In part three of the interview (go here and here for parts one and two), things get a little serious in this Kleid interview. Or do they?
Tim O'Shea: Since you shared this detail (when giving background for the interview), and it is clearly a major part of your life, have you ever turned down a project as it conflicted with your beliefs as an Orthodox Jew? Or does your faith have any direct bearing on your creative output at all? I would think not, given your participation in the upcoming True Porn with your story, Shomer Negiah.
Neil Kleid: And lo, we come to the part of the interview where my mother disowns me. Yes, I created a cartoon for a book entitled True Porn. Yes, it's about Judaism.
I am one hundred percent Orthodox. keep kosher, I keep the Sabbath and Holidays. And on and on. I believe since Jordan Gorfinkel entered the Witness Protection Program, I might be one of the only Orthodox Jews remotely connected to comics.
When I first started creating comics, noted romantic and Rock'Em Sock'Em Robot addict Dean Haspiel helped sort some creative kinks. I had written up a big ol' OGN which may or may not see the light of day. It's about dating and relationships from a male point of view - mine. One of Dean's comments was "so, you touch on religion, right?" See, I know where he was coming from, but here's my issue: Why? Why should everything I create have to come from the portion of my being that regulates guilt and knishes? So I wear a kippah. Can't I create without having to rub the fact that I'm Jewish in people's faces?
In this, I'm torn.
I wrote a pitch called The Big Con. It's about a pulpit Rabbi that's been lying to his congregation and family about his religion for forty years. When I explained it to someone the first comment I got was "Very Eisner.' As if every Eisner piece ever fashioned was about Jews and Judaism. Do I want to be pigeonholed as a "Jewish creator?"
It's funny. Jews are not easily represented in the media. Ask someone to name ten movies about Jews and you'll end up with YENTL, THE CHOSEN, SCHINDLER'S LIST and other shtetl/Holocaust related movies. Sometimes you get the odd duck like SCHOOL TIES which is about racism. But for the most part, you're not going to see Michoel Feldman saving the world in DIE HARD. How come Jews only take center stage in stories about religion like KEEPING THE FAITH? Why are we always the accountants, the lawyers, the stockbrokers? My friends went ballistic with excitement when BOILER ROOM came out because, while it was about money (natch, it portrayed a much different view of Jews than ever seen in film. You watch the SOPRANOS? Every Jew I know will tell you that they've seen the Hasid episode and called me the next day when a kid with a kipah sold some ecstacy to Jackie Junior in the third season. Same thing with the golem episode of the X-FILES. But a leading Jew? Only if his name's Seinfeld.
Let's bring this back to comics, and more specifically, comics and me.
I tell stories. Sometimes there are Jewish themes, sometimes there aren't. Reflected Glory, an 8 page Late Night Block comic is rooted in kabbalist theories. But it's the only one that is. Many of my minis touch on Judaic topics because, well, I invariably end up as the protagonist. Stable Rods, a story about rules and fatherhood, discusses the Jewish Defense League because well. my father had something to do with them back in the day. Ten Minute Jitters, a tale of pre-wedding jitters talks about Mount Sinai, where the Jews got the Torah, but it's mostly about heart.
Have I turned down stories because of religion? Let's talk Shomer Negiah, my story for the True Porn anthology.
It's NOT PORN.
Don't get me wrong. I have no issues with porn. I'm an open-minded guy and I know the time. I can write a good dick joke and script a sex scene with the best of them. When I heard that a few of my friends (K Thor Jensen, Sean Bieri, Laurenn McCubbin) were contributing to this anthology, curiosity got the better of me and I dropped a line to Robyn Chapman and Kelli Nelson, the editors. They told me it was going to be a book about real life sex stories. The tales could be about sex, connected to sex, or simply discussing sex, etc. and my mind started thinking, "hey - wouldn't it be great to try and explain how the Jewish religion handles sex?" Most of my friends have heard some wild theories about Jews and sex: it's only done through a sheet, you need to spend "unclean" periods apart and it needs to be watched by two Rabbis (no, yes and are you freakin' insane?). But this would be a way for me to, ahem, dialogue with the average comic book reader (who's planning on buying this for naked people) and explain something personal via the medium of comics. Shomer Negiah means literally, "guarding touch." A great deal of Jews do not have physical contact with the opposite sex before marriage and prefer to have an intellectual and emotionally heightened dating period that way. The True Porn story relates how I explained this to a friend who I used to act with in my theatre days and how she ah, er, tries to tempt me. Anyone reading this one looking for boobies, you might as well move on to the next story.
