
Speaker 6: just sort of I was studying like TV video. I
Speaker 6: kind of started working at not as a scary farm
Speaker 6: as a monster because it was a fun gig for
Speaker 6: a bit, and I just sort of it kept going
Speaker 6: and kept going. And now I'm I'm so lucky to
Speaker 6: be able to create things that literally my job is
Speaker 6: to make things to make people have a good time,
Speaker 6: and that's crazy, like, and I think, really, I'm so
Speaker 6: fortunate to have had the family I had with my dad. Obviously,
Speaker 6: not only just comic Con. He was a member of
Speaker 6: first fandom in like the thirties, you know, he was.
Speaker 6: His history in just sci fi and books and even
Speaker 6: fanzines and just book selling is sort of what gave
Speaker 6: him all of that cred and just experience to be
Speaker 6: able to help these kids with this crazy idea of
Speaker 6: a convention make that a reality. So yeah, well, growing up,
Speaker 6: I mean a lot of people get to they go
Speaker 6: to comic con and it's just this crazy big thing.
Speaker 6: And yes, I've seen it. I was with it from
Speaker 6: my infancy. I watched it from its infancy. As I've
Speaker 6: grown up in old it's certainly doing probably better in
Speaker 6: its old age.
Speaker 2: Than I am.
Speaker 6: But one of the things that people usually think, like, oh,
Speaker 6: isn't it strange to be around all these people? To me,
Speaker 6: it's perfectly normal. Strange as normal, creative is normal. I
Speaker 6: read more comic books than anyone I knew, because growing
Speaker 6: up my dad wasn't even a big comic guy, but
Speaker 6: he did have a comic store when I was in
Speaker 6: He went from having a bookstore that sold comics to
Speaker 6: just having a comic store while I was in high school,
Speaker 6: and I would ride my bike there every day after
Speaker 6: after school to go help my mom, which was really
Speaker 6: meant that I would go there and I would just
Speaker 6: read every comic I could, So I would be reading
Speaker 6: like five or ten comics a day for my entire
Speaker 6: like years. So I think it really just opened me
Speaker 6: up to always looking at things in a fantastical sense,
Speaker 6: in a creative sense, and I just love creating, and
Speaker 6: I don't always want to look at things the same
Speaker 6: way as everybody else does. It's just I think if
Speaker 6: I just did normal stuff all the time, I'd be
Speaker 6: so bored. I would be so bored because I'm just
Speaker 6: so used to being surrounded by artists and creatives and
Speaker 6: weirdos that I just that's home. It's home for me.
Speaker 6: So maybe I'm I. You know, my coworkers don't really
Speaker 6: appreciate my silliness as much, but I have a great time.
Speaker 6: But that said, I was able to just take all
Speaker 6: of that and everything I did, I tried to always create.
Speaker 6: You know, when I was doing like student films, I
Speaker 6: was just creating. I just always wanted to find a
Speaker 6: way to be expressive and make something fun and make
Speaker 6: something that literally this sounds hokey, but I just love
Speaker 6: making things that make people smile. I like to see
Speaker 6: people have a good time, and knowing that somebody had
Speaker 6: a good time because of something I created is amazing.
Speaker 6: Like that's the best thing ever. And the fact that
Speaker 6: I've been so lucky is to be able to make
Speaker 6: a career of it. I can't even speak to that,
Speaker 6: but yeah, it's just I mean, if you read every
Speaker 6: single thing that comes out, just you just kind of
Speaker 6: There's actually a comic character that, like Keep the Flaming Carrot,
Speaker 6: he got brain damage because he read too many comics
Speaker 6: as a kid, And I feel like that's sort of
Speaker 6: that was my path. Like I'm not shooting criminals or
Speaker 6: wearing a big carrot on my head, but I mean,
Speaker 6: given the right circumstances, I probably wouldn't be a verse
Speaker 6: to either. But but yeah, just growing up in that environment,
Speaker 6: seeing that this is such a great outlet and it's
Speaker 6: it is for it's for everyone, but it really is
Speaker 6: for the weirdos because so many of us that see
Speaker 6: things a little differently. There's there's something in fandom to
Speaker 6: find a home in and early years of comic Con
Speaker 6: that's so.
Speaker 2: Much what it was.
