Bonus Episode: With Great Power #224...22 Panels with Ted Intorcio, Soren Christiansen, Denis Kitchen

Tad discusses Oddly Compelling: The Denis Kitchen Story with Ted Intorcio, Soren Christiansen and Denis Kitchen!

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Transcript

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Tad Eggleston: Good evening, everybody. Welcome back to 22 panels. My guests tonight are my friend Dennis Kitchen returning, and this time because he is the the subject of an upcoming documentary

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Tad Eggleston: currently, in its pre-launch time on Kickstarter. So go and save and be notified on launch for the oddly compelling the Dennis kitchen story on Kickstarter right now from Tinto Press, and I have Directors Ted in Torsio and Soren Christiansen

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Tad Eggleston: to to join me to to tell me what they think is oddly fascinating about Dennis. I just think it's fun to talk baseball with them, but I'm certain that they have more.

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Tad Eggleston: I mean. For that matter, I've already gone through your your your list of interviewees, and and seen seen a number of people that I that I either like talking to myself, or want to talk to myself. So like I'm impressed at the

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Tad Eggleston: the the any, the beginning stages, I guess, of of your work so Ted or Soren, take it away. Tell us, tell us what inspired you, what? What you're what you're going after.

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Tad Eggleston: what's cool? Why should we give you money other than I say so, and like my say so doesn't mean much

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Soren Christiansen: I met Dennis through Ted, so I'll let Ted start, and then I can certainly jump in at some point

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Ted Intorcio: Okay,

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Ted Intorcio: So I met. This is Ted. I met Dennis at a Denver Independent comic convention that I was part of called Dink.

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Ted Intorcio: and he was the for the 1st year of it. He was well, he was actually a guest every year at that, and I think that was that in 2017, or 20,

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Denis Kitchen: Sounds about right?

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Ted Intorcio: Yeah. And he wandered over to my

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Ted Intorcio: my table. I was also tabling there. And he goes, you know, Hi, I like your stuff, and we just started chatting, and I found out he was Dennis kitchen, and I said, Oh, geez! You're famous, aren't you? And you know we got we just hit it off, I guess, and I was surprised that this guy that had had, you know, the kind of successes that he had wanted to talk to low life. Like myself.

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Tad Eggleston: I know that feeling really well.

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Ted Intorcio: Yeah.

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Ted Intorcio: it was, and you know, so I've known him for several years. I did he? He turned me on to a project with

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Ted Intorcio: Mort Walker, the guy that did Beatle Bailey.

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Ted Intorcio: who lives not too far, I mean same, maybe a couple hours away from Dennis. Anyway, I was shooting at nothing actually happened with that particular project, but after I was done shooting at Mort's house, he invited me to come and visit his house and me and the guy I was shooting with. We came. We came out there, and we're just amazed at his place

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Ted Intorcio: and the kinds of stuff that he had hanging on the walls and the valley of the dolls, which maybe we'll talk about later that he has in his basically his backyard. And you know, we kept in contact. We worked on a couple of things I published

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Ted Intorcio: at least. What was it? Well, I'm working on publishing another book, but I published

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Ted Intorcio: one of his creatures from the subconscious books, and

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Ted Intorcio: you know I was also doing some work with Soren.

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Ted Intorcio: some freelance. I do motion design for you know, as a freelancer for my paycheck, or whatever

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Tad Eggleston: Checks are good of paychecks around here

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Ted Intorcio: You want to. You want to make enough to live, anyway.

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Tad Eggleston: Also health insurance. Health insurance is good.

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Ted Intorcio: Just oh, yeah, if you can manage it.

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Ted Intorcio: I just wanted to. Well, I was, you know, talking to Soren one day, and I said. You know you should meet this

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Ted Intorcio: this friend of mine, Dennis Kitchen. Soren's not a comic book, guy, but he is kind of a pot smoking hippie sort of a Communist, you know, I said, and I said that with it in tongue, in cheek, obviously, but they seemed to have some things in common. So he goes, yeah, yeah, let's let's do a zoom or whatever. And we met that way. And then, before you know it, Soren, you know, is suggesting we do a documentary on him.

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Ted Intorcio: And I was actually developing an idea to animate some of Dennis Kitchen's work, his characters, anyway.

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Ted Intorcio: And I thought, Okay, that's a better venue than trying to come up with a half hour show.

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Ted Intorcio: Let's work on a documentary together, and we, Soren and I both worked at Turner in the early 2 thousands.

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Ted Intorcio: And so we had a lot of respect for each other's work. And boy it just it just seemed to work out

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Soren Christiansen: Yep, and and dennis's story was, you know.

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Soren Christiansen: oddly compelling. It certainly is, is worthy there to to use that quote.

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Soren Christiansen: It was a lot of fun to talk with Dennis and and hear about his life. And so

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Soren Christiansen: I am a history major. And so, when talking about his past with underground comics.

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Soren Christiansen: They brought up the 1st amendment battle with the comic book. Legal Defense fund. That was, that's excuse me. When a light bulb went off for me. Because that's a there's, there's relevance. You know, 2 things are important to want to know

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Soren Christiansen: something you want. If you know about someone and are intrigued by that person. Then you're willing to listen

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Soren Christiansen: to more about that person. And so Dennis is someone who is is worth knowing. Incredibly interesting stories. I've been to his house, I think. Is it? Twice or 3 times, Dennis? Twice, and and

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Tad Eggleston: Now I'm kidding functionality.

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Tad Eggleston: I got to come out East

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Soren Christiansen: It's. It's amazing.

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Tad Eggleston: Seems like he invites everybody

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Soren Christiansen: This has a beautiful home. That was a mill in the in the 18 hundreds

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Tad Eggleston: Cool.

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Soren Christiansen: It has the pond, and it has the sluice, which is the watergate. You can still see that, or the original pioneers who built that. So it's just a really neat piece of property. And then, when you have

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Soren Christiansen: life-sized big boy statues outside that Dennis was able to find from restaurants when you cross over a little bridge and you're in the valley of the Dolls. It's it's just a neat little paradise, and then you go inside, and it's just like you're walking into a collector's paradise.

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Soren Christiansen: Dennis has collecting chest

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Soren Christiansen: a tremendous amount. The difference between me and Dennis and most people is that Dennis has categorized, itemized everything.

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Soren Christiansen: I mean, it truly is extraordinary. And there's a reason why why Dennis does that, and I'll let him share that about who he is, and why he's done that. But it really is fascinating to walk around there and just to see walls. Walls of eyeballs, walls, you know, of dogwood walls of I mean what else I mean. I just everything that I could imagine. As far as

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Soren Christiansen: vintage postcards, toys are in that house and displayed. So it's a lot of fun to be there

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Ted Intorcio: The oddly compelling, you know. Wasn't that hard of a title to come up with? Because everything about what Dennis is interested in? And he not only collects, and he does it very artistically, you know, he's constantly creating art, not just drawing, although he draws quite a bit. So you know, when the notion of doing a documentary about him came up. Originally I was like, well, this is just a really cool guy behind the guy

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Ted Intorcio: thing, you know where he was never quite in the spotlight to the extent of people like our Crum. And you know, Charles Burns and some of these people, that he's published in the in the past.

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Ted Intorcio: so that to me was interesting. But then we, the the whole notion of the fact that, you know he's played quite a large part in the fight, for you know freedom of the press and freedom of speech.

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Ted Intorcio: and giving, giving the voiceless a voice, you know, giving them a

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Ted Intorcio: a podium from which to speak. In in a sense, he was the 1st person to, you know, publish gay comics, for instance, it wasn't just

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Soren Christiansen: First.st It wasn't the 1st

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Tad Eggleston: Yeah.

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Soren Christiansen: But he was. He, wasn't it? Wasn't we? I think we double checked that there was somebody else who published, but he was one of the one of the 1st to do that. He broke the mold on absolutely

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Ted Intorcio: Yeah, thanks, mate.

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Ted Intorcio: So that that correction, anyway. Yeah. And I don't want to keep talking. I actually want to let Dennis talk a little bit, but I did want to bring that up

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Tad Eggleston: Well, I mean what? What?

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Ted Intorcio: Please don't say Dennis

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Tad Eggleston: We'll get there. I hadn't asked him a question. He's been on the show before

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Ted Intorcio: Yeah.

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Ted Intorcio: I don't want to talk so much

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Soren Christiansen: 1 1 thing, though, I was just gonna say, and is

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Soren Christiansen: when we started this, the 1st amendment that factor was it was there. But it grew. I was very fortunate people. Plowski, who's an amazing cartoonist, was visiting Dennis and was working on a political series of political cartoons for a client that was taking on Maga and I. I shot it, but I didn't.

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Soren Christiansen: I didn't. I thought, oh, I'll shoot it. But you know what. I don't know how relevant this is going to be, because Biden's going to win in a landslide because Americans have woken up to this absolute fascist nonsense, this book Banning, and every all this crap, that's all going to get tossed. And then we're, you know. So it's not going to be that relevant.

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Soren Christiansen: But I was fortunate that I did interview Pete about those cartoons, the political cartoons he was doing, and then, you know, the election, and it really has changed everything. There is now a an attack, and so the relevance of Dennis's fight. You know that death by a thousand cuts we all have to do our part and stop wherever the attacks occur or we lose it. And so the relevance is really there, and

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Soren Christiansen: and I'll be quiet now

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Tad Eggleston: Dennis, how does it feel?

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Denis Kitchen: Very center of it.

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Tad Eggleston: Acumen

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Denis Kitchen: Very weird, Ted. I have to say.

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Denis Kitchen: you know I I have been involved in other documentaries about other cartoonists, says a talking head.

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Denis Kitchen: And I enjoyed doing that. It's very different being the focus, I guess, of one.

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Denis Kitchen: So yeah, I'm just trying to, you know.

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Denis Kitchen: cooperate. I'm glad these guys think it's interesting enough. I can't be objective about myself, but

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Denis Kitchen: I guess

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Denis Kitchen: you know, I guess the kinds of things they do are not common. I it's not something I think about, you know.

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Denis Kitchen: I just do what I do.

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Denis Kitchen: and I've been doing it for a long time. I kind of take it for granted.

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Tad Eggleston: I actually appreciate that a lot, because what you do as they were both pointing out is

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Tad Eggleston: I mean to kind of distill it you have. You have a specific moral compass, you know, in that free speech

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Tad Eggleston: is important, and but that there's a difference between free speech and hate speech, and that that free speech doesn't mean speech without consequences. It means that like.

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Tad Eggleston: if you see something and you think it's worth publishing, you'll find a way to publish it, and hopefully find a way to break even on it rather than going. Oh, this is too dangerous! Or Oh.

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Tad Eggleston: whatever

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Denis Kitchen: Yeah, yeah. I mean, as a publisher, you have all those thoughts you have to

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Tad Eggleston: Yeah.

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Denis Kitchen: You know.

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Denis Kitchen: I think what helped for me. When I was right out of high school, and I wanted to be a cartoonist.

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Denis Kitchen: There was no place in the world you could go to train to be a cartoonist. There were art schools.

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Denis Kitchen: the art schools hated cartoons that was considered the lowest of the low to even call yourself, you know, in art.

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Denis Kitchen: and I had teacher after teacher. Tell me how deplorable cartoons were, so I just dropped out of various art classes because I didn't think

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Denis Kitchen: I fit. And so I majored in journalism, in college and in retrospect. That was actually a pretty good choice.

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Denis Kitchen: because if you're going to be a good cartoonist, you know, you have to know how to write and write efficiently, and

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Denis Kitchen: I love the fact that journalism uses the old inverted pyramid theory, which is the most important stuff at top, and then it diminishes so

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Tad Eggleston: At least we hope that it does. The New York Times, burying the lead a lot weirdly

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Denis Kitchen: And and early on, you know, the the freedom of the press was a core

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Denis Kitchen: And so when I was able to get a foothold in comics. My journalistic training never left me, and the whole

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Denis Kitchen: freedom of the press just was

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Denis Kitchen: part of comics were part of the larger press.

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Denis Kitchen: So it came naturally, and it's particularly chilling now to see an administration that is so. Anti-media calls the media our enemy has banned. Now certain journalists from White House.

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Denis Kitchen: Press the gatherings, and it's well, you know. Let's not get down that road. But

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Denis Kitchen: so I appreciate that what I brought to comics was that background

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Denis Kitchen: as a trained journalist. It also was very helpful

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Denis Kitchen: over the years, getting publicity and understanding how newspapers worked, and

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Denis Kitchen: what a slow news day was, and how to kind of manipulate that, and

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Denis Kitchen: was very helpful. When I had no

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Denis Kitchen: money for advertising, I relied on free publicity.

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Denis Kitchen: So, you know, was a long, strange journey, and

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Tad Eggleston: Wait a minute. No, that's the grateful dead. You can't steal, you can publish them, but you can't steal from them

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Denis Kitchen: No, I know but it I think it.

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Denis Kitchen: It's it's a parallel in one way, you know.

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Tad Eggleston: It is.

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Soren Christiansen: You know what?

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Soren Christiansen: Then it one of the reasons that we had gotten along

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Soren Christiansen: so well, I believe, even though I am not an easy person to get along with. At the at the core. All 3 of us we care.

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Soren Christiansen: And most importantly, there's a saying, people think the saying is that money is the root of all evil, and that's not the case. The real, the real quote is the love of money is the root of all evil.

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Soren Christiansen: and when you meet people who love money

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Soren Christiansen: you can't. You can't do business with them. You can never trust them, and throughout this whole process. None of us are trying to make this movie to make money. It'd be nice to make money. But we're making this movie because it's a statement worth making.

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Soren Christiansen: And along the way we've had discussions about, you know, money. If we receive funding, and the 1st questions we we all ask are, you know we've had. We've had this a group called Harmonica Lewinsky, which has given us the craziest music and so much fun. It's another group in Denver called log. They gave us a piece of music for the trailer.

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Soren Christiansen: You know, and all of us have been talking along the way that if we do if we make money and are able. The 1st thing we want to do is pay the people

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Soren Christiansen: who right

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Soren Christiansen: people who came with with nothing. I mean we didn't. We haven't offered them anything. And and this is just a right now it's it's it's ethereal. It's in the air. And so that they sacrificed their time. They gave us their music. Some they did, some sound mixing for us, and we've all

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Soren Christiansen: we all we want to make a great product, and we want to make sure that we can look back at everybody, and if they're not happy we can't make everybody happy, but we can look them honestly in the eye and say that we did everything we could to make this right. And the reason I say that is because, Dennis I

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Soren Christiansen: I'm not saying I'm sharing every commonality with Dennis, but one of the things that I, when Dennis told me the story is that I see myself whenever I get money from a client. The 1st thing I think about is paying whoever what not my vendors.

