Recent Comic Strips and Documentary with Autographs

[Josh Board]

There were a couple of cute comic strips this week that were autograph related. In the great Bizarro, by the talented Dan Piraro (who I had the pleasure of meeting at a party, and a week later buying an autographed copy of his book at Comic Con) – his strip had a woman coming home and showing her husband a picture. She is saying, “Guess whose autograph I got today?”

The man is looking at it and says, “Pt Sjk?”  (now at this point in the comic strip, autograph collectors are cringing, because 70% of our autograph collections are names that nobody else can even read). Anyway, the woman explains, “Pat Sajak. I couldn’t afford any vowels.” (as an autograph collector and a movie critic that is always looking for mistakes, I think a better punchline would’ve been “Maybe he couldn’t afford any vowels.”

The other comic strip was yesterday morning. It was The Fusco Brothers by J.C. Duffy. A woman goes up to a guy on a park bench and asks, “Hi, I’m a big fan. May I have 500 copies of your autograph?” The guy responds, “Why do you need so many?” To which she answers, “I’m hoping that I can trade 500 Rolf Fusco autographs for one Garfield autograph.”

And speaking of being a movie critic, I saw a great documentary that Mike Myers directed (my review is here: http://fox5sandiego.com/2014/06/18/supermench-the-legend-of-shep-go...

Since this guy managed and hung around the rich and famous, there are a few autograph things in the movie. One of them involves the huge parties he has at his mansion on the beach in Hawaii. He has a rule that you can’t talk business with anybody else and you can’t ask for autographs. Some of his parties would have Sly Stallone, Jack Nicholson, Sharon Stone, Michael Douglas, and many others. Tom Arnold says embarrassingly, “Clint Eastwood was forced to sit with me at a table. He was like…’What the f*** is this?’”

Speaking of Hawaii – the privacy bill known as “the Steven Tyler Act,” (he also talks in the documentary) – it was proposed by the Aerosmith front man, and it allows people to sue others who take photos or videos of their private moments (no, not private parts). The bill made it through the Senate a few months ago, but it is missing deadlines in the state House. Key lawmakers say they won’t push it through.

As I’ve said before, the paparazzi, and the fans always snapping photos with their cell phones, have made it much harder for the guy that just wants a ticket stub or the bill of his hat signed.

[J.Seah]

Thanks Josh!! Great blog as usual!! :D

[Ian Baldock]

I used to do some graphin at restaurants and hotels in philly in the eighties. I couldnt imagine what a pain it is now. I saw one of the philly eagles at Nordstrums a couple of weeks ago. He was surrounded by people with cell phones wanting to take pictures. I wanted no part of that scene.

[Josh Board]

I hear ya, Ian. One of the Chargers best receivers was in a sports bar I was at. It surprisingly didn't get so bad. People would go up to him...every 15 minutes or so...and take a photo. It seems people would rather do that than the autographs these days.