Speaker 6: There's a community, there is a brotherhood for people who
Speaker 6: saw things differently. Now it is more culturally acceptable to
Speaker 6: see things differently. Now we see everything differently, and now
Speaker 6: we fight about it, which is so much worse than
Speaker 6: But that's a whole other podcast. Being exposed to all
Speaker 6: of that and seeing that people were able to create
Speaker 6: and just come up with these things like literally like
Speaker 6: I'm I'm there. I think my dad published a comic
Speaker 6: that Scott Shaw.
Speaker 2: Grew about a turd.
Speaker 6: And that's what I'm reading.
Speaker 2: At like eight.
Speaker 6: So everything's normal, Everything's fine, there's no no weird thing.
Speaker 6: I'm just like, yeah, that's normal. Oh look dad made
Speaker 6: the comic. At the last page, they're sad as butthole.
Speaker 6: You know, it's being so exposed to so much and
Speaker 6: such a wide community of people and everybody accepting of
Speaker 6: everybody else. It's just so good for the soul that
Speaker 6: it just opens you up to anything as possible.
Speaker 2: You know. I don't, I don't.
Speaker 6: I don't feel like there's a weird thing if you say,
Speaker 6: like really dark humor like whatever. I don't really find
Speaker 6: I don't have like maybe that's a bad thing, but
Speaker 6: I don't really think like there's too soon. I don't
Speaker 6: think that it's all just comedy and entertainment and finding
Speaker 6: ways to pull people out of the minutia and the
Speaker 6: reality that life can be really hard and then you die. Well,
Speaker 6: let's let's have fun while we're here.
Speaker 3: You bring up something really interesting about even the way
Speaker 3: that fan culture has shifted over the years. I think
Speaker 3: because of the online I know, because of the online
Speaker 3: ecosystems we all inhabit. It is sometimes said that no
Speaker 3: one hates Star Wars more than Star Wars fans, and
Speaker 3: you know, everything is a subject of debate and there's
Speaker 3: that animosity. Does that spill over into the comic con
Speaker 3: these days? Or is it like a safe place, kind
Speaker 3: of a haven, a refuge from all that stuff.
Speaker 6: I think there was more of a schism in the
Speaker 6: Twilight Years, yeah, as in the movie, like, but I
Speaker 6: really think it's sort of now. People are just it's
Speaker 6: so hard to be there. Who has time to fight?
Speaker 6: I think the all of the schisms that comic con
Speaker 6: are like this, this asshole just elbowed me in the nards, right,
Speaker 6: It's or like, wow, take a shower. It's not so
Speaker 6: much like your fandom's the worst, because everybody has an
Speaker 6: embarrassing fandom, and everybody has a mainstream fandom. I think
Speaker 6: from my experience, there are little things, little bits of
Speaker 6: pockets of people who really hate this or really hate that.
Speaker 6: But on the whole, I don't see any of that
Speaker 6: at Comic Con. I really Comic Con and wonder Con.
Speaker 6: They're smaller convention in Anaheim. To an extent, I really
Speaker 6: just see it as a place where people can just
Speaker 6: go and be themselves. And that's what's great about it.
Speaker 6: Even all these years, it was people who felt like
Speaker 6: this is a safe space to be myself. And yeah,
Speaker 6: you could post online that you took a picture with
Speaker 6: a really embarrassing mascot or something, and somebody online is
Speaker 6: going to have something crappy to say in the comments,
Speaker 6: but who cares. That's going to happen all the time.
Speaker 6: But when you're there for so many people, I think
Speaker 6: it just feels like home. And for me it feels
Speaker 6: like home. I wish all those people weren't in my home.
Speaker 6: It kind of gets hard to move, But even in
Speaker 6: that chaos, I'm so.
Speaker 2: Used to it.
Speaker 6: And again, like my like I said, I started, I
Speaker 6: worked as a monster at Not Scary Farm for so
Speaker 6: many years, so I'm used to like darting in and
Speaker 6: out of people, but I'm used to the crowds and
Speaker 6: I kind of have this personal safety net that when
Speaker 6: I'm there, I can handle it. If I'm at Walmart,
Speaker 6: I can't handle that many people, But a comic con,
Speaker 6: I'm sort of like you've stealed up your resolve to
Speaker 6: go there. But yeah, I feel like it's it's a
Speaker 6: safe space for the most part, and any of that
Speaker 6: stuff is just on the periphery. I don't really think
Speaker 6: you'd get the whole Star Trek Star Wars Wars like
Speaker 6: you used to have because I think I mean, honestly,
Speaker 6: for me personally, I'm just exhausted by the fighting that
Speaker 6: happens every day in every aspect of our life. I
Speaker 6: just want to escape into a fandom and have fun.