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Soren Christiansen: and before even paying myself because I want them to be paid, and when Dennis started his 1st publishing company he wasn't making money, and yet he had some of crumbs work, and then Dennis had a friend who became his manager, and the 1st thing he said was, you've got to stop giving so much money to the artists you're paying above and beyond what the artists are supposed to get

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Soren Christiansen: which I'm I'm the same way. I want to make sure everybody's happy. But yet, if I'm not

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Soren Christiansen: able to pay my bills. What's the point? And so that Dennis, I think, was a cathartic moment. If I'm correct, Dennis, for you, that it's a business, too.

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Denis Kitchen: Yeah, yeah, it's true. When I started the 1st couple of years,

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Denis Kitchen: I asked around. And I, I heard that 10% was kind of a standard royalty. And I thought, Well, that sounds kind of chintzy to me. I'm gonna

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Denis Kitchen: I picked 16%. I thought that was realistic. 1 6, th basically of gross.

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Denis Kitchen: And when my eventual partner came along, and

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Denis Kitchen: and before he agreed to be my partner, he wanted to look at all the the business mechanicals, and one by one he checked out. You know, he said, hey.

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Denis Kitchen: seem to be paying your printer the right amount. Your your rent's reasonable. All these things, he said, where'd you come up with this royalty of 16%? And I said.

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Denis Kitchen: Well, that one I kind of pulled out of the air, and he said, Well, that's why you're not making any money. You're giving away a thin profit margin

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Denis Kitchen: to the artists, and he said, I won't join you unless

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Denis Kitchen: where our business model allows us to make a profit.

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Denis Kitchen: So he convinced me. So I had to go then to artists and

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Denis Kitchen: say, Hey, I can't pay that anymore.

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Denis Kitchen: In fact, shortly after that Crumb was visiting, and and I had very awkwardly brought it up. And I

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Denis Kitchen: and I finally said, Robert, I

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Denis Kitchen: I can't pay you 16% anymore. I have to go to 10%. And he said, he said, I have no idea what you pay me. My wife gets all the checks

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Denis Kitchen: he didn't care, and he didn't know.

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Denis Kitchen: And

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Denis Kitchen: basically all the artists were like that. They they just they. We all just wanted it to be fair. We knew the old business model

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Denis Kitchen: really exploited artists, and it's sad when you, if you look at the careers of the comic book artists in the forties and fifties. A lot of these guys just worked their ass off, and they made very little, and they had no side benefits. They didn't even get to keep their art. They didn't get to keep their copyright. So

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Denis Kitchen: so my generation was adamant that if we're gonna

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Denis Kitchen: build this thing we call underground comics. The business model has to be artist friendly, and that's how it was established. And

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Denis Kitchen: so I didn't intend to be a publisher. You know I am. I'm just going to be one of those cartoonists I just happened to.

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Denis Kitchen: I filled a vacuum. There was a vacuum for publishers, and I had just enough of a knack for business that I could do it.

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Denis Kitchen: but I wasn't really a businessman, and

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Ted Intorcio: Everything was just

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Denis Kitchen: Built on the premise of things need to be equitable, and it grew from there

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Soren Christiansen: But you know what's I was just gonna say, Dennis, and I've joked with you about that. Is that

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Soren Christiansen: the sad fact is, is that here you are, and I try to be so equitable. And yet

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Soren Christiansen: somebody on the outside, you know the artist who gives you the work, and then they see the final book, and they're like.

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Soren Christiansen: why am I only be being paid? This? All you did was slap the pages together, print it. And why are you getting off? And it's and we joke about the fact of just all the ancillary things

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Denis Kitchen: Oh, yeah.

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Soren Christiansen: Has to happen before you even get to the

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Denis Kitchen: Yeah. The

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Ted Intorcio: Yeah. It didn't

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Denis Kitchen: Was an artist. There was a cartoonist who I published many of his works, and at 1 point he's basically said that to me. He said.

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Denis Kitchen: he said, you're getting a disproportionate share. And he said, I just want to tell you I'm going to now

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Denis Kitchen: become a self-publisher, and I said, that's great.

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Denis Kitchen: And he said, What you're happy. And I said, Yeah, you're gonna find out how difficult it is. And

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Denis Kitchen: someday someday you're gonna come back. And and you're gonna you're gonna tell me how fucking miserable it was trying to publish your own books and get them into the market.

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Denis Kitchen: And it happened not gonna name names. But

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Tad Eggleston: Let me know!

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Denis Kitchen: You know.

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Tad Eggleston: Yeah, the the generation that I

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Tad Eggleston: grew up reading, you know, the self published of the nineties. What I'll say as I've gotten to know a lot of them that they almost all have a very similar story.

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Tad Eggleston: They've got

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Tad Eggleston: one person made good comics, and and their spouse, or significant other or whatnot, had the business sense to make everything else work

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Denis Kitchen: It's a lucky cartoonist who has a smart spouse

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Tad Eggleston: Right, you know. That's that's the Terry Moore story. That's that's the

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Denis Kitchen: Jeff's

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Tad Eggleston: Smith, story.

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Ted Intorcio: Is, is, it's it's it's having published myself, you know.

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Ted Intorcio: I own Tinto press. So so you know, I've done a decent amount of publishing nothing like what Dennis has done. But the truth is, you know, it's hard all around, you know it's hard for the artists because they work in slave, and they may get in, you know, even if they get

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Ted Intorcio: on fantagraphics, or if they get a larger publishing deal, you know, maybe they're getting 6%.

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Ted Intorcio: Maybe they're getting 4%. Maybe they're, you know, they. But

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Denis Kitchen: Should demand 16% to

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Ted Intorcio: Well, and and I understand the the

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Ted Intorcio: the anger. There, you know I completely understand it, but you know the the stores that carry the books, take half

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Tad Eggleston: Yeah, they take half of that cover. Price

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Ted Intorcio: So, you know, and you

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Tad Eggleston: They also

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Ted Intorcio: If you have a distributor, they want 10% or 12% on top of the half

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Tad Eggleston: So if you're working with somebody like Diamond, or you know they they want to take

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Ted Intorcio: They want to pay you 40, 35% of that cover price the, you're lucky if you can print in numbers

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Ted Intorcio: where the cost of the book is less than half of the cover price anymore. And that's that's becoming more and more difficult with, you know, the tariffs and the

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Ted Intorcio: the way just the way and the cost of paper and and toner and everything. The printers sometimes aren't making that much money, even because the Toner people, you know, are making the money, and the the people that are making the printers are those expenses are going up. So it's just. It's just a difficult business for the fact that you know it's not a worldwide. I mean, there's a worldwide audience of people who read comics.

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Ted Intorcio: But it's a small percentage of the population.

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Ted Intorcio: And so you know, it's a i would

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Tad Eggleston: And I mean all the costs that you're you're talking about are even before you get into the challenge of How do you get

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Tad Eggleston: your stuff into

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Ted Intorcio: Promotion.

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Tad Eggleston: Their hands. I say, as I am just subscribing to your newsletter because I was only vaguely aware of Tinto press, which is terrible, because, as I flip through your catalog, I have all of the stuff from Carl Crumholz. I have

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Ted Intorcio: Nice

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Tad Eggleston: Approve it.

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Tad Eggleston: I have the alfalfa book. I have a number of the books that you have in your

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Tad Eggleston: your catalog, but because I bought them directly from

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Tad Eggleston: the creators, which is, which is one of the Creator. Challenges, is that they often have to be at cons to say, Hey, take this

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Ted Intorcio: Absolutely, absolutely.

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Tad Eggleston: You know, and I think the smarter creators, but not always. The purchasers understand that it's a it's a business in general where where the margin lines are thin. I mean, you mentioned, the bookstores take 50%. But like I've become friends with the people at Lions Tooth, and even with their 50%, you know, managing to stay open

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Ted Intorcio: They got to pay the rent

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Tad Eggleston: Challenge right? They've got to pay rent. They've got

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Ted Intorcio: Cash register person. They have to pay

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Tad Eggleston: Right.

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Ted Intorcio: To pay to keep the lights on absolutely right.

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Denis Kitchen: Basically it's difficult for everyone

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Tad Eggleston: Right.

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Ted Intorcio: Forever.

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Denis Kitchen: Except the reader

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Tad Eggleston: Yeah, but that's that's why A, I remind the readers that that spending money on

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Tad Eggleston: on comics is is a valuable thing to everybody involved, and and BI,

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Ted Intorcio: Yeah, if you want to support the

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Tad Eggleston: I mean what I love most about Dennis, what I love most about Lion's Tooth, and some of the great bookstores and comic shops. What I love most about so many of the creators I know is that they understand that

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Tad Eggleston: the community is necessary for anybody to really make money in comics for anybody to live in comics. They need to try to do it together, not at each other's expense.

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Tad Eggleston: Yeah.

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Tad Eggleston: No.

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Ted Intorcio: Yeah. And you know, it doesn't hurt if it gets picked up for a television show

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Tad Eggleston: No, it certainly doesn't hurt, though it doesn't always pay as well as you'd think either.

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Ted Intorcio: That's that's true, too.

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Tad Eggleston: Bye.

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Tad Eggleston: I was talking to a friend recently who who has an adaptation of one of his movies coming out with an A-list actor. And he's like, Yeah, we got paid not nearly as much as you'd think

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Ted Intorcio: Sure. Yeah, there's a lot of stories out there, and Dennis can tell those stories better than anyone you know. He's he was involved with, for instance. Well, he published the Crow, for instance.

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Tad Eggleston: Okay. Yeah.

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Ted Intorcio: A huge, you know, successful movie.

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Ted Intorcio: And well, I could let him talk about that

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Tad Eggleston: Yeah, I don't think you've talked about the crow here.

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Tad Eggleston: Tell me about the crow

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Denis Kitchen: That's what you want to talk about. Sure. I mean

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Ted Intorcio: He published a quote. He questioned.

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Denis Kitchen: You know, it's it's exciting when one of them actually makes it to the Big 6 arena and and is successful. But you know the batting average, for that is pretty low.

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Denis Kitchen: You can option things and get some, you know, halfway decent money, but it's

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Denis Kitchen: rare that they get beyond the development stage and actually pay that purchase price.

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Denis Kitchen: But it's still part of the business, and

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Denis Kitchen: you know you, you have a lot more misses than hits right. Even the hits are more likely to be singles or doubles.

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Denis Kitchen: The crow was a home run, you know, by most standards

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Denis Kitchen: And as a publisher I benefited from the Crow

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Denis Kitchen: movie being made because sales went from pretty good to amazing, pretty much overnight, and kitchen sink ended up selling

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Denis Kitchen: around 400,000 copies of that graphic novel, and that

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Denis Kitchen: paid the rent for a long time.

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Denis Kitchen: And

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Denis Kitchen: you know I mean James, I'm still James Obar's agent, and he's still, you know, the crow is still all kinds of incarnations all over the world.

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Denis Kitchen: It's still successful, it's a franchise.

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Denis Kitchen: But cartoonists, you know. Look at that, and they go. Well, I can do that. It's not easy, you know. It's it's like anything. It's like

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Denis Kitchen: acting baseball, whatever you you see, a handful of people who are very successful. You see a lot of people who are.

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Denis Kitchen: you know, struggling at various levels to get there, and many never get beyond

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Tad Eggleston: And it's not not always pure talent and and

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Denis Kitchen: It's luck! It's luck! It's timing. It's subject

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Tad Eggleston: Timing and an industry like comics. It's often how many hats can you wear

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Tad Eggleston: if you're a decent cartoonist and a decent writer, but also a decent marketer and a decent business person. You're way more likely to make it than the brilliant artist who doesn't know what a contract means

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Ted Intorcio: This is one of those things that Dennis that makes Dennis special is that he's the unicorn

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Ted Intorcio: that has, you know. He's he has the artistic sensibilities and the business

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Ted Intorcio: acumen. Or really, I don't know if it's business acumen so much as it is. He's just a personable guy

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Ted Intorcio: that, you know is, he can talk to anybody. He deals with difficult people very, very easily. Which comic artists may I say? Need I say more?

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Ted Intorcio: And and they can be interesting

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Tad Eggleston: Interesting.

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Ted Intorcio: And he's he's open to ideas, like one of my favorite stories that Dennis tells is him

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Ted Intorcio: publishing a 78

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Ted Intorcio: of of crumbs, you know, band, our crumb, and the cheap suit serenaders. I don't know if you've ever heard this story, but

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Tad Eggleston: I have not

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Ted Intorcio: Dennis. You gotta you gotta give them the the heads up on that one

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Denis Kitchen: Well, this would have been 1975, I think.

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Denis Kitchen: and Crum was passing through town with 2 guys that he played music with Al Dodge and Bob Armstrong. Bob is also a cartoonist. He did Mickey Ratt comics.

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Denis Kitchen: and so they were. They were jamming at my place, and I love their music. And

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Denis Kitchen: and I said, You know, you guys should be recorded. Are you recorded? And they all went?

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Denis Kitchen: And I said, Gosh, you know. And then, I remember, you know, Robert collected 78 Si collected old jukeboxes that played 78 s. So I half jokingly said,

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Denis Kitchen: we should

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Tad Eggleston: You have my world's favorite collection, then I don't own one, but that's 1 of my dreams is to own a 78 jukebox

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Denis Kitchen: Wow!

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Tad Eggleston: Then I'd have to buy more. 78 s. But

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Denis Kitchen: When I was in Wisconsin. Yeah, I know one time I had in my barn about 30 jukeboxes, because

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Tad Eggleston: Oh, wow!

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Denis Kitchen: People were selling them for 50, 75 bucks, you know, and

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Tad Eggleston: Right.

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Denis Kitchen: I had a pickup truck I'd go pick them up, and

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Denis Kitchen: so, anyway. So I half jokingly said that to the band, and they all kind of perked up and said, Oh, that would be cool!

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Denis Kitchen: And then they expected me to follow up so

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Denis Kitchen: well. Alright. So I started calling. You know, record manufacturers.

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Denis Kitchen: and as soon as I said 78, they were like, Are you crazy? That's been obsolete, for you know, at least 20 years. When I called.

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Denis Kitchen: and but I persisted, and it took months, and I finally found an old guy in Nashville, I think.

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Denis Kitchen: and he didn't say no right away, he said.

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Denis Kitchen: He said, well, I think I got one covered with a tarp.

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Denis Kitchen: Let me let me go. Dust it off and see if it still works.

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Denis Kitchen: So a week or so later he said, Yeah, he got it running. Then he had to see if somebody still made 10 inch platters, you know.

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Denis Kitchen: So finally, finally, yes, found someone who did it. And so, after about a year of recording them locally.