So. yes - if asked to do a straight up porn story. I'd probably say no. It's just the way my principles go. Am I weird about the fact that there will be wild, untamed horizontal mambo before and after my story? Let's just say Mom isn't getting a contributor copy.
Would I write Christian comics? I've been asked. Don't have the background, can't relate. Would I want to write the sequel to The New Adventures Of Hitler? I'll have to pass, Grant. On the flipside, do I want to be the next Will Eisner or Art Spiegelman, heroes to Jewish cartoonists 'round the globe? Look. I'm Jewish, dig? I write comics. It's not necessarily a marriage.
That being said, if Vertigo wants to discuss the Ragman pitch Nick Bertozzi and I pitched last year, I'm all ears.
TO:What can you tell folks about your work in progress, Bit City?
NK:God, what a mess.
I was contracted by a small press publisher who shall remain nameless to write several 8-page stories for their anthology title. Bit City, a futuristic noir tale, was born from that. If I really think about it, Bit Cityhttp://www.rantcomics.com/rant-committed.html was my first Late Night Block story, as it was a self contained Mickey Spillane-inspired yarn about missing people, computers and twist endings. It was originally meant as a one shot outing and that was that.
In the end, two more stories were developed by an in-house writer and my palm A. Dave (Mortal Coils) Lewis and we had a 22 page book about different aspects of the Bit City world. That kind of opened my eyes and I began developing Bit City into a larger serial, something with legs.
Skip ahead a year and a half later and the publisher was more interested in getting their logo on skateboards than on the masthead of comics. Words were tossed and I asked them to release me from my contract. A few months of emails and pushing and they finally let Bit City go, making it clear that all the artwork was theirs (shame, as its stunning stuff). I said fine, They said fine. I went away and wrote a 22 page script, fleshed out from the first 8 I had done for them.
Bit City is about worlds within worlds. It's about our dependence on technology and how that leads to ruin. The first arc, A Cop's Story, follows Communications Officer Vector Webb and his partner Tabitha Raster who have been infected by the mysterious virus ravaging Bit City. While Webb's disease is almost incurable, Tab's is synthetic, and perhaps can be treated by the only one who understands the virus - Bit City's reclusive creator. The problem is, the only man who can find him hasn't been seen in ten years. Webb's hours begin to slip away as he hunts down the key to his partner's salvation, and quite possibly, his own.
The script is currently being pencilled and inked by a fantastic British artist who shall remain nameless for the time being, and either it'll get self published or pitched around.
Oh, and to date? That small press publisher has only printed one comic. One.
TO:Is there anything else you'd like to discuss that I did not ask?
NK:Check out my work at www.rantcomics.com and you can grab my minis at Midtown Comics and Hanley's in NYC, GreenBrain Comics in Dearborn, MI and the Isotope Comics Lounge in San Francisco.
I'll be selling my minicomics at the MoCCA Arts Festival in NYC on June 22 and at SPX in September (my first!). I'll be at the House of Twelve table with noted hooligans Cheese Hasselberger, Tim Kelly, Evan Forsch, Brian Musikoff, Dave McKenna, Jenny Gonzalez and at times, K Thor Jensen. I'll also have a short carton in House of TwelveV 2.0, debuting in San Diego.
Late Night Block #2 with a cover by Carla Speed McNeill is out by MoCCA. Rant Comics #3 and a mini entitled The Art Of Heartbreak will premiere at SPX along with Late Night Block #3 with a cover by Mike Oeming.
I'm working on a graphic novel entitled Brownsville with Jake Allen. It's about mobsters. Yes, they're Jewish. Sigh.
I think Captain Crunch could kick Tony the Tiger's ass. I mean, come on - he's a freakin' CAPTAIN.