Speaker 6: And I think for some people that's really just that's
Speaker 6: what this is.
Speaker 3: In Matthew, in your oral history, that's a common theme
Speaker 3: that comes up, especially in the earlier days, as people
Speaker 3: were finding their tribe at the comic con, and that
Speaker 3: was a way to not feel so much of an outcast, right.
Speaker 3: That was like the one time of year that the
Speaker 3: the freaks felt normal.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I was actually gonna say, and Gus, I think
Speaker 5: that the way that you put all that was really poetic,
Speaker 5: and I was kind of sitting there listening and going, Wow,
Speaker 5: there's a Jewish value, and there's a Jewish value, and
Speaker 5: there's a Jewish value just because of the theme of
Speaker 5: the show. I can't help myself but to realize you
Speaker 5: have this aspect of it being very hamish, of it
Speaker 5: being almost have like a sense of being like a.
Speaker 2: Schettle in a way. Particularly Gus's father's store.
Speaker 5: This comes up in the podcast and the book, and
Speaker 5: it's one of the reasons why I always enjoy having
Speaker 5: Gus along for the ride, not just because of who
Speaker 5: his father was, but because of the store itself. I've
Speaker 5: always compared it without ever having been there, and you know,
Speaker 5: I was born away after and whatnot, but from the
Speaker 5: stories people told me, the pictures and everything, it was like,
Speaker 5: there's the CBGB to the punk world, or you know,
Speaker 5: you know wood Stock if you will, or or the
Speaker 5: way that Silicon Valley became a hub for people who
Speaker 5: were interested in early computers. Ken Store, Gust's father's store,
Speaker 5: before there even was comic Con, was in and of
Speaker 5: itself almost kind of a little comic con, a little
Speaker 5: comic con. It wasn't just a store where they were
Speaker 5: selling science fiction books and comic books and things like that.
Speaker 5: They would have people come and talk and they would
Speaker 5: show little little cartoons and the like. It was kind
Speaker 5: of its own little small event space, and it was
Speaker 5: very eclectic. It was like a little art center. Sometimes
Speaker 5: in the back of my mind, I think of it like,
Speaker 5: you know, one of these like kind of nineteen eighties
Speaker 5: teen movies where it's like the rec center for all
Speaker 5: the kids to go to and you know, skateboarding and
Speaker 5: they're smoking outside, and you know, some of them are
Speaker 5: a little bit tougher than the others. But there's also
Speaker 5: the geeks and the nerds and all different kinds of
Speaker 5: people there. And that was the real spirit of Comic Con.
Speaker 5: And let's be honest, there's a real Jewish cultural tradition
Speaker 5: there of tolerance and acceptance and once again of the
Speaker 5: weirdos and the outsiders coming together. We Jews, you know,
Speaker 5: we're we're not called the wandering Jews for a reason.
Speaker 5: You know, there's a good reason that would call that.
Speaker 5: And you know, we had to kind of find our
Speaker 5: tribes and we had to find our way and connect.
Speaker 5: Not to mention that we have a real history of
Speaker 5: you know, no one wants to do entertainment in vaudeville
Speaker 5: and such. Okay, I guess we'll do it because they
Speaker 5: won't let us do anything else. Oh, then that becomes big. No, well,
Speaker 5: we can't go to the country clubs and things during
Speaker 5: the summer. I guess we'll go up to the Catskills
Speaker 5: where no one is.
Speaker 2: Whoops. We turn that into something really cool. We go
Speaker 2: out to Hollywood. Whoops. Now that's the big thing. You know.
Speaker 5: It's like everywhere we go, it's don't you know, no
Speaker 5: one else wants to do it, no one else cares
Speaker 5: about it. We kind of help to really get it going,
Speaker 5: and then it becomes this huge thing. And you know,
Speaker 5: in some way you could say that same thing kind
Speaker 5: of happened, not just with common con but yeah, with fandom.
Speaker 5: You know, Gus was even talking about his father being
Speaker 5: part of first fandom back in the thirties. What's can
Speaker 5: considered really the first convention it was more science fiction
Speaker 5: than com books is World Con in nineteen thirty nine,
Speaker 5: and one of the creators was a guy named Sam
Speaker 5: mouse Gowitz. You know, Hello, so we've always kind of
Speaker 5: been there, even back when No one wanted to be
Speaker 5: a nerd, no one wanted to be a weirdo. No
Speaker 5: one wanted to do these things. You had to hide it.