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Denis Kitchen: we put out a 78. Now I had a partner at the time who was

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Denis Kitchen: not a dreamer like me. He was very practical business, Guy, and he said, What the fuck are you doing? Said this was a joke, and when it was a joke I laughed. And now you're getting serious, he said. How are we going to sell a 78,

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Denis Kitchen: and I said, I just have faith, it's just cool, and you know, crumbs and

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Tad Eggleston: Well, I don't see any available at your store now, so you must have sold out.

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Tad Eggleston: Yeah, no, the other. I think they're long gone. But

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Denis Kitchen: But it happened, and and we and

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Denis Kitchen: so I asked the old guy in Nashville, you know what's the minimum I can print that'll be worth your while. And he said, well, he said, you got to do at least 5,000, or it's not worth it for me.

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Denis Kitchen: And my partner said, 5,000, are you kidding?

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Denis Kitchen: But

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Denis Kitchen: I was the head of the company. I pulled the trigger, and we not only sold those 5,000. We reprinted another 5,000, and we probably could have sold a 3rd printing, but my partner was

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Denis Kitchen: getting apoplectic, that we would get stuck with the the rest. So what what it proved to me is. I always tried to trust my own gut instinct because

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Denis Kitchen: I knew that at heart I'm a collector, and I know what's cool when I see it, and if I make something cool I gotta think there's a few 1,000 other people who will share my aesthetics, and it almost always worked out.

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Denis Kitchen: Not that that's business advice. You should take

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Tad Eggleston: Well, this is a question that I've been meaning to ask, because it's 1 of the biggest differences between the book publishing world and the comics publishing world really, actually.

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Tad Eggleston: comes down to storage

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Tad Eggleston: comics. Don't want to sell anything that you know don't even want to print things that they can't flip immediately, whereas the book publishing world thinks more in terms of 5 and 10 years

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Tad Eggleston: for a return on

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Tad Eggleston: a novel or whatnot. So so how? I mean, because, yeah, I agree, if you like, something, you should be able to find 5,000 other people that like it. But then the challenge is

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Tad Eggleston: out of the 9 billion people in the world. How do you?

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Tad Eggleston: How do you manage to allow, or how do you manage to to?

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Tad Eggleston: To to actually find those 5,000 people and let them know it's available. And and and how much time can you allow for that before it becomes

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Tad Eggleston: not worth doing

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Denis Kitchen: Right. And I think a lot of those customers probably never played the record because they didn't have the right record player unless they got Mom and Dad's old, you know.

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Denis Kitchen: one that played all 3 speeds

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Tad Eggleston: I would have been the crazy guy that went out and bought a record player

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Denis Kitchen: Yeah. And it was it was good. But I mean,

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Soren Christiansen: There's a nostalgia aspect, just a nostalgia aspect to it, but also, too, I mean, do you remember the pet rock

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Denis Kitchen: Yeah, oh, sure.

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Denis Kitchen: Sure.

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Soren Christiansen: Now, do you remember the invisible dog walking? The leash that had the?

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Soren Christiansen: It was a hard. It was basically like the leash was hard. So it looked like you were walking. An invisible dog

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Soren Christiansen: they were! They were ridiculous. And how

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Soren Christiansen: how many pet rocks were sold because somebody knew marketing right. And so

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Soren Christiansen: there are so many things that end up being hits that people just buy because they were duped. And you know, and they move on. It's it's hard to to be a good

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Soren Christiansen: artist, writer, publisher, and also promoter. It's tough, all right.

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Soren Christiansen: And so I have mad props for Dennis in that regard.

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Soren Christiansen: Because that's it, that's it.

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Tad Eggleston: But yeah, did you? Did you have a warehouse early on, I guess?

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Tad Eggleston: Oh, yeah.

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Tad Eggleston: Question, because like that.

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Tad Eggleston: Yeah, that I think having a well organized warehouse can be a game changer in terms of

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Tad Eggleston: being able to sell, I mean, because sometimes, when I'm talking to

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Tad Eggleston: independent cartoonists right now, one of the problems is they're running out of apartment space. They need to get people to buy buy books so that they

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Denis Kitchen: Well, when I started, I I what I lived in a

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Denis Kitchen: apartment. It was a second floor walk up, and it had an attic that was on the 3rd floor, of course.

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Denis Kitchen: and the 1st couple of books that I published

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Denis Kitchen: it came, like, I think, 500 books in a long box kind of like a white comic box, and they were heavy.

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Denis Kitchen: and I had to schlep them up 3 flights of stairs, set them down, go back to my hearse and get another.

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Denis Kitchen: and when I finally got a couple of partners after doing that once, they said Never again so

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Denis Kitchen: very quickly as just a practical matter. We found a place we could afford in Milwaukee.

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Denis Kitchen: and, you know, moved a couple of times, and finally my solution was leaving Milwaukee, where rent was relatively high

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Denis Kitchen: to further north in Wisconsin, where I bought a farm that

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Denis Kitchen: came with a nice big empty barn, and so

347
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Denis Kitchen: I just slowly remodeled the barn, one unit of space at a time, and as long as I could insulate it from

348
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Denis Kitchen: dampness, and so on, that I could store comics in there, and eventually

349
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Denis Kitchen: the entire barn was filled with offices, and it pushed out the warehouse, and I had to build a warehouse next to the barn. And so

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Denis Kitchen: necessity, you know, is what determines it. And

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Denis Kitchen: but yeah, it's there's no question you you have to

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Denis Kitchen: be prepared for that kind of growth. When you start a small enterprise, because sometimes it doesn't stay small

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Tad Eggleston: Well, but also, like you brought up with with the crow, you know.

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Tad Eggleston: Crow had been around for a while before it became a movie. So for a while you you had, however, many you'd printed, and you'd get orders, and it was important to get them out and whatnot. But

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Tad Eggleston: if you'd had to pulp huge amounts of books, or you'd had to drastically discount huge amounts of books. Then, when the crow hit, you would have had to immediately go print a huge amount of books. I mean, that's actually one of the problems that Marvel and DC run into on a regular basis is that

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Tad Eggleston: their movies come out and they haven't gotten a round of of graphic novels out

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Tad Eggleston: to to go along with the movie. And by by the time you've got a bunch out.

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Tad Eggleston: The next movie is out and people don't want the captain marvel anymore. Comic shops are always like furious about this. It's like, hey, we've got a movie coming out, and you're out of print on all of the best titles for the character in the movie

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Denis Kitchen: Well, that doesn't sound like the best run company

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Tad Eggleston: No, it doesn't, doesn't

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Soren Christiansen: You know.

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Soren Christiansen: What's it's funny, though, that Den Dennis mentioned the farm that he bought, and

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Soren Christiansen: what I distinctly remember from that story. On the logistics side is that Dennis purchased that farm, and he had a bunch of like minded friends right, Dennis, who and when they, when Dennis said he bought a farm. And, gosh! You guys can move out here and we can all pitch in and do a little work, and we can live you know the the dream. And

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Soren Christiansen: and what happened all those people didn't do work

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Denis Kitchen: So.

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Denis Kitchen: It turns out. No, not all hippies are industrious. I found out

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Ted Intorcio: Who need it.

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Denis Kitchen: Yeah, they they like to live in there and smoking weed and

369
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Denis Kitchen: being, you know, kind of unproductive, and it cost at least

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Tad Eggleston: They were the talent, Dennis. They were the talent

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Denis Kitchen: Well, you know

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Soren Christiansen: But when I okay, I'm sorry.

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Denis Kitchen: I mean, I'll just leave it as I was young and naive and an idealist, and it takes, you know, it takes some experience to realize. Okay, some of the

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Denis Kitchen: ideas you have are not necessarily practical. And

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Denis Kitchen: you know I was a card carrying Socialist then. And I thought, Hey, we'll start a Utopia here. It just doesn't work that way.

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Ted Intorcio: One of the things that I like about

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Ted Intorcio: Dennis's marketing is that he doesn't really apply a whole lot of like marketing science to anything like again with the 78, you know. That's a that's that you could. A rational person could could be convinced that that's a bad idea, you know but but he he went with his gut.

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Ted Intorcio: you know it wasn't about, and I don't think it was about marketing it so much.

379
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Ted Intorcio: It was just. It was a cool thing by a cool guy

380
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Ted Intorcio: or anti-cool guy. I don't know, depending on what you think of our chrome, but but and and it worked, you know, and that's that he was taking a chance. But but

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Ted Intorcio: But it worked. There's something very sincere and kind of artistic about that that I really love

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Tad Eggleston: Well, go ahead. Dennis.

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Denis Kitchen: Well, I was. Gonna say, it's also reason. I don't think it would have been easy for me to work for

384
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Denis Kitchen: a bigger company. Those ideas would have been shot down. It wasn't my money, it wasn't my decision. I think it would have been

385
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Denis Kitchen: very uncomfortable, and I wouldn't have stayed in publishing. So

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Denis Kitchen: it's just a factor, you know you.

387
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Denis Kitchen: If you, if you want to be able to do whatever you want, you've got to have the wherewithal.

388
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Denis Kitchen: and it took a while to get to that point. You know I had no working capital at all starting out, and I couldn't go to a bank with hair halfway down my back and fuzzy face.

389
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Denis Kitchen: Bankers would have

390
00:44:29.830 --> 00:44:36.290
Denis Kitchen: shown me the door very quickly, so I had to self capitalize, and that's a slow process, you know.

391
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Tad Eggleston: Well, and I think you also said a really key word that I think

392
00:44:42.900 --> 00:44:51.840
Tad Eggleston: balances your story really well, which which was, you realized that it wasn't practical. Well, but

393
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Tad Eggleston: you remind me a lot of Bill Veck in baseball, and Richard Feynman in physics like you're willing to take risks. You want to take risks. The fact that nobody's ever done it before isn't at all a good reason not to do it. But at the same time, if you. If you go to set up your your commune, and you discover that most of the people are there to smoke. Pot not like. Fix up the barn you go.

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Tad Eggleston: Let me rethink this

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Denis Kitchen: Yeah, yeah.

396
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Soren Christiansen: Yeah, well.

397
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Tad Eggleston: You know.

398
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Denis Kitchen: I the the reference to Bill Veck. I love because he was like

399
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Denis Kitchen: man, too, if you don't know him well.

400
00:45:29.280 --> 00:45:35.429
Denis Kitchen: not enough to unto understand it, but I know he was a kind of a a maverick in physics.

401
00:45:35.650 --> 00:45:43.954
Denis Kitchen: but but I remember when Vec. Wrote his autobiography, it was called vec, as in wreck cause he upended things

402
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Soren Christiansen: I just remember you talking about Dennis, about when Stan Lee reached out to you. And

403
00:45:52.770 --> 00:45:57.839
Soren Christiansen: you guys agreed to do the the Spoof superhero comic

404
00:45:58.380 --> 00:46:05.230
Soren Christiansen: if I'm correct me if I'm wrong. But then the your your artists

405
00:46:05.540 --> 00:46:11.099
Soren Christiansen: were allowed to keep their work, and Stan Lee called you basically

406
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Soren Christiansen: apoplectic because his artists had found out

407
00:46:16.170 --> 00:46:25.160
Soren Christiansen: that your artists got to keep their work and they did not. They were going to go back to the drafting board for X dollars an hour, whereas

408
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Denis Kitchen: Yeah, it's very. It's very odd. Thinking of that again, because you have to look the context on. That was

409
00:46:33.840 --> 00:46:51.000
Denis Kitchen: the publisher at marvel for many years was a guy named Martin Goodman, who owned the company, and he reached an age where he finally decided to retire and move to Florida, and so Stan, who had been his editor since he was literally a teenager, he made Stan the publisher.

410
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Denis Kitchen: Well, Stan was a terrific writer and editor, but

411
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Denis Kitchen: shortly after he became publisher, and he was very green at it is when

412
00:47:04.100 --> 00:47:10.069
Denis Kitchen: we discussed this idea of me putting out a magazine for him, and I flew to New York.

413
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Denis Kitchen: I basically said, what you summarize there, which is the artists I work with. They're going to expect the original art back. They're going to expect on their copyright and expect to be able to, you know.

414
00:47:23.420 --> 00:47:41.330
Denis Kitchen: use the F word and whatnot, and I don't know if we can work this out, and he said, no, no, he said, he said, I think we can do this, he said. We'll put you in a magazine, so you'll be on newsstands. You don't have to worry about the comic code authority. So that's okay. And he said, Yeah, we can make exceptions for you. So the deal we cut

415
00:47:41.600 --> 00:47:46.140
Denis Kitchen: was honest. It blows my mind. But he

416
00:47:46.560 --> 00:47:54.050
Denis Kitchen: was not a good negotiator. And so this, you know, relatively young hippie from Wisconsin, of all places.

417
00:47:54.460 --> 00:47:58.039
Denis Kitchen: you know, basically pulled a fast one on the New York publisher.

418
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Denis Kitchen: And so, yes, inevitably, the guys in the bullpen and everyone else. They they found out pretty quickly. This was a sweetheart deal, and they resented it. And then he was in a dilemma. And so the easiest thing was Kill the magazine because

419
00:48:13.270 --> 00:48:15.610
Denis Kitchen: he had let Pandora out of the box.

420
00:48:15.820 --> 00:48:19.709
Denis Kitchen: but it was great for that year or year and a half, because

421
00:48:19.860 --> 00:48:23.739
Denis Kitchen: all the starving artists I was dealing with made marvel money, and

422
00:48:23.990 --> 00:48:33.999
Denis Kitchen: we had newsstand exposure. They were printing 200,000 copies instead of our usual 10,000. So a lot of people had their 1st major exposure that way.

423
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Denis Kitchen: So yeah, again, I never could have predicted that. And it's funny even talking about it now. But

424
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Soren Christiansen: But you know, Ted, Ted mentioned the unicorn aspect with you, and and you know I'm not trying to blow sunshine here, but it's unique that

425
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Soren Christiansen: the artists, you you were fighting for the art, for the art, for the artists. And so you would think that Stan Lee would just hate you or you that you 2 would not. And yet you 2 corresponded and had a good relationship, and it and that shows the sign of a mature somebody, a Wisconsin man who could be a who could be a reasoned publisher

426
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Denis Kitchen: Well, I mean even that even the way I got to know Stan it was. It started with me publishing my self publishing my 1st comic, sending it to him as a fan, with a brief letter.

427
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Denis Kitchen: being surprised to get a letter back.

428
00:49:30.280 --> 00:49:37.550
Denis Kitchen: having the temerity to send him another, and pretty soon we were pen pals, and I mean, I thought this guy's way too busy to

429
00:49:37.860 --> 00:49:45.480
Denis Kitchen: be a pen PAL. But there was something about the letters I sent him that he thought were

430
00:49:46.180 --> 00:49:49.869
Denis Kitchen: funny. Even the letterheads I used to in those days I had

431
00:49:50.500 --> 00:49:53.770
Denis Kitchen: still, do you know, a letterhead for every day of the week, and

432
00:49:53.970 --> 00:49:59.659
Denis Kitchen: some of them were funny in a dry kind of way, and one of them

433
00:49:59.930 --> 00:50:08.659
Denis Kitchen: was my office at the time, as the letterhead said was located in the in.

