Outsider in a Mad world

Bart Simpson: 'With something this dense I felt an imperative to keep the story simple' Photo: Aconite Productions

When he was growing up in Victoria in British Columbia filmmaker Bart Simpson was a big fan of comic strips and in particular Mad magazine which has had a defining influence on popular culture. A friend and cartoonist Gareth Gaudin who still owns a vintage comic book store in downtown Victoria, was up for an award for his store and had got to know Adele Kurtzman, the wife of the magazine’s key founding editor and prime contributor Harvey Kurtzman.

Gaudin was invited over to the house and posted on social media that he was going to draw at Harvey’s desk, which caused a stir in comic strip circles. Now years down the line Simpson has benefited from that early connection which directly lead to his fascination with the man and his art – and out of it all emerged his documentary The Mad World Of Harvey Kurtzman, recently world premiered at the Edinburgh International Film Festival.

“I have memories of going to a cabin by the lake owned by the parents of a friend where they had a stack of the Mad magazines. My father also was a fan and I learned a lot about Harvey’s stuff from him. Some of his early drawings scared the heck out of me. We talked to the family who had been interested in doing a film on Harvey for some time. We were conscious that some of his acquaintances were a good age so we prioritised the interviews. Sadly Adele passed away before we finished but she was such an influential figure in his life,” said Simpson.

He was pleased to have been able to put together the project as a co-production between Scotland and Canada. Animation studio 2D Workshop, based outside Edinburgh, was one of the key allies along with such partners as Aconite Productions, Intuitive Pictures, Telefilm Canada and Screen Scotland.

Terry Gilliam was delighted to play his part, not only figuring among the interviewees but also coming aboard as an executive producer. Simpson explained that the Monty Python star and director had become a family friend of the Kurtzmans. Talking of his connection to his hero Gilliam has said: “When Mad Comics came out, it completely changed my view of the world. Because it was the first time I was dealing with humour in a way I'd never experienced before, and the idea of parody was something I didn't even know of.

The Mad World Of Harvey Kurtzman. Bart Simpson: 'He was a kind of hidden domino who had created this culture of satire to reflect the growing influence of media and pop culture' Photo: Courtesy of EIFF

“It was the beginning of my fascination with Harvey Kurtzman. He was the God ultimately for me. By the time I got to college. I would practically worship him. My films have always been about what my version of reality is, or what it seems to be, and I keep wanting them all to be grounded in reality. They may become surreal, they may become silly, but the reality is the central to it, and that all comes from Harvey.’’ Simpson gives a nod of recognition to Gilliam at the start of the film.

Kurtzman was born in 1924 in Brooklyn as the son of Russian-Ukrainian Jewish parents. After his father’s death, Harvey's mother placed her children in an orphanage for three months, until she found a job as a hat-maker. She remarried to a brass engraver who encouraged Kurtzman to pursue his artistic interests. His love for parody and satire was in part shaped by the anarchic comedy of The Marx Brothers and the cartoons of Tex Avery and Looney Tunes.

Simpson, 56, who broke through in 2003 by producing and acting as 2nd unit director on the feature documentary The Corporation, added: “What interested me about Harvey was that he was a kind of hidden domino who had created this culture of satire to reflect the growing influence of media and pop culture. He has a huge following and you can draw a direct line from Kurtzman to such magazines as France’s Charlie Hebdo. Comics always have been regarded as ‘low art’ but now you have all these big budget movies such as Spiderman so perhaps people are looking at them differently. And everybody is happy to get involved in making millions of dollars.”

The Mad World Of Harvey Kurtzman poster Photo: Intuitive Pictures

Kurtzman, who died in 1993, had been a rather private individual with a rebellious nature. “One of the challenges was that there was certain reluctance to speak ill of the dead but everybody wanted to do their best and people like the late editor Stan Lee and underground artist Robert Crumb were generous with their time,” explained Simpson who had been given 36 boxes of archive material, mostly catalogued. Among other contributors were The Simpsons creator Matt Groening, journalist Gloria Steinem and Gilliam, who was an assistant to Kurtzman on Help! magazine and executive produced the documentary.

The cartoonist's youngest daughter Nellie who has now become the keeper of her father’s legacy, also features. “There was a mix of drawings and sketches in the boxes so we used as much of that as we could,” concluded Simpson, who completed his PhD at Edinburgh College of Art/University of Edinburgh. “With something this dense I felt an imperative to keep the story simple.”