Speaker 5: You really did get beat up for reading comic books.
Speaker 5: Your teachers would say, oh, you can't read Ray Bradberry,
Speaker 5: you can't write a report about Lord of the Rings.
Speaker 5: That's not literature. These people did it anyway, And then
Speaker 5: now it's everything and there's a certain Jewish thread there,
Speaker 5: if you don't mind my saying, you know, again, more
Speaker 5: culturally than religious and some of these other venues that
Speaker 5: we've been in it. So everything that Gus was just
Speaker 5: talking about that makes comic con comic con.
Speaker 2: Yeah, sorry, I.
Speaker 5: See it as a lot of Jewish values in Jewish
Speaker 5: culture there, and I think that that's really important and
Speaker 5: partly why, you know, I thought it would be appropriate
Speaker 5: to talk about all this on a show that is
Speaker 5: in part talking about Jewish culture and whatnot. And you know,
Speaker 5: it's exciting to see and it is. The nerds got
Speaker 5: their revenge, the weirdos got their revenge, and for many
Speaker 5: of us, that's kind of the story of the Jews. Also,
Speaker 5: we you know, were able to take over and run
Speaker 5: and do all these different things with Hollywood and with
Speaker 5: you know, this, that and the other. And you know
Speaker 5: when people say those kinds of things sometimes it can
Speaker 5: come off as insulting or stereotypical.
Speaker 2: But I'm always like, that's pretty.
Speaker 5: Cool that we were able to do that, you know,
Speaker 5: from nothing, you know, and people didn't like us and
Speaker 5: shoved us away, and like, you know, that's kind of
Speaker 5: neat that we were able to create these empires in
Speaker 5: that regard. That's nothing to be ashamed of or embarrassed by.
Speaker 5: And now we see it in fandom and in comic
Speaker 5: con too. I mean, Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster were kids,
Speaker 5: you know, they created Superman as a protector because they
Speaker 5: themselves felt very you know, oppressed and very small, and they.
Speaker 2: Needed a hero.
Speaker 5: They needed an uber mench to come and save them
Speaker 5: and their community. I mean, that's what so much of
Speaker 5: that's about, and Gus's right, it's bringing everybody together and
Speaker 5: having a place to be safe and inclusive and anybody
Speaker 5: could be anything. And that's been true since day one.
Speaker 5: When you flip through pictures of my book, you see
Speaker 5: all different kinds of people, and we talk about it
Speaker 5: and whether it's LGBT or people from other countries or
Speaker 5: Mexico or different places in Asia or wherever it was.
Speaker 5: Comic Con was one of the first places to really
Speaker 5: promote manga and anime before anyone else even knew what
Speaker 5: that was. And you know artists who are from you know,
Speaker 5: Black communities and Hispanic communities. You know that was there,
Speaker 5: That wasn't They weren't getting on a bandwagon in the nineties.
Speaker 5: They were doing it when no one else was doing it,
Speaker 5: when it was a little dangerous to do it. And
Speaker 5: they came together and said, Hey, we're going to all
Speaker 5: stick together here and make this happen. And we're all
Speaker 5: one in that regard because we love these different fandoms
Speaker 5: and you're creating stuff and I'm creating stuff, and yeah,
Speaker 5: I'm sorry, I see something very Jewish in that aspect.
Speaker 4: Any last things, you guys got to plug about the
Speaker 4: panel and the things going on around the off site
Speaker 4: Comic Gun oral history onto ly twenty third.
Speaker 2: The panels are fun.
Speaker 6: It's funny for me because so many of the I
Speaker 6: don't want to say old timers, but I'm not a
Speaker 6: young person either. I just go there to feel young.
Speaker 6: That's why Matt hangs out with us all because he
Speaker 6: feels young. But no, those guys have some such amazing stories.
Speaker 6: And even though in a lot of these things, I
Speaker 6: think I really the perspective I bring to these panels
Speaker 6: is just sort of like having seen it evolve. I
Speaker 6: they're the ones with the crazy color for stories, They're
Speaker 6: the ones that were there. I just have been sort
Speaker 6: of that the passenger along the way, And I think
Speaker 6: that's why Matt had me in the book number one.