434
00:50:08.940 --> 00:50:10.280
Denis Kitchen: I think it said

435
00:50:14.010 --> 00:50:35.230
Denis Kitchen: it had the word prestigious in it was like in the prestigious loft above the Polyprim dry cleaner. Oh, on Milwaukee's prestigious East Side, and that was just a fine print at the bottom of the letterhead, and it broke them up. And I think to this day. If it hadn't been for that little sly line in the letterhead we wouldn't have gotten to the point of talking business.

436
00:50:35.560 --> 00:50:42.919
Denis Kitchen: but it says something about him that he was open to something new

437
00:50:43.040 --> 00:50:49.020
Denis Kitchen: and receptive. This was a quite a gamble he took, and I mean I don't mean to belittle that he gave

438
00:50:49.330 --> 00:50:52.260
Denis Kitchen: us things he shouldn't have.

439
00:50:53.110 --> 00:50:56.640
Denis Kitchen: I would rather admire him for taking that chance and

440
00:50:56.960 --> 00:51:06.029
Denis Kitchen: putting a significant budget into a big gamble. So I there are people who criticize Stan to me. He was always a gentleman, and he was fair and

441
00:51:06.420 --> 00:51:10.969
Denis Kitchen: right to the end, I think, when we did, a

442
00:51:11.920 --> 00:51:20.429
Denis Kitchen: partner, John Linda and I did a collection of the best of comics book. That which was that magazine, and Stan was already, like.

443
00:51:20.690 --> 00:51:33.299
Denis Kitchen: I think, 90 issue approaching it, and I asked him if he'd write an intro, and he not only did he said it was one of the things he was most proud of which kind of surprised me

444
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Tad Eggleston: Because

445
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Tad Eggleston: this is where I got to throw in a shameless plug just because it was it was appropriate right at the beginning of this whole talk and more so now that we've talked about the intricacies of Stan Lee, my good friend and and regular 22 panels contributor wrote the the

446
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Tad Eggleston: award nominated play House of Ideas that showed in Chicago. This last idea about Stan and Jack. Yeah. Bark prop, met Dennis the 1st time he was on the air. We talked to him because his play then, was the seduction of innocent. So the

447
00:52:10.040 --> 00:52:17.460
Tad Eggleston: or yeah, the seduction of the innocent. So so the Dennis and his legal defense fund

448
00:52:18.030 --> 00:52:20.928
Tad Eggleston: was was very relevant to the work there. But,

449
00:52:21.660 --> 00:52:24.149
Tad Eggleston: The the artwork was a major

450
00:52:25.890 --> 00:52:32.410
Tad Eggleston: point of contention between Kirby and Lee in particular. Eventually.

451
00:52:32.410 --> 00:52:34.140
Tad Eggleston: Yeah. Yeah. But

452
00:52:34.140 --> 00:52:40.100
Tad Eggleston: but it also seems to have started with Goodman. So so it was like, kind of a in-between.

453
00:52:40.400 --> 00:52:45.500
Tad Eggleston: You know, it wasn't that Lee wasn't so

454
00:52:45.500 --> 00:52:48.690
Denis Kitchen: It was the company policy, you know.

455
00:52:49.190 --> 00:52:56.730
Denis Kitchen: Martin Goodman's was a traditional kind of old school publisher, and that's a kind way of putting it.

456
00:52:57.470 --> 00:52:58.120
Denis Kitchen: and I'm

457
00:52:58.120 --> 00:53:07.329
Denis Kitchen: kind way would be the way Harvey Kurtzman portrayed Martin Goodman in his classic jungle book. He portrayed him as a schlock publisher.

458
00:53:07.840 --> 00:53:15.859
Denis Kitchen: and Martin goodman's attitude was, I'm paying these guys, you know, 5 or 10 bucks a page, that's my page.

459
00:53:16.770 --> 00:53:22.940
Denis Kitchen: you know. Was he going to give it back? You know that was was his. That was their attitude.

460
00:53:23.849 --> 00:53:31.040
Denis Kitchen: And I think Stan inherited. You gotta remember he he! This I think Martin was his uncle by

461
00:53:31.160 --> 00:53:32.120
Denis Kitchen: married

462
00:53:32.870 --> 00:53:33.570
Soren Christiansen: And yeah.

463
00:53:33.570 --> 00:53:36.330
Tad Eggleston: Well, and his. His father was

464
00:53:36.540 --> 00:53:42.390
Tad Eggleston: alcoholic and mostly absent. So there was definitely an interesting family, dynamic

465
00:53:42.390 --> 00:53:42.930
Denis Kitchen: Yeah.

466
00:53:42.930 --> 00:53:48.059
Tad Eggleston: You know he was the nephew. That was kind of given a job out of pity, you know.

467
00:53:48.510 --> 00:53:49.830
Denis Kitchen: Well, and also

468
00:53:49.830 --> 00:53:50.879
Tad Eggleston: Stuff going on

469
00:53:51.130 --> 00:53:53.205
Denis Kitchen: Well and actually kind of

470
00:53:53.950 --> 00:53:57.030
Denis Kitchen: tyrannical in the office as a teenager.

471
00:53:57.190 --> 00:54:05.179
Denis Kitchen: They're a Adele I before they'll his son married Harvey Kurtzman.

472
00:54:05.590 --> 00:54:14.050
Denis Kitchen: She worked at the timely office. She was Stan's right hand girl, as they used to say, and so

473
00:54:14.170 --> 00:54:18.590
Denis Kitchen: she was there when Stan was a teenager, and she said

474
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Denis Kitchen: one time she walked in the office in the morning, and he was sitting cross-legged on top of a file cabinet, and everyone who came in had to bow to him like he was a Buddha statue, or he did silly things. One time there was an artist named Frank Giakoya, one of the old timers, who liked to smoke a cigar and read the New York Times

475
00:54:39.990 --> 00:54:44.899
Denis Kitchen: early before that work started at 9 Am.

476
00:54:45.030 --> 00:55:06.079
Denis Kitchen: And one morning Stan saw him still reading the paper with a cigar in his mouth at like 5 after, and he canned them for the day, he said, Frank, you're going home breaking the rules. So what didn't sound like a nice kid? It sounded like, Hey, my uncle owns this place, and you have to take my orders, no matter what age I am.

477
00:55:06.370 --> 00:55:13.039
Denis Kitchen: and obviously he got more mature. But imagine being given the responsibility

478
00:55:13.760 --> 00:55:23.939
Denis Kitchen: as a teenager to run an office! I don't know how many employees. But there are a lot of people there, including Al Jaffe, was there at that time, and other people you'd remember.

479
00:55:24.310 --> 00:55:25.300
Denis Kitchen: So

480
00:55:27.480 --> 00:55:35.720
Denis Kitchen: you know. That's like you don't. You don't hear stuff like that, because there are very few people who witnessed it who were alive by the time. Fans were curious

481
00:55:36.330 --> 00:55:36.665
Tad Eggleston: Yeah.

482
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Soren Christiansen: And just a little just a little teaser. Ted, for our documentary. Karen green. Is the curator.

483
00:55:46.350 --> 00:55:59.309
Soren Christiansen: Yeah. The comics for for Columbia University, and they Columbia University has about. I think it's over 50,000 documents of Dennis's archived letters.

484
00:56:00.450 --> 00:56:01.060
Soren Christiansen: Everything

485
00:56:01.060 --> 00:56:06.110
Denis Kitchen: It's 50, some 1,000 just letters, plus other documents. Yeah.

486
00:56:06.110 --> 00:56:16.126
Soren Christiansen: Yeah, okay? And so, but in them, I was looking at one today. Actually, it's from Stan. It's between you and Stan Lee. And you had apparently written them a letter.

487
00:56:16.550 --> 00:56:19.850
Soren Christiansen: considering doing a satire of spider-man.

488
00:56:20.680 --> 00:56:24.440
Soren Christiansen: he wrote back, basically saying abso-fucking-lutely, not

489
00:56:24.860 --> 00:56:31.030
Denis Kitchen: That's right, because because if you do that satire, we lose the copyright

490
00:56:31.150 --> 00:56:31.880
Soren Christiansen: So there!

491
00:56:31.880 --> 00:56:32.240
Denis Kitchen: Well.

492
00:56:32.240 --> 00:56:33.699
Soren Christiansen: Way, and now you're touching

493
00:56:33.700 --> 00:56:34.969
Denis Kitchen: Yeah, and I mean it.

494
00:56:35.130 --> 00:56:48.899
Denis Kitchen: I would still argue. I mean, a satire is protected. But I wanted to do an extensive one that probably went too far. But yeah, that was an example of him, you know. I hit a raw nerve there, and he got a little paranoid, but

495
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Soren Christiansen: Oh, but he was, but he was fun. It was genial. It wasn't like, you know he was. He was, you know. It was like a brother saying to you, no effing way, but I think

496
00:56:57.210 --> 00:57:00.080
Denis Kitchen: You're you're yeah. You're out of your fucking mind, as I think

497
00:57:03.640 --> 00:57:16.562
Soren Christiansen: Yeah. So there's some really good stuff that we're gonna show in the in the documentary. There's some. There's some fun correspondence. There's another one that I won't share. But it's it's pretty. It's extraordinary. Some of the stuff that we're going to show

498
00:57:17.080 --> 00:57:21.140
Soren Christiansen: just from a cultural perspective, the way people responded when asked

499
00:57:21.700 --> 00:57:24.530
Soren Christiansen: about themselves and what you know

500
00:57:24.660 --> 00:57:29.669
Soren Christiansen: their fears, I guess. So I'm not gonna talk anymore about that. But that'll be in the doc.

501
00:57:29.830 --> 00:57:35.399
Ted Intorcio: Yeah, we we've got a few new people that have just sort of

502
00:57:35.580 --> 00:57:50.979
Ted Intorcio: signed on for to be interviewed. So Allison Bechdel is one that we have recently, you know, she's given her. Okay, they're okay for that. And

503
00:57:51.680 --> 00:57:56.370
Soren Christiansen: Dan Klaus actually is going to be interviewed. So we're

504
00:57:56.500 --> 00:58:01.949
Ted Intorcio: Happy about that Noah van Skyver. We just talked to him

505
00:58:01.950 --> 00:58:04.429
Tad Eggleston: New book was excellent. I read it yesterday.

506
00:58:04.430 --> 00:58:07.590
Ted Intorcio: I read it. I read it last week. Yeah, it was pretty good, right?

507
00:58:07.590 --> 00:58:08.542
Ted Intorcio: I liked it.

508
00:58:08.860 --> 00:58:09.770
Tad Eggleston: It, Rufus

509
00:58:09.770 --> 00:58:17.860
Ted Intorcio: I actually yeah, what's funny about that is, I actually just read his grateful dead thing.

510
00:58:18.770 --> 00:58:19.770
Ted Intorcio: which was also very

511
00:58:19.770 --> 00:58:21.280
Tad Eggleston: I still need to read that. Yeah.

512
00:58:21.280 --> 00:58:26.619
Ted Intorcio: I don't think there's there aren't too many things that he's done that I don't really enjoy

513
00:58:26.620 --> 00:58:28.109
Tad Eggleston: You know Noah's impressive

514
00:58:28.110 --> 00:58:31.130
Denis Kitchen: Yeah, yeah. And he's so he's so prolific

515
00:58:31.270 --> 00:58:33.120
Ted Intorcio: He's oh, my God! He's fast

516
00:58:33.750 --> 00:58:36.389
Denis Kitchen: How many pages a day does he do

517
00:58:36.390 --> 00:58:49.709
Ted Intorcio: He can whip him out if he's if he's really. I used to go to a drink and draw with him every Wednesday night, you know, I would drive him to to the thing because he didn't have a car, and he could just

518
00:58:50.020 --> 00:58:54.480
Ted Intorcio: he could just work. He's very, you know, focused.

519
00:58:54.640 --> 00:58:59.420
Ted Intorcio: and there's no nonsense about his work. You know a lot of people

520
00:58:59.780 --> 00:59:10.729
Ted Intorcio: that were his age when we were doing it, they would labor. I'm 1 of those people that labors over you mentioned the the alfalfa book, you know. That took me a long time to do that little 24 page comic

521
00:59:10.730 --> 00:59:11.060
Denis Kitchen: Yeah.

522
00:59:11.476 --> 00:59:16.479
Ted Intorcio: And he could. He could do something like that, you know.

523
00:59:16.740 --> 00:59:20.090
Ted Intorcio: over a course of a couple of weeks if he wanted to.

524
00:59:21.290 --> 00:59:38.649
Ted Intorcio: He doesn't. He doesn't mess around. He doesn't mess around with the computer much, either. He, you know, goes straight to the lettering, you know. He just he can see it. You're one of those people, too, Dennis. You can, I said. How do you letter things without penciling it in 1st he goes. I just can see it on the page before

525
00:59:39.100 --> 00:59:43.150
Tad Eggleston: You know, before I write it down I can make it fit. Oh, wait a minute.

526
00:59:43.150 --> 00:59:49.578
Soren Christiansen: See now I'm feeling even more stupid. So I've actually met you, Ted. I bought alfalfa from you at cake.

527
00:59:49.900 --> 00:59:51.869
Ted Intorcio: Oh, oh, cake! Okay. Great.

528
00:59:52.205 --> 00:59:52.540
Denis Kitchen: Yeah.

529
00:59:52.540 --> 00:59:54.990
Tad Eggleston: In probably 2019

530
00:59:55.390 --> 00:59:59.720
Ted Intorcio: Yeah, that was a while back. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That. I only did cake once.

531
01:00:00.030 --> 01:00:01.130
Ted Intorcio: So yeah.

532
01:00:02.040 --> 01:00:03.329
Tad Eggleston: I was there.

533
01:00:03.757 --> 01:00:05.530
Ted Intorcio: Lot of fun, fun.

534
01:00:05.530 --> 01:00:06.400
Denis Kitchen: That's fine!

535
01:00:06.920 --> 01:00:08.430
Ted Intorcio: I appreciate it. Yeah, I

536
01:00:08.430 --> 01:00:10.990
Denis Kitchen: Yeah. The 1st of a series, right? Ted.

537
01:00:10.990 --> 01:00:17.550
Ted Intorcio: Well, I have a second one out about Mickey Daniels, who was a

538
01:00:17.930 --> 01:00:28.460
Ted Intorcio: he was a silent movie. He was, you know, like a generation before alfalfa and during the before they had talkies.

539
01:00:28.600 --> 01:00:31.559
Ted Intorcio: and that one's out, and it's called horse laugh.