Speaker 6: Obviously my connection through my father, but still to get
Speaker 6: the insight of someone from who grew up attending the convention. Yeah,
Speaker 6: it's really fun to hear these stories told from them
Speaker 6: and just sort of watch that. A lot of times,
Speaker 6: I don't have a ton to add personally. I can
Speaker 6: always do color commentary and add my insight, and you know,
Speaker 6: if anybody asks, hey, what's your take on how where
Speaker 6: it's come, I certainly have an opinion on that, and
Speaker 6: I certainly have watched that progression, and I even though
Speaker 6: it is I feel it's a natural progression. It's just
Speaker 6: like anything else. Things change and they're not always to
Speaker 6: the way we like them. But there's probably a bunch
Speaker 6: of fifteen twenty year olds out there that this is
Speaker 6: the best thing ever.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 6: Unfortunately the way we experience the world isn't the way
Speaker 6: the world is always going to be. But to get
Speaker 6: back to the panel, I just love being a part
Speaker 6: of it. I love seeing everybody. I love hearing their stories.
Speaker 6: It's always good to see that, of course, but just
Speaker 6: to be a part of it. It brings me back
Speaker 6: to that. So if you want to hear just some
Speaker 6: real charming stories from people who have been there, people
Speaker 6: have done some crazy shit, and people who have survived
Speaker 6: to tell the tale, it's it's it's got charmed to it.
Speaker 6: It doesn't. It never gets dry like a excuse me,
Speaker 6: but like a bunch of old fuddy duddies like well
Speaker 6: back in my day. It never feels like that because
Speaker 6: the back in my day that they're talking about, some
Speaker 6: of that stuff is bananas. Like the things that they did.
Speaker 6: Look what they created, Look at what they created, Look
Speaker 6: at the legacy of what this ragtag group of like
Speaker 6: pan or twelve dudes, DIDs and a couple of girls too.
Speaker 6: I don't want to there's definitely there, yeah, for sure,
Speaker 6: And and honestly, that's a going back. Comic Con was
Speaker 6: one of the first very not one of the first,
Speaker 6: but it's it was always open to everybody. The females
Speaker 6: brought more to the table, and and it wasn't really
Speaker 6: a matter of now it's acceptable for girls. It always was.
Speaker 6: It's just that culturally girls didn't participate in that. And
Speaker 6: when they did participate in that, unfortunately, due to conventions
Speaker 6: of the time, not comic conventions, but conventions of society,
Speaker 6: they were told not to so they weren't as forthcoming
Speaker 6: with that. So I just I'm just delighted that weren't
Speaker 6: a place where people can be forthcoming with what they
Speaker 6: like and that we're still here. And thanks to Matt
Speaker 6: for forgetting this venue and making this reality like this happened,
Speaker 6: because I know we wanted to do it at first,
Speaker 6: but you know, unfortunately this isn't a panel that Comic
Speaker 6: Con is interested in having at this point.
Speaker 5: Yeah, no, it's it's a it's a good point, Gus,
Speaker 5: and I think that that's something that people should know
Speaker 5: if they are interested in coming, because even though it's free,
Speaker 5: which is important to remember, even though you do not
Speaker 5: need a badge, and it is open to the public.
Speaker 2: Yeah, people have a lot of opportunities to.
Speaker 5: Go to other things and see other things, and you know,
Speaker 5: they might even be a little bit put off by
Speaker 5: an oral history that sounds kind of boring. I want
Speaker 5: to go and you know, watch you know, things, and
Speaker 5: play video games and this, that and the other. Gus
Speaker 5: is one hundred percent, and I think it's the legacy
Speaker 5: again of this early group of fandom people and comic Con.
Speaker 5: Pretty much every single person, certainly all the people who
Speaker 5: are gonna be on our panel, but every single person
Speaker 5: who was involved in the early days of comic Con,
Speaker 5: they went on to live out their dreams, most of them.
Speaker 5: It's one of the reasons why a lot of them
Speaker 5: don't have a lot of money today is you know,
Speaker 5: they did not become lawyers, they did not become doctors.
Speaker 2: They did not.