540
01:00:31.730 --> 01:00:33.210
Ted Intorcio: And I'm actually working off one

541
01:00:33.210 --> 01:00:33.770
Tad Eggleston: Goals.

542
01:00:33.770 --> 01:00:35.999
Ted Intorcio: The death of Freckles. Do you have that one too?

543
01:00:36.000 --> 01:00:38.060
Tad Eggleston: I don't. But I'm looking at it on your website.

544
01:00:38.060 --> 01:00:41.160
Ted Intorcio: Okay. And I'm I'm working on one. I've been working on a quote

545
01:00:41.160 --> 01:00:45.849
Tad Eggleston: I've been looking for you a cake every year since, because I knew that you were working on more

546
01:00:45.850 --> 01:00:52.680
Ted Intorcio: Oh, yeah, well, I mean working on it, you know, between between other things. But

547
01:00:52.680 --> 01:00:58.719
Tad Eggleston: Well, you were very excited. In 2019 you made it sound like they were going to come out on a regular basis.

548
01:00:58.720 --> 01:00:59.660
Ted Intorcio: Yeah, well, that.

549
01:00:59.660 --> 01:01:00.800
Tad Eggleston: And I haven't talked to you since

550
01:01:00.800 --> 01:01:11.929
Ted Intorcio: Yeah, I think I think in 2019, I started to work on the next one, which was about the character that played Farina.

551
01:01:12.330 --> 01:01:21.549
Ted Intorcio: who was a sort of a the the black kid. You know what I mean quote unquote. He was one of the early ones he was sort of.

552
01:01:22.199 --> 01:01:25.930
Ted Intorcio: you know, buckwheat was kind of like farina 2.0.

553
01:01:26.400 --> 01:01:42.280
Ted Intorcio: And I talk about that in in this new book. So I've been working on that one for for quite that one's going to be a little longer. It's gonna be. It's a little bit more serious work. And but you know, this isn't about me. So

554
01:01:42.280 --> 01:01:46.280
Denis Kitchen: This is what happens when a cartoonist becomes a publisher right

555
01:01:46.500 --> 01:01:49.110
Ted Intorcio: Yeah, you get. You get sidetracked easily.

556
01:01:50.000 --> 01:01:51.489
Ted Intorcio: I was supposed to be

557
01:01:51.490 --> 01:02:01.130
Tad Eggleston: Well, it's also what happens on this. Podcast. We definitely get sidetracked easily for that matter. I'm going to drop something in the

558
01:02:01.280 --> 01:02:08.659
Tad Eggleston: the chat. That's breaking news, and I'll let Dennis decide if we want to get sidetracked by it.

559
01:02:08.660 --> 01:02:09.870
Denis Kitchen: Breaking News

560
01:02:10.520 --> 01:02:12.590
Tad Eggleston: Yeah, I just got an email

561
01:02:15.220 --> 01:02:22.971
Tad Eggleston: and and you know that this one of the questions that I want to ask that that we might work this new story into is that

562
01:02:23.710 --> 01:02:36.160
Tad Eggleston: One of the more recent books that I've picked up from you and I've loved is your consumer. Comics which you made just in time for them to to end the grants that you made it for

563
01:02:37.640 --> 01:02:39.389
Tad Eggleston: and we seem to be

564
01:02:39.950 --> 01:02:46.079
Tad Eggleston: going through another phase of that where it's like all sorts of good, interesting things that have been.

565
01:02:47.400 --> 01:02:49.970
Tad Eggleston: The funding gets cut off. Yeah.

566
01:02:49.970 --> 01:02:55.006
Tad Eggleston: funding has been taken away, or things have been erased.

567
01:02:56.450 --> 01:03:02.790
Tad Eggleston: so I mean, kind of talk to me a little bit about what it's like to to have been

568
01:03:03.500 --> 01:03:06.680
Tad Eggleston: been at the forefront of the counter revolution

569
01:03:07.510 --> 01:03:13.569
Tad Eggleston: 40 years ago, and have to see it come back as you're having a documentary made about you.

570
01:03:13.570 --> 01:03:21.359
Denis Kitchen: Know. They say history is cyclical. So it, you know, it would have been easy to predict, not at this level of

571
01:03:22.710 --> 01:03:23.210
Denis Kitchen: sanity.

572
01:03:24.680 --> 01:03:25.530
Denis Kitchen: Yeah.

573
01:03:25.880 --> 01:03:38.040
Denis Kitchen: I mean. It seemed much simpler when I was in my twenties, and Richard Nixon seemed like the most evil person there could be, and my God rather have him in the White House, you know almost anybody

574
01:03:38.490 --> 01:03:40.679
Tad Eggleston: Hey? At least he believed in climate change

575
01:03:41.410 --> 01:03:43.990
Denis Kitchen: Well. And yeah, he started the EPA, that's right.

576
01:03:43.990 --> 01:03:44.890
Tad Eggleston: Right.

577
01:03:46.330 --> 01:03:51.160
Denis Kitchen: But yeah. Well, like that consumer comics thing wasn't

578
01:03:52.800 --> 01:03:59.020
Denis Kitchen: Well, I I was at. I was at a local bar called hooligan's, and I was talking to a friend.

579
01:03:59.190 --> 01:04:04.359
Denis Kitchen: and there was a guy sitting next to me in a suit I wasn't really paying attention to and

580
01:04:04.480 --> 01:04:17.010
Denis Kitchen: talking to my friend. Comics must have entered the conversation, because at some point the guy in the suit turned to me and like tapped my shoulder or something, and he said, he said, Are you in the comics business?

581
01:04:17.760 --> 01:04:22.439
Denis Kitchen: And I turned to him like, Yeah, why?

582
01:04:23.050 --> 01:04:36.390
Denis Kitchen: And he reached into his pocket and he pulled out a business card and handed it to me, and it said he was the Assistant Attorney General of a State of Wisconsin, in charge of consumer affairs.

583
01:04:36.900 --> 01:04:53.980
Denis Kitchen: and he said, he said, we hand out these really dry tracts to students to educate them, and he said, They don't seem to be very effective. And he said. I'm wondering if comics might be a way to reach these kids with a message they'll actually learn.

584
01:04:54.620 --> 01:05:02.419
Denis Kitchen: And and so I took his card and I said, Well, that sounds interesting, you know we can follow up. And we did.

585
01:05:02.770 --> 01:05:13.019
Denis Kitchen: And he managed to get the last grant from the office of economic opportunity before Nixon killed it.

586
01:05:13.450 --> 01:05:14.069
Denis Kitchen: and

587
01:05:14.920 --> 01:05:22.350
Denis Kitchen: So myself and 2 other artists, Pete Paplaski and Pete Loft, did this thing, working with

588
01:05:23.130 --> 01:05:29.770
Denis Kitchen: people in the you know, obviously department of consumer education to the point being to

589
01:05:31.530 --> 01:05:50.160
Denis Kitchen: give it to 17 year old high school seniors just before they legally can sign a contract. And it basically, it's these are common scams to watch out for and just be smart before you sign anything. And it seemed to be pretty successful, and it got reprinted, and

590
01:05:50.390 --> 01:05:55.739
Denis Kitchen: a couple of other States, and somebody actually counterfeited it.

591
01:05:57.450 --> 01:06:00.010
Denis Kitchen: With bad art, and

592
01:06:00.340 --> 01:06:05.469
Denis Kitchen: I forget how we found out. I've got a copy of my file somewhere. It's like somebody went to the trouble.

593
01:06:05.940 --> 01:06:08.989
Denis Kitchen: They I mean, they could have just xeroxed ours, but they could

594
01:06:08.990 --> 01:06:09.700
Soren Christiansen: Yeah.

595
01:06:09.700 --> 01:06:13.899
Denis Kitchen: They redrew it all the same words and everything. And so.

596
01:06:15.350 --> 01:06:21.689
Denis Kitchen: But through the reprints and the counterfeits, and whatever. Yeah, it reached, a lot of kids, and I hope it made a difference.

597
01:06:21.980 --> 01:06:28.680
Denis Kitchen: and the whole idea of educational comics was very appealing to me. And it's something I would have

598
01:06:28.840 --> 01:06:39.250
Denis Kitchen: probably pursued, but the process of doing that, and having everything fact checked and everything questioned by bureaucrats.

599
01:06:39.992 --> 01:06:45.170
Denis Kitchen: just was oppressive, and when it was done I was glad it was done, but I said Never again

600
01:06:46.237 --> 01:06:47.639
Denis Kitchen: and it was

601
01:06:48.490 --> 01:06:55.070
Tad Eggleston: I mean, I just it popped into my head in part because I've I've recently sat in on some

602
01:06:58.330 --> 01:07:08.620
Tad Eggleston: like financial literacy classes for high school kids that like, they're watching Youtube videos from Charles Schwab without even anybody mentioning that, like

603
01:07:08.930 --> 01:07:14.709
Tad Eggleston: these tutorials might actually also have a bias

604
01:07:14.710 --> 01:07:15.689
Soren Christiansen: And wow.

605
01:07:18.405 --> 01:07:21.600
Tad Eggleston: And I'm sitting there going. Where's consumer comics now?

606
01:07:21.600 --> 01:07:23.520
Denis Kitchen: Well, you know you can. Xerox. Your

607
01:07:24.130 --> 01:07:27.510
Denis Kitchen: pass it around. I won't object

608
01:07:28.010 --> 01:07:38.320
Tad Eggleston: We're we're we're we're literally letting let letting the curriculum be handed out to the financial companies rather

609
01:07:38.320 --> 01:07:42.849
Soren Christiansen: It's well, I mean the lobbyists, I mean the lobbyists are writing the laws anyways, right?

610
01:07:42.850 --> 01:07:47.068
Tad Eggleston: Exactly. That's that's that's that's that's where I was going.

611
01:07:47.490 --> 01:08:15.550
Soren Christiansen: It was Stephen Colbert at the White House press dinner, or whatever years ago, and he was under bush, and he said that this should be the heyday for journalists. They literally are going to write the stories for you. All you need to do is go to the office and just turn it in. You can go back home and write that novel you've been dying to write for the last 10 years, basically calling them out for cowardice, saying, you know, there's there's something that's going on here, folks, and you might want to report on it. But

612
01:08:16.220 --> 01:08:20.050
Soren Christiansen: they're not. And so we're. It's a strange time

613
01:08:20.560 --> 01:08:24.889
Tad Eggleston: It's strange. Time is the nicest way to put it.

614
01:08:25.439 --> 01:08:27.289
Tad Eggleston: By the way, you, I'm so happy.

615
01:08:27.390 --> 01:08:46.879
Tad Eggleston: so happy, that they haven't noticed comics yet every once in a while they'll talk about. They'll talk about woke comics because Superboy is gay or or whatnot, but they haven't actually taken the time to to read comics and discover that we've been liberal forever.

616
01:08:47.010 --> 01:08:51.010
Ted Intorcio: There's there's not. That's because there's not a ton of money in it, you know. That's

617
01:08:52.279 --> 01:09:01.689
Ted Intorcio: that is literally the only reason they haven't attacked it yet. That's 1 of the reasons that the queer community has been able to, you know, make it their own.

618
01:09:02.050 --> 01:09:07.199
Ted Intorcio: Yes, you know, and and that's the the reason that you know comic

619
01:09:08.630 --> 01:09:11.270
Tad Eggleston: Did you say that they have gone after some comics

620
01:09:11.279 --> 01:09:11.599
Ted Intorcio: Sorry.

621
01:09:11.600 --> 01:09:16.120
Tad Eggleston: Ya comics that involve gay people they'll go after, or black people

622
01:09:16.120 --> 01:09:16.700
Soren Christiansen: Yeah.

623
01:09:16.700 --> 01:09:23.639
Tad Eggleston: We can't have those middle school kids knowing that gay and black people exist and are okay and are real human beings.

624
01:09:23.640 --> 01:09:24.270
Ted Intorcio: Yeah.

625
01:09:25.120 --> 01:09:34.350
Soren Christiansen: It'll be interesting, because I think that the it's the the underground movements that are usually the ones that end up causing the revolution. And I don't

626
01:09:34.359 --> 01:09:34.799
Tad Eggleston: Absolutely.

627
01:09:34.859 --> 01:09:47.499
Soren Christiansen: Violent overthrow. But there's there's, you know, there's cowardice. This it's again. It's going back to the money thing. Too many Americans are too in debt.

628
01:09:47.930 --> 01:09:53.659
Soren Christiansen: to beholden, to banks, to credit cards, and

629
01:09:53.660 --> 01:09:56.929
Tad Eggleston: Student loans. Don't forget my student loans

630
01:09:56.930 --> 01:10:20.889
Soren Christiansen: And they're not going to rock that boat, and they're just saying, Hey, you know. And that was exactly what happened in the 19 thirties, you know I've got this little piece of land here, you know I don't. Don't rock this boat. Well, the boat's going to get rocked either way. You can be accountable now and step up, or you can wait until quote the cows come home. But

631
01:10:21.010 --> 01:10:23.690
Soren Christiansen: you know, eventually there's got to be paid for

632
01:10:23.690 --> 01:10:29.210
Tad Eggleston: I I think the cows got bought by multimillion dollar corporations. They're not actually coming home

633
01:10:29.710 --> 01:10:30.570
Soren Christiansen: No, the

634
01:10:32.240 --> 01:10:46.890
Soren Christiansen: have you seen the price? Have you seen that? Now we're going to? We went to Denmark asking for eggs, and now we're going to Germany. I mean, it's like dude. We just squatted on your country and crapped all over it. What what do you? What do you mean? And now we're basically just like, Hey, you guys.

635
01:10:46.890 --> 01:10:47.470
Tad Eggleston: Beggar.

636
01:10:47.470 --> 01:10:50.360
Soren Christiansen: I mean, it's just. It's insanity.

637
01:10:50.860 --> 01:10:52.360
Tad Eggleston: It's just insanity.

638
01:10:52.570 --> 01:11:00.987
Soren Christiansen: On a on a lighter note. You you guys mentioned you the warehouse that Dennis had at in

639
01:11:01.879 --> 01:11:06.550
Soren Christiansen: Wisconsin. I sent you a request. That's okay. I was gonna show you

640
01:11:06.980 --> 01:11:14.109
Soren Christiansen: as we had a small teaser video us that let me see, can I do it now. Yep, there we go!

641
01:11:15.560 --> 01:11:19.459
Tad Eggleston: Nobody else gets to see this, because we're audio only. But I'm going to get to see something cool

642
01:11:19.860 --> 01:11:21.380
Soren Christiansen: Now? Where is

643
01:11:21.380 --> 01:11:22.059
Tad Eggleston: On their end.

644
01:11:22.060 --> 01:11:24.360
Soren Christiansen: There it is. Yep. Okay. There we go

645
01:11:24.920 --> 01:11:28.049
Soren Christiansen: there. And can you see that

646
01:11:28.290 --> 01:11:29.250
Tad Eggleston: Oh, yeah.

647
01:11:30.100 --> 01:11:36.399
Soren Christiansen: So just literally in the Cryogenic Institute.

648
01:11:36.610 --> 01:11:46.849
Soren Christiansen: which is Dennis's warehouse in Massachusetts. I went, and just, you know, for about a half an hour and just took some shots, and just I didn't move anything.

649
01:11:47.100 --> 01:11:51.900
Soren Christiansen: And so here you have, Janice, what is that? Is that? A what is that a printing is that a press

650
01:11:51.900 --> 01:11:53.440
Denis Kitchen: Bing press. Well.

651
01:11:53.440 --> 01:11:54.580
Soren Christiansen: The printing press

652
01:11:54.780 --> 01:11:56.347
Denis Kitchen: No, actually, it's

653
01:11:57.120 --> 01:12:02.839
Denis Kitchen: If you have things that are wrinkled. You! It's a high pressure.

654
01:12:03.714 --> 01:12:07.620
Denis Kitchen: Forget a press but not a printing press.

655
01:12:07.620 --> 01:12:08.240
Tad Eggleston: Oh, right?

656
01:12:08.240 --> 01:12:08.790
Tad Eggleston: Price.

657
01:12:08.790 --> 01:12:10.579
Ted Intorcio: It's a. It's a book press. Yeah.

658
01:12:10.580 --> 01:12:11.120
Denis Kitchen: Yeah.

659
01:12:11.620 --> 01:12:20.319
Soren Christiansen: But just in that shot I mean, you've got Crumb Eisner, and is, that is that Krupp in the back, Dennis, with the 60 cents each

660
01:12:22.098 --> 01:12:23.370
Denis Kitchen: Yes, that's Steve Grubb

661
01:12:23.890 --> 01:12:31.320
Soren Christiansen: That's deep crop. So yeah, so it's there's a lot of fun, a lot of fun stuff that we're going to show in the documentary. We also.

662
01:12:32.530 --> 01:12:33.360
Soren Christiansen: as a little side

663
01:12:33.360 --> 01:12:36.700
Tad Eggleston: I mean, I know that I just like going through his.

664
01:12:36.820 --> 01:12:47.870
Tad Eggleston: And this is something that that I don't think I've ever mentioned before. I love the fact that you leave stuff up on your website, even when it's sold out, because it makes it half website, half museum

665
01:12:48.060 --> 01:12:48.540
Soren Christiansen: Oh!

666
01:12:49.020 --> 01:12:54.679
Tad Eggleston: I I like to be able to go through and go. Oh, wow! That looks cool. I wish I'd bought it 10 years ago.

667
01:12:55.040 --> 01:13:00.340
Denis Kitchen: That's a that's totally my wife's decision. She runs that entirely by herself.

668
01:13:00.580 --> 01:13:02.119
Tad Eggleston: Well, it was a good call

669
01:13:02.719 --> 01:13:05.220
Denis Kitchen: Okay, I'll I'll tell her that.

670
01:13:05.430 --> 01:13:05.950
Denis Kitchen: Be

671
01:13:05.950 --> 01:13:10.360
Tad Eggleston: Because I do. I really, I really enjoy being able to see

672
01:13:10.540 --> 01:13:14.059
Tad Eggleston: see things that aren't necessarily available, but are are

673
01:13:14.540 --> 01:13:23.940
Denis Kitchen: Actually you should. You should say that, send it to info@denniskitchen.com, and she'll read it, and she'll love getting a compliment. So

674
01:13:23.940 --> 01:13:29.000
Soren Christiansen: And and if you could just send a picture of a of a Reese's buttercup peanut buttercup

675
01:13:29.960 --> 01:13:36.139
Soren Christiansen: that she'll get those when the order is fulfilled. I promise you she'll expedite that that order

676
01:13:36.660 --> 01:13:37.699
Tad Eggleston: He likes

677
01:13:37.700 --> 01:13:39.140
Soren Christiansen: The peanut butter, cups.

678
01:13:39.510 --> 01:13:42.610
Tad Eggleston: Reese's peanut butter cups good to know.

679
01:13:43.290 --> 01:13:48.919
Tad Eggleston: So the next time I make an order I'll call Dennis and say, Pick up some Reese's on your way home.

680
01:13:49.070 --> 01:13:51.000
Tad Eggleston: Give them to your wife.

681
01:13:51.590 --> 01:13:53.890
Tad Eggleston: No, no, they're from me

682
01:13:53.890 --> 01:13:56.380
Denis Kitchen: It'll be packed with extra loving care

683
01:13:59.060 --> 01:13:59.990
Tad Eggleston: Oh!

684
01:14:00.980 --> 01:14:01.969
Soren Christiansen: Any other questions.

685
01:14:02.300 --> 01:14:05.594
Tad Eggleston: Yeah, I've got. I've got a I've got a couple I'm gonna start with.

686
01:14:06.110 --> 01:14:12.100
Tad Eggleston: start with, you guys without necessarily spoiling anything that you don't want to spoil

687
01:14:12.787 --> 01:14:17.820
Tad Eggleston: talk to me about something you didn't know before you started the project

688
01:14:18.710 --> 01:14:19.180
Ted Intorcio: Oh, God!

689
01:14:19.660 --> 01:14:20.540
Ted Intorcio: So much.

690
01:14:21.000 --> 01:14:37.560
Tad Eggleston: That well, that that like really stuck out to you as in like, wow! I thought you were cool before, but now or wow! I thought you were cool, and now I can't believe I'm making a documentary, because, man, that was a jerk move. I don't think this has ever done that.

691
01:14:37.560 --> 01:14:42.410
Ted Intorcio: Yeah, I won't get too much into this. But you know Dennis was drafted.

692
01:14:43.280 --> 01:14:46.190
Ted Intorcio: for in, you know, during the Vietnam War.

693
01:14:47.110 --> 01:14:51.599
Ted Intorcio: and there's a story about that that I'd prefer. We don't tell

694
01:14:52.390 --> 01:14:53.080
Soren Christiansen: Correct.

695
01:14:53.496 --> 01:14:58.073
Ted Intorcio: Right now, but but we'll be covered, and and that was

696
01:14:59.450 --> 01:15:02.610
Ted Intorcio: That was, you know, poignant.

697
01:15:03.700 --> 01:15:06.349
Ted Intorcio: It was poignant, and and something worth

698
01:15:06.470 --> 01:15:10.410
Ted Intorcio: worth hearing about, you know. And

699
01:15:10.410 --> 01:15:15.089
Tad Eggleston: Just made it. So I'm looking forward to the documentary more. Yeah, I was already looking forward to it

700
01:15:15.884 --> 01:15:19.920
Ted Intorcio: But you know, like there, there's some actually

701
01:15:20.870 --> 01:15:31.810
Ted Intorcio: every everything I find out, you know, I go. Wow! That is really cool, and and I don't know everything. I you know you'd think I'd be an expert on Dennis Kitchen at this point right? But is it possible

702
01:15:31.810 --> 01:15:32.500
Tad Eggleston: Possible.

703
01:15:32.910 --> 01:15:36.070
Tad Eggleston: I I mean, I don't know if Dennis is a an expert on my point.

704
01:15:38.280 --> 01:15:50.699
Ted Intorcio: I. He's he's the preeminent, you know, expert on Dennis kitchen, but but I mean there's a lot. There's a lot going on there, and he's not done yet, you know. That's that's the other thing I'd like to do.

705
01:15:50.700 --> 01:15:51.320
Denis Kitchen: Yeah, same thing.

706
01:15:51.320 --> 01:15:53.130
Ted Intorcio: But he's still working on this stuff

707
01:15:54.070 --> 01:15:55.129
Tad Eggleston: You know.

708
01:15:56.290 --> 01:15:56.870
Ted Intorcio: Yeah.

709
01:15:56.870 --> 01:16:00.939
Tad Eggleston: I'm not supposed to to end this episode in loving memory

710
01:16:01.230 --> 01:16:07.300
Ted Intorcio: No gonna outlive, all of us. He's gonna attend my funeral, that's for sure.

711
01:16:07.650 --> 01:16:08.890
Tad Eggleston: I'm in favor of that

712
01:16:10.930 --> 01:16:12.000
Ted Intorcio: Yeah.

713
01:16:12.000 --> 01:16:14.660
Tad Eggleston: Not in favor of you having a funeral anytime soon. Just

714
01:16:14.660 --> 01:16:15.340
Ted Intorcio: Oh, good!

715
01:16:15.340 --> 01:16:16.859
Tad Eggleston: Money for it.

716
01:16:17.330 --> 01:16:26.490
Ted Intorcio: But you know just he's a he's a font of of.

717
01:16:26.600 --> 01:16:33.740
Ted Intorcio: you know, not just knowledge about comics and collecting and 1st amendment rights. But

718
01:16:33.740 --> 01:16:42.280
Tad Eggleston: That font for a second. There, I'm like Dennis has his own font, too. I mean, he's been in comics long enough. That would make sense, but I haven't seen the kitchen font

719
01:16:42.280 --> 01:16:43.650
Ted Intorcio: Ount, I guess, is the

720
01:16:44.219 --> 01:16:45.359
Tad Eggleston: No, I

721
01:16:46.700 --> 01:16:47.350
Ted Intorcio: But

722
01:16:47.350 --> 01:16:49.520
Tad Eggleston: Autism brain. Late at night.

723
01:16:49.520 --> 01:16:50.189
Ted Intorcio: Oh, sure!

724
01:16:50.190 --> 01:16:52.021
Tad Eggleston: Forgive me, forgive my

725
01:16:52.480 --> 01:16:58.949
Ted Intorcio: Yeah, yeah, I stopped being able to, you know, make complete sentences at about 8 30. So

726
01:17:00.470 --> 01:17:03.529
Ted Intorcio: At night. That's what television is for. But

727
01:17:03.720 --> 01:17:10.599
Ted Intorcio: yeah, he's also just a good friend. And just a really interesting guy to have a you know, a beer with

728
01:17:10.600 --> 01:17:11.210
Denis Kitchen: Hmm!

729
01:17:13.090 --> 01:17:18.169
Denis Kitchen: Well, that's how it started when I 1st met Ted at this little Denver show.

730
01:17:18.500 --> 01:17:24.429
Denis Kitchen: and I liked them right away. And I think, I said, are you busy, lady? You want to grab a beer, and that's how it started

731
01:17:24.430 --> 01:17:25.120
Ted Intorcio: Yeah.

732
01:17:25.450 --> 01:17:52.694
Ted Intorcio: we ended up going on this long walk, because we're trying to figure out where the party was, you know, for the and we had heard it was at this bar, and we were walking with a couple of his friends as well, and we're walking here, and we're walking there, and I was getting upset. I'm like, where the hell is this place? This is terribly unorganized. I'm part of this. I should know what's going on. And then we did finally find it. And we just we had a grand conference, you know, great conversation. And

733
01:17:54.140 --> 01:18:04.560
Ted Intorcio: you know, there were a lot of fans of Dennis there, obviously surrounding him. So that was when I really started to find out about him. I don't know, Soren, what what

734
01:18:04.850 --> 01:18:15.590
Ted Intorcio: is there anything that you found out that, you know. Was that changed your attitudes, or or like, you know, made a an impression

735
01:18:17.440 --> 01:18:18.920
Tad Eggleston: And you're muted right now

736
01:18:20.920 --> 01:18:28.440
Soren Christiansen: I love the underground aspect. I was really impressed with the people that we interviewed.

737
01:18:29.390 --> 01:18:33.231
Soren Christiansen: because interviewing Mari and Naomi,

738
01:18:34.000 --> 01:18:34.400
Ted Intorcio: Yeah.

739
01:18:34.400 --> 01:18:38.119
Soren Christiansen: Who who was, you know, who grew up? Basically

740
01:18:38.410 --> 01:18:41.560
Soren Christiansen: basically believing that there was no one like her.

741
01:18:41.690 --> 01:18:45.820
Soren Christiansen: and that she was terribly alone. And that's and that's an awful thing.

742
01:18:46.070 --> 01:18:48.580
Soren Christiansen: That's I mean, I just it it

743
01:18:49.200 --> 01:18:56.490
Soren Christiansen: I don't. You know. An adult, an adult can can deal with pain. It is what it is. When you hear about a child it's like because a child will

744
01:18:56.620 --> 01:19:16.540
Soren Christiansen: will blame themselves, and they'll think that which is exactly. You know. I believe Marianomi was talking about is that you think? Well, then, I'm wrong. There's a reason why I that no one talks to me or likes me, or and so with her. There was a young woman she was best friends with.

745
01:19:16.640 --> 01:19:20.279
Soren Christiansen: and then, you know, when you start to come of age,

746
01:19:21.100 --> 01:19:29.200
Soren Christiansen: if if you're if you are raised heterosexual, and you've not been taught to be open-minded.

747
01:19:29.780 --> 01:19:35.689
Soren Christiansen: What happened with Marianomi was that all of a sudden her best friend, you know, stopped talking to her

748
01:19:37.390 --> 01:19:38.200
Tad Eggleston: They!

749
01:19:38.780 --> 01:19:45.409
Soren Christiansen: They? I do apologize. I keep saying I am the worst, and I apologize. I will. I am, an I'm a dinosaur, and if

750
01:19:45.410 --> 01:19:50.630
Tad Eggleston: I can also also be the worst sometimes, but that's why I try to try to

751
01:19:50.630 --> 01:19:59.409
Soren Christiansen: Absolutely, and I didn't catch you on that. Yes, and so to me, my absolute apologies on that. And I am. I am struggling with that

752
01:19:59.410 --> 01:20:06.970
Tad Eggleston: And to Mari Naomi, if you're actually listening. Oh, my God! I'm incredibly, incredibly flattered, and I'd love to have you on

753
01:20:09.000 --> 01:20:23.789
Soren Christiansen: My my saving grace in that regard is that I, anybody who knows me is that I am what I am, and I absolutely, unequivocally. I may not understand something, but the right to be the right to exist

754
01:20:23.790 --> 01:20:29.500
Tad Eggleston: I sometimes off air when I know that there are pronouns that I might stumble over.

755
01:20:29.680 --> 01:20:33.859
Tad Eggleston: Just tell people I grew up

756
01:20:34.050 --> 01:20:44.119
Tad Eggleston: with an English teacher for a grandmother, and I used to prefer they them for everybody, just because it was easier. And and I was regularly

757
01:20:44.630 --> 01:20:47.659
Tad Eggleston: reminded that that's a plural

758
01:20:48.321 --> 01:20:57.970
Tad Eggleston: but she was also as liberal as all hell. So I'm certain that if she was alive now she would be 100% in the

759
01:20:58.370 --> 01:21:00.830
Tad Eggleston: if it makes them happy, you fucking, do it

760
01:21:00.830 --> 01:21:09.929
Ted Intorcio: There, you know, I teach a class at the local community college in motion design. And I I have a lot of you know.