Speaker 5: Become you know, handcuffed two desks and you know, work
Speaker 5: their way up to become you know, manager of pencil
Speaker 5: pushing at some big corporation that you know that they
Speaker 5: hated their lives. That almost every single person that we're
Speaker 5: talking about, almost every single person in the book and
Speaker 5: the podcast, I think, to the exclusion of maybe like
Speaker 5: one or two got involved as gust himself did in
Speaker 5: theme parks in toy design and at really top levels
Speaker 5: Hasbro and Mattel and got involved with Hannah Barbera and
Speaker 5: were involved in film and Tell and worked with Steven
Speaker 5: Spielberg and George Lucas and even people who were on
Speaker 5: more of the commercial side, and we're doing more publicity
Speaker 5: and marketing. Well, they were doing it with David Lynch,
Speaker 5: and they were doing it with the people who you know,
Speaker 5: did Blade Runner and this, that and the other, and
Speaker 5: some of them still even to this day, are still
Speaker 5: very much connected to those worlds.
Speaker 2: So the people who helped.
Speaker 5: To create comic Con are themselves creators, are artists, our writers, musicians, filmmakers, designers.
Speaker 5: So when you're coming to a panel like this, and
Speaker 5: it's one of the reasons I keep doing these kinds
Speaker 5: of things and really loved working on the book, is
Speaker 5: it's not just you know, history about something really fun.
Speaker 5: The people telling the history they're really fun. I love
Speaker 5: these people. It kills me that I never got to
Speaker 5: meet Ken because I really like Gus a lot. Gus
Speaker 5: is a fun guy, and sometimes we have times where
Speaker 5: we get to talk over the phone just about other things,
Speaker 5: or meet up at comic Con as you do, and
Speaker 5: we don't even talk about Comicon.
Speaker 2: We just talk about other things.
Speaker 5: And I grew up going to knot Sperry Farm and
Speaker 5: certainly not scary farm, so I asked them questions about that.
Speaker 5: But all these people who are going to be on
Speaker 5: the panel the point that I'm making, yeah, as Gus said,
Speaker 5: are not going to sit there and talk and all
Speaker 5: these technical terms. And they're way better at this than
Speaker 5: I am. As the point making. They tell really funny,
Speaker 5: really interesting, fascinating stories. And also they were a bunch
Speaker 5: of proto punks and hippies. They pulled pranks and there
Speaker 5: was a lot of naked swimming in the pool, and
Speaker 5: Timothy Leary came one year and.
Speaker 2: All that came with that.
Speaker 5: So they were a bunch of teenagers in the seventies
Speaker 5: and take that for what it's worth. So to hear
Speaker 5: those stories is really exciting and fun, and to be
Speaker 5: able to do it at the thing, surrounded by the
Speaker 5: hundreds of thousands of people that now populate their little
Speaker 5: world that they had. That all came from Gus's father's bookstore, which,
Speaker 5: by the way, in the back sold some knotty magazines
Speaker 5: and such to actually pay the bills. You know, stories
Speaker 5: like that even you know, that's part of the fun
Speaker 5: of it. So yeah, if people are coming to Comic Con,
Speaker 5: come to our panel. It might be history, but it's
Speaker 5: really fun history and the people telling it they're really fun.
Speaker 5: I love hanging out with them. They are a lot
Speaker 5: of good times, and some of them will probably be stoned.
Speaker 5: So you know, there you go, Hey, you're going to
Speaker 5: be in the gas lamp. It's right after lunchtime.
Speaker 6: Go out there, grab some lunch, come and check us out,
Speaker 6: and then get back in the show.
Speaker 5: Yeah, two to three pm at Bards and Cards, right
Speaker 5: there in the gas lamp Thursday, July twenty third. Again,
Speaker 5: it's free, it's open to the public, and we will
Speaker 5: be filming it too, Gus. I don't even know if
Speaker 5: you're aware, but Mike Catron is going to film it.
Speaker 5: So not to say that that should be a reason
Speaker 5: to miss it, because you've got to be there live
Speaker 5: and in person, and audience members will have the opportunity
Speaker 5: to ask questions. Not only will there be books there
Speaker 5: for people to sign also, by the way, but people
Speaker 5: can bring other things because some of the folks who
Speaker 5: will be on our panel, you know, again, our creators
Speaker 5: and people might want to bring stuff to sign.
Speaker 3: Well, thanks so much for joining us, Gus and Matthew.
Speaker 6: It's been a pleasure.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thanks for coming, guys.
Speaker 3: And to our audience. Now back to your regularly scheduled lives.
Speaker 3: Amusing Jews is here to amuse you.
Speaker 4: If you like being amused, go ahead and click like
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