761
01:21:12.360 --> 01:21:24.580
Ted Intorcio: non-binary and and and trans and and different, you know, gendered other gendered people, and I make that mistake all the time, and I think people just appreciate it when you

762
01:21:24.580 --> 01:21:28.229
Tad Eggleston: Think, intent the mistake, and then move on. That's all.

763
01:21:28.230 --> 01:21:55.530
Soren Christiansen: Yeah, you know, last thing when I Ted was at Turner, Tbs. And I was at Cnn. And they had quite a few classes there that you would go to for growth and development, and some of them were not that great, some of them that were pretty good, and there was one that was extraordinary, and it was about tolerance. And there was a young black woman who was probably 2223 years old, and

764
01:21:55.830 --> 01:22:01.109
Soren Christiansen: we were just they were discussing tolerance, and then she raised her hand

765
01:22:01.150 --> 01:22:27.910
Soren Christiansen: and she said, I can't stand that word tolerance the way it's being used. And this other white guy and I looked at each other, and it was the most absurd thing like we looked at each other like, oh, here we go with some, you know, crazy, and she just she slammed us because, she said, I don't like that word, because I'll tolerate a 3 year old baby who's screaming.

766
01:22:27.960 --> 01:22:30.090
Soren Christiansen: I'll tolerate a racist jerk.

767
01:22:30.440 --> 01:22:58.160
Soren Christiansen: but somebody whose sexuality, who they are gay, straight, black, you know Jewish Christian. I don't care. I embrace them for that, and I tell them that I respect them for that. I don't tolerate that. And and the guy and I who before were looking at her like Oh, here we go. It was, you know, a shame moment like, Oh, my God! I'm embarrassed, and you know. But that's okay. Shame's important, and when you meet people in life.

768
01:22:58.340 --> 01:23:05.750
Soren Christiansen: who? Who will not be ashamed, who just blinders on and just go. You know they're not gonna they look forward, they don't look back.

769
01:23:05.920 --> 01:23:08.350
Soren Christiansen: Those are not the people I want to be around. You know we're not

770
01:23:08.350 --> 01:23:11.540
Tad Eggleston: No, they drive me up the wall. Yeah, I tolerate them.

771
01:23:12.290 --> 01:23:14.959
Ted Intorcio: Well see what you did. There.

772
01:23:14.960 --> 01:23:15.710
Soren Christiansen: Exactly.

773
01:23:18.190 --> 01:23:20.649
Tad Eggleston: Dennis, I'm going to flip this question over.

774
01:23:22.010 --> 01:23:32.560
Tad Eggleston: What thing have you wound up sharing with these guys that you like?

775
01:23:32.710 --> 01:23:38.109
Tad Eggleston: It was just a thing to you, and they got particularly excited. And you're sitting there going.

776
01:23:38.330 --> 01:23:42.100
Tad Eggleston: Oh, maybe that is cooler than I thought it was

777
01:23:43.100 --> 01:23:48.050
Denis Kitchen: I mean, I guess when I agreed to this I didn't

778
01:23:48.720 --> 01:23:51.599
Denis Kitchen: realize that when they were here

779
01:23:51.970 --> 01:23:56.179
Denis Kitchen: kind of every nook and cranny would be examined. I I have

780
01:23:56.910 --> 01:24:04.801
Denis Kitchen: like flat files of stuff that I organized for myself. I never thought a camera would be panning any of it. So

781
01:24:05.280 --> 01:24:12.680
Denis Kitchen: some of. It's just you know, strange and meaningful to me. But I

782
01:24:13.660 --> 01:24:19.269
Denis Kitchen: I suspect you'll have to ask them that when some drawers are open they kind of scratch their

783
01:24:19.590 --> 01:24:20.709
Denis Kitchen: head and went.

784
01:24:20.860 --> 01:24:21.950
Denis Kitchen: What the fuck?

785
01:24:24.360 --> 01:24:25.140
Ted Intorcio: Yeah.

786
01:24:25.140 --> 01:24:27.110
Denis Kitchen: Yeah, yeah.

787
01:24:27.470 --> 01:24:30.659
Soren Christiansen: I was just gonna say to me.

788
01:24:31.080 --> 01:24:49.979
Soren Christiansen: not being the comic person, I'm fascinated by the historical aspect, and I just loved just the amount of items, and just the way that they were displayed. But when I went up there I went up there with Ted, and also a gentleman named Jonathan Bayless from so buttons. So buttons. Yeah.

789
01:24:49.980 --> 01:24:54.000
Tad Eggleston: Jonathan is is a regular on the show as well

790
01:24:54.000 --> 01:24:55.110
Denis Kitchen: Yeah, I'm not surprised.

791
01:24:55.110 --> 01:24:57.779
Tad Eggleston: Jonathan, he might actually be listening

792
01:24:58.560 --> 01:24:59.260
Soren Christiansen: And so Tim.

793
01:24:59.260 --> 01:25:02.350
Tad Eggleston: But only because he sees Dennis's name bye.

794
01:25:02.350 --> 01:25:08.631
Soren Christiansen: Ted and Jonathan. It was like they were 2 Catholics visiting the Vatican

795
01:25:10.310 --> 01:25:12.785
Ted Intorcio: He's Jewish, I'm I'm actually Catholic, though.

796
01:25:16.705 --> 01:25:17.590
Ted Intorcio: Well.

797
01:25:17.590 --> 01:25:18.400
Tad Eggleston: So, so.

798
01:25:18.400 --> 01:25:19.940
Ted Intorcio: But we were definitely a couple of

799
01:25:19.940 --> 01:25:22.219
Tad Eggleston: Gonna have to do to get you into comics

800
01:25:22.220 --> 01:25:23.010
Ted Intorcio: What now?

801
01:25:23.510 --> 01:25:26.269
Tad Eggleston: What are we going to do to get Soren into comics?

802
01:25:26.720 --> 01:25:28.060
Tad Eggleston: The greatest medium.

803
01:25:28.220 --> 01:25:28.760
Denis Kitchen: That's a great

804
01:25:28.760 --> 01:25:31.050
Ted Intorcio: Question. That's a really good question. I mean.

805
01:25:31.050 --> 01:25:32.269
Soren Christiansen: You gotta send me some

806
01:25:32.270 --> 01:25:32.830
Ted Intorcio: I think he

807
01:25:32.830 --> 01:25:33.240
Soren Christiansen: My team.

808
01:25:33.240 --> 01:25:41.679
Ted Intorcio: In the social aspects of it, you know. I think he's interested in the historical aspects of it.

809
01:25:42.020 --> 01:26:07.539
Ted Intorcio: and and he kind of comes into it from that angle, like, I'm very. I'm really, you know, just to take a minute to to stroke Soren here a second. I mean, we get into it a lot, but because we have different ideas about how to do things. But his his ability to shoot stuff is amazing. And you know his stick-to-itiveness, and and his his visual storytelling is.

810
01:26:07.750 --> 01:26:12.989
Ted Intorcio: is I keep telling him I was like, Wow, that was way better than I had hoped.

811
01:26:13.270 --> 01:26:21.135
Ted Intorcio: you know, because anybody can can point a camera and and shoot it, but he he knows how to light things. He knows how to

812
01:26:21.930 --> 01:26:34.809
Ted Intorcio: he! He is a true artisan when it when it comes to, you know, getting a good shot. And I think that's really going to make a difference, I think, for the viewing audience

813
01:26:34.950 --> 01:26:43.170
Ted Intorcio: in in the end, you know. And we're gonna we're probably gonna have a lot more arguments between now and when this thing is finished.

814
01:26:43.340 --> 01:26:47.989
Ted Intorcio: But you know I'm I'm very happy, like I don't know how

815
01:26:47.990 --> 01:26:55.089
Tad Eggleston: You just gave me the 1st question, for when you come back to to pitch the or to to like

816
01:26:55.460 --> 01:26:59.560
Tad Eggleston: plug the finished film, what was your biggest argument while you were

817
01:26:59.560 --> 01:27:01.917
Soren Christiansen: Yeah, I was, gonna say, are we still talking?

818
01:27:03.940 --> 01:27:06.280
Ted Intorcio: Yeah, we have one every day

819
01:27:06.910 --> 01:27:07.410
Tad Eggleston: Yeah.

820
01:27:07.410 --> 01:27:13.780
Soren Christiansen: It. It's in the contract that we're going to be flown in by private jets separate private jets for all the premieres

821
01:27:13.900 --> 01:27:15.400
Ted Intorcio: Yeah. Fortunately.

822
01:27:15.400 --> 01:27:22.670
Ted Intorcio: you know, we're both of the opinion that you know, as we're probably, you know, friends before we were coworkers.

823
01:27:23.060 --> 01:27:28.430
Ted Intorcio: and that doesn't change just because we have a disagreement.

824
01:27:29.420 --> 01:27:29.880
Ted Intorcio: Yeah.

825
01:27:32.100 --> 01:27:58.339
Soren Christiansen: I'm watching the bear right now, and I was a food server for many years and just watching the intensity. And I really, I like that. And one of the aspects of the show that I really enjoy is the fact that there are incredibly stressful moments in the kitchen, and something is dropped that's needed immediately. That's going to take hours to do. And there are screaming matches, matches, and they're

826
01:27:58.560 --> 01:27:59.620
Soren Christiansen: personal

827
01:28:00.080 --> 01:28:17.085
Soren Christiansen: personal invectives. Not like you're a pathetic loser. But you know you shut the fuck up right now. Do you know where most people in a corporate environment? Oh, my God! Hrs run! You know life isn't perfect in high stress environments.

828
01:28:18.090 --> 01:28:23.360
Soren Christiansen: you should never cross a line and be personal, and and we don't do that. But but

829
01:28:23.530 --> 01:28:24.799
Soren Christiansen: if you can't

830
01:28:25.210 --> 01:28:44.769
Soren Christiansen: occasionally be passionate and get a little angry about something, and not be able to say to that person, hey, I'm sorry I was. You know we were arguing about this, but you know we're both trying to push this ball forward, and then, you know, we can laugh it off. And Ted will say, Yeah, fuck you, and you know, and we laugh and

831
01:28:44.770 --> 01:28:54.490
Ted Intorcio: Yeah. Well, I think there's some mutual respect as much as we don't let our conversation reflect that respect we we do have respect. So at the end of the day.

832
01:28:54.580 --> 01:29:20.360
Ted Intorcio: you know, we're able to compartmentalize it, you know, like I could tell you right now I had. We had a huge, you know, blow up on the second trip out to Dennis's. He didn't like how I drove I was driving. He's like you're going to drive the truck back to the, you know, and I speed it up. You know. He was telling me to go faster and everything, and then and then I almost ran the truck off the road.

833
01:29:21.637 --> 01:29:27.980
Ted Intorcio: Because, you know, Dennis lives over the river and through the woods. I mean, he's in a remote

834
01:29:27.980 --> 01:29:35.070
Tad Eggleston: Yeah. So and I just wanna let you know, in case we're ever in a car together, that I am the type to pull off the road and say, Do you want to walk

835
01:29:36.030 --> 01:29:39.249
Ted Intorcio: I I did that. I I think I said that at some point

836
01:29:39.250 --> 01:29:39.790
Tad Eggleston: Oh, my God!

837
01:29:39.790 --> 01:29:46.218
Ted Intorcio: You know, I'll pull this over and let you drive. But but you know

838
01:29:47.030 --> 01:29:59.750
Ted Intorcio: But again, you know, it was like, Okay, we're good, you know, and I'm sure you know I have to make him explain things to me probably more than he would like.

839
01:30:01.820 --> 01:30:16.370
Ted Intorcio: we had a thing with the the Youtube, one of the Youtube. Well, all the Youtube clips. We put a URL in the descriptions and they got truncated. They got disabled because that's what Youtube does. We found out for short.

840
01:30:16.880 --> 01:30:27.750
Ted Intorcio: shorter clips. And he tried to explain this to me, and I was, you know, confused. And it was, it was tense.

841
01:30:28.060 --> 01:30:28.820
Ted Intorcio: But yeah.

842
01:30:28.820 --> 01:30:45.229
Soren Christiansen: Well, you know, it's like it's the publisher thing again. I've got, you know, when you've got all these things going on, and then I've got to stop and explain. I don't want to explain right now. It's fucked up. Let's fix it. And but you know again, it's

843
01:30:45.540 --> 01:31:00.029
Soren Christiansen: the creative process I loved. When I was in advertising I loved going into that room and throwing out ideas, and I had a phenomenal creative director, Beresford Mitchell.

844
01:31:00.150 --> 01:31:07.289
Soren Christiansen: who was a Canadian guy, and I just I loved his approach towards advertising. But what

845
01:31:07.410 --> 01:31:09.020
Soren Christiansen: he said was, you know, look

846
01:31:09.310 --> 01:31:25.380
Soren Christiansen: those commercials that you see where they're a little risque that didn't start that way. That started in a in A, in a boardroom somewhere where a think tank was happening and ideas were being thrown out, and somebody said them something that was so sexually absurd. But

847
01:31:25.610 --> 01:31:52.790
Soren Christiansen: they laughed about it. We could never say that, but then they dialed it back just into the safe area to where there was a little sexual innuendo. But it's not offensive, but that process something offensive things were said in the meetings in the description of how do we? How do we? How do we make this advertisement that has this sexual scenario? Let's say, and in discussing it there are some people who are going to be who could be offended

848
01:31:52.810 --> 01:31:56.329
Soren Christiansen: by by use of words. I'm not interested in that

849
01:31:56.480 --> 01:31:59.480
Soren Christiansen: if I heard you, Ted, but I mean, I just if you.

850
01:32:00.060 --> 01:32:19.719
Soren Christiansen: a creative process, it can sometimes be down and dirty, and as long as there is respect in that room, ideas should flow, because from those ideas you do something, you bring something that actually can pass. Quote corporate muster where it's not going to be objectionable.

851
01:32:20.500 --> 01:32:22.570
Soren Christiansen: So I love the creative process

852
01:32:25.790 --> 01:32:30.779
Tad Eggleston: Alright, my my required final question.

853
01:32:33.310 --> 01:32:39.636
Tad Eggleston: Tell me something you love, preferably a comic, though apparently Soren doesn't know any

854
01:32:41.010 --> 01:32:51.879
Tad Eggleston: that not enough. Other people have read experience, listen to, watched whatever, and you want them to, so that you have more people to talk about

855
01:32:52.020 --> 01:32:55.870
Tad Eggleston: with it or talk about it with, yeah.

856
01:32:59.160 --> 01:33:00.450
Tad Eggleston: And we can go in anywhere

857
01:33:01.030 --> 01:33:02.946
Denis Kitchen: Yeah, I just I just

858
01:33:03.870 --> 01:33:09.260
Denis Kitchen: picked up recently and and was looking at it the last couple of days. Charles Burns is

859
01:33:09.550 --> 01:33:12.799
Denis Kitchen: comics. KOMM. IX.

860
01:33:13.860 --> 01:33:15.430
Tad Eggleston: The covers

861
01:33:15.430 --> 01:33:33.140
Denis Kitchen: There's yeah, there's no story. It's just these unbelievably weird. And I know, weird. I I create weird stuff. But I look at his stuff, and it's so beautifully rendered, and it's so out there, and every single one I just I just

862
01:33:33.700 --> 01:33:34.890
Denis Kitchen: savor

863
01:33:35.380 --> 01:33:35.800
Tad Eggleston: Yeah.

864
01:33:35.800 --> 01:33:48.160
Denis Kitchen: I think, with his art is so beautiful, and his ideas are so out there, I just stare at them. So I probably took as much time looking at that book as most people would do to read a book.

865
01:33:48.460 --> 01:33:55.129
Denis Kitchen: because I just soaked it in. So I would recommend that anyone who just loves the aesthetics of drawing.

866
01:33:55.890 --> 01:33:56.870
Denis Kitchen: You know

867
01:33:58.040 --> 01:34:06.309
Tad Eggleston: Well, and he definitely shows why he's 1 of Francois's favorite people to turn to for New Yorker covers, because he can tell such a

868
01:34:06.310 --> 01:34:07.970
Tad Eggleston: no, it's not often enough.

869
01:34:07.970 --> 01:34:08.570
Tad Eggleston: Story

870
01:34:08.570 --> 01:34:09.370
Denis Kitchen: Thing but

871
01:34:12.950 --> 01:34:20.219
Denis Kitchen: anyway, so that that springs to mind as one that was particularly exciting. Recently

872
01:34:20.600 --> 01:34:21.100
Tad Eggleston: Yeah.

873
01:34:21.100 --> 01:34:21.670
Ted Intorcio: I, yeah.

874
01:34:21.670 --> 01:34:22.549
Tad Eggleston: Loved that book.

875
01:34:22.930 --> 01:34:35.539
Ted Intorcio: I happen to be reading a few new things for me, and the thing I'm reading right now is impossible. People. A completely average recovery story by Julia Wertz.

876
01:34:35.980 --> 01:34:39.929
Ted Intorcio: who is, you know, sort of underrated.

877
01:34:40.150 --> 01:34:44.779
Ted Intorcio: In my opinion. I don't know if you're familiar with Julia Wertz's stuff.

878
01:34:45.830 --> 01:34:48.489
Tad Eggleston: That's been on my list for a while, but I haven't read it yet.

879
01:34:48.490 --> 01:34:51.130
Ted Intorcio: I think it just came out last year, or I'm

880
01:34:51.130 --> 01:34:51.790
Tad Eggleston: Right.

881
01:34:51.790 --> 01:34:52.800
Ted Intorcio: Not too long ago.

882
01:34:52.800 --> 01:34:53.919
Denis Kitchen: That's a big book.

883
01:34:54.080 --> 01:35:08.480
Ted Intorcio: Oh, my God, I mean, yeah, that's got some thickness to it. And I'm about. I'm almost done with it. And I just love her sense of humor, and you know she's a much better

884
01:35:08.720 --> 01:35:15.030
Ted Intorcio: drawer artist than I think people give her credit for. She can draw

885
01:35:16.020 --> 01:35:22.889
Ted Intorcio: buildings and and landscapes, you know there's only one other person I would compare her to, and that's Carl Christian Krumholz.

886
01:35:23.250 --> 01:35:24.089
Tad Eggleston: I love Carl

887
01:35:24.500 --> 01:35:28.219
Tad Eggleston: Hi, Carl, he's on the. He's on the podcast. Regularly, too

888
01:35:28.220 --> 01:35:38.119
Ted Intorcio: Oh, that's great. Yeah, he's you know. He lives right down, not too far from me. And we Co. Published Queen City

889
01:35:38.120 --> 01:35:39.010
Tad Eggleston: I saw that

890
01:35:39.010 --> 01:35:42.369
Ted Intorcio: Which is the best selling book I've

891
01:35:42.510 --> 01:35:48.260
Ted Intorcio: you know, ever published in terms of, you know, straight sales and

892
01:35:48.646 --> 01:35:50.579
Denis Kitchen: 90% in Denver or

893
01:35:50.580 --> 01:35:57.979
Ted Intorcio: Oh, oh, I would say, yeah, oh, definitely, or people that are from Denver or Colorado that live elsewhere. Yeah.

894
01:35:57.980 --> 01:36:00.029
Tad Eggleston: I own a copy

895
01:36:00.860 --> 01:36:03.479
Ted Intorcio: Okay, well, it's

896
01:36:03.480 --> 01:36:07.169
Tad Eggleston: I've only been to Denver once, but Carl's a friend

897
01:36:07.450 --> 01:36:09.649
Ted Intorcio: Oh, well, there you go.

898
01:36:09.870 --> 01:36:14.949
Ted Intorcio: Yeah, he's he does great work. So in, you know.

899
01:36:14.950 --> 01:36:17.679
Tad Eggleston: I met him the same day. I met you, by the way.

900
01:36:17.680 --> 01:36:20.779
Ted Intorcio: Oh, yeah, we we traveled together to that.

901
01:36:22.730 --> 01:36:23.440
Ted Intorcio: Yeah.

902
01:36:23.820 --> 01:36:26.860
Ted Intorcio: He he was my back when I was

903
01:36:27.860 --> 01:36:30.169
Tad Eggleston: And his wife introduced me to Dennis

904
01:36:30.860 --> 01:36:34.117
Ted Intorcio: Oh, okay. Well, there you go. Yeah. I love his wife, too. Yeah. Just

905
01:36:34.350 --> 01:36:35.340
Tad Eggleston: Kelly's amazing

906
01:36:35.340 --> 01:36:51.779
Ted Intorcio: Yeah, they're. They're a wonderful couple, and they're very, you know. He's very talented, and she's just a wonderful human being. They make a fabulous couple, you know. But I don't want to take too much away from Julia either, because just

907
01:36:51.780 --> 01:36:53.230
Ted Intorcio: no, I'm I have nothing

908
01:36:53.230 --> 01:36:54.400
Tad Eggleston: Do with this I have.

909
01:36:54.400 --> 01:36:56.830
Tad Eggleston: She has at her website. It looks

910
01:36:56.830 --> 01:36:58.150
Ted Intorcio: Okay. Yeah.

911
01:36:58.150 --> 01:37:00.250
Tad Eggleston: Went higher on my list of things to read

912
01:37:00.250 --> 01:37:14.769
Ted Intorcio: It reads very easily and very, very relatable stuff. The humor is stellar. I laugh out loud reading her stuff, and I own a page of hers. I met her once at Dink

913
01:37:14.960 --> 01:37:20.900
Ted Intorcio: and got to interview her and did. What was it.

914
01:37:21.510 --> 01:37:30.879
Ted Intorcio: Noah and a couple other people? And yeah, just above average person, you know, in all respects.

915
01:37:32.550 --> 01:37:36.049
Ted Intorcio: So that's what about your Soren? What's your favorite?

916
01:37:36.590 --> 01:37:37.720
Ted Intorcio: You've been reading lately.

917
01:37:37.720 --> 01:37:43.319
Soren Christiansen: You know I what's funny? It's not a comic. But have you all have y'all ever seen one Punch man

918
01:37:44.690 --> 01:37:45.780
Tad Eggleston: One Punch man.

919
01:37:46.530 --> 01:37:50.200
Tad Eggleston: I have not watched it, but I've read the 1st volume of the Comic

920
01:37:50.610 --> 01:37:55.530
Soren Christiansen: And I have not read it, but I watched it with my my son wasn't really into anima for a while, and

921
01:37:55.530 --> 01:37:55.860
Tad Eggleston: Dad

922
01:37:56.230 --> 01:38:04.140
Soren Christiansen: He he. So I watched that with him, and I thought that was absolutely fantastic.

923
01:38:04.140 --> 01:38:04.890
Ted Intorcio: I mean

924
01:38:05.580 --> 01:38:11.330
Soren Christiansen: It, is it, Anime? Is that just again, I'm not the expert on that, but it is anime correct

925
01:38:11.330 --> 01:38:28.949
Tad Eggleston: It was manga first, st and it's now both a successful manga and a successful anime. And I'll let Soren give the the because it sounds like he's watched more give the because this is it sounds like something that should be ridiculous, and it's not as ridiculous as it should be so like.

926
01:38:29.300 --> 01:38:30.680
Tad Eggleston: Tell us why

927
01:38:30.680 --> 01:38:37.700
Soren Christiansen: Well, this is just it. Just basically it's a guy who can kill somebody with one punch.

928
01:38:37.870 --> 01:38:52.400
Soren Christiansen: And he goes through, I mean, and it's been a while. So please actually help me out. I mean, I just remember laughing at the scenarios that were just so absurd. And it was I I, it really blew me away I walked away from that enlightened

929
01:38:52.400 --> 01:39:01.179
Tad Eggleston: Yeah, I mean, what always strikes me about it is like everybody knows he'll win any fight with one punch. He knows it. They know it.

930
01:39:02.600 --> 01:39:07.679
Tad Eggleston: So there's like a certain element of the drama is, he would prefer just not to fight.

931
01:39:07.810 --> 01:39:12.517
Tad Eggleston: and like he gets pushed to it, and finally, it becomes, well, okay.

932
01:39:13.130 --> 01:39:29.999
Soren Christiansen: Yes, and then it's just utter destruction. You know, I really enjoyed that. And so yeah, I. My problem is that I'm married with a with a 16 year old son. I'm in this documentary. We've been working on this documentary for 2 and a half years.

933
01:39:30.340 --> 01:39:31.160
Tad Eggleston: Oh, wow!

934
01:39:31.330 --> 01:39:48.109
Soren Christiansen: And that's a learning thing for me. I remember seeing, you know, hearing, you know someone's been. Oh, they took them 3 to 4 years to do the documentary I was like. But again, like talking to a publisher. What what the hell are you doing back there, Dennis? I mean, how long did it take to publish a book? My God! And then you

935
01:39:48.230 --> 01:40:02.010
Soren Christiansen: you get in the weeds. And you're like holy crap. I mean just the versioning for every every video we make, I have to make it 16, 9, 5, 4. I'm sorry. 16, 9, 4, 5, and 9 16

936
01:40:02.390 --> 01:40:08.609
Soren Christiansen: every version. And so if anything has changed, I have to go back and change all 3 versions every time.

937
01:40:08.780 --> 01:40:15.280
Soren Christiansen: So I mean, it's there's just a tremendous amount of work that people, you know don't realize so, but it's worth it.

938
01:40:15.280 --> 01:40:27.829
Tad Eggleston: Well, never mind the deciding what goes in what doesn't go in learning about something and deciding. Oh, my God! I didn't know about that. Now I want to go back and talk to this person and that person. Now I want to talk to this person and that person

939
01:40:28.642 --> 01:40:34.000
Tad Eggleston: th. This was the bane of my existence when I was writing research papers in college. It was like.

940
01:40:34.120 --> 01:40:38.020
Tad Eggleston: When are you supposed to stop asking questions and start writing

941
01:40:38.530 --> 01:40:40.539
Soren Christiansen: Yep, yeah. But

942
01:40:40.540 --> 01:40:46.440
Tad Eggleston: For me. It was generally about 4 h before the paper was due. That is not what I recommend

943
01:40:47.240 --> 01:40:47.790
Ted Intorcio: Yeah.

944
01:40:48.025 --> 01:40:48.260
Ted Intorcio: Oh.

945
01:40:48.260 --> 01:40:48.790
Soren Christiansen: Yep.

946
01:40:49.100 --> 01:41:12.320
Ted Intorcio: I would like to just add one last thing about this documentary, and that is that I think there's a lot of red meat in this documentary. You know, there's a lot of subject matter that's relevant and that is topical by sheer chance, really. But you know, for what's going on in today's society.

947
01:41:12.320 --> 01:41:20.039
Ted Intorcio: and you know both both Soren and I were drawn to it for different reasons. You know that

948
01:41:20.070 --> 01:41:43.749
Ted Intorcio: complement each other, and you know I'd really like to recommend everybody to just go to the Kickstarter and hit that notify button so that we can actually get enough people following it so we can launch the Kickstarter and and finish this thing. Get the finishing funds for this. What I think is going to be, you know, and I'm a pessimist, but I think this is going to be a pretty successful

949
01:41:44.050 --> 01:41:45.530
Ted Intorcio: undertaking.

950
01:41:46.760 --> 01:42:09.079
Tad Eggleston: I was really really hoping, because at the beginning of of our recording I took to Blue sky and told people to punch the save button and I was really really hoping that I could report that that had been successful. But you have the same 206 followers that you had an hour and a half ago, so I'm sorry I'll keep trying

951
01:42:09.080 --> 01:42:11.280
Ted Intorcio: Okay, I mean.

952
01:42:11.280 --> 01:42:11.770
Tad Eggleston: Refresh.

953
01:42:11.770 --> 01:42:12.499
Ted Intorcio: Every little bit.

954
01:42:12.500 --> 01:42:13.693
Tad Eggleston: In case

955
01:42:14.290 --> 01:42:15.690
Ted Intorcio: Every little bit, helps

956
01:42:18.100 --> 01:42:20.220
Tad Eggleston: And 206 is not nothing.

957
01:42:20.785 --> 01:42:25.920
Tad Eggleston: This is a cool story. I'm certain that that more followers will come.

958
01:42:27.920 --> 01:42:33.240
Tad Eggleston: I know I was excited, as all get out to, to see

959
01:42:33.410 --> 01:42:48.770
Tad Eggleston: how somebody else would look at the life and put together the life of a friend of mine, even though I could only imagine God, that must be weird, to be the center of a documentary. That was my very 1st thought. Dennis was exactly what you said when when I asked the question at the beginning is like

960
01:42:50.010 --> 01:42:50.730
Denis Kitchen: No.

961
01:42:50.730 --> 01:42:55.800
Tad Eggleston: What's what's it like to be at the middle of one neat?

962
01:42:56.476 --> 01:43:11.920
Tad Eggleston: Yeah, gentlemen, it's been a a blast, Dennis, I always love talking to you, Sorn and Ted. It was great to meet you. Hopefully. We'll we'll all talk again for 22 panels. We will see you after the next page