Link to Get Your War On by David Rees
Read exclusive David Rees interview with Constructive Anarchy
Just closed off Broadway!
A wonderful new play based on the great clip art of David Rees.Elvis Slobinski: You have created a wondeful new genre. What is your background in art, clip art, etc?
David Rees: I will not take credit/blame for inventing profane online clipart comics. I used to draw cartoon by hand until I got tired of all the work involved. Then I had a boring temp job and started making comics using the PowerPoint clip art… that led to finding other clip art images (of karate fighters, ambulances, office workers) and basing jokes and comics off of them.
Then a man down by the docks taught me how to cuss and the rest is herstory.
ES: How did this play come to be?
DR: Someone connected with the Rude Mechs theatre company sent me a letter about adapting GET YOUR WAR ON for the stage. Based on his correspondence, I felt like he really understood the emotions behind the work (rage, confusion, vulnerability, etc.) and wasn’t just “jazzed” about all the profanity— which is often the case when people approach me about adapting my comics or exploiting them to sell ringtones. They think the comics are “edgy” and don’t seem interested in the emotional stuff going on underneath. So anyway
I gave the Rude Mechs permission to adapt the comic.
ES: Is the play based on one or all of your books?
DR: The play is based on the entire GET YOUR WAR ON series… it starts with the first strips from October 2001 and ends with the execution of Saddam Hussein. So it’s an historical overview of the War on Terror as viewed through the lens of this one comic strip.
ES: Most of our readers are Left Coast. Any plans to swing it our way? LA? SF?
DR: I think any additional tours of the show are contingent on how well it does in NYC. It’s been playing here for a few weeks as part of a theatre festival, so maybe some West Coast theatre promoter will see the show and fall in love with it and labor to spread it all over California like left-liberal marmalade.
ES: Has America turned the corner with a new Dem Congress or should we expect more of the same?
DR: More of the same, but better and more awesome!!! It’s a step in the right
direction, but it ain’t a leap.
ES: We would have dumped tea in the harbor…how about you?
DR: Probably not… I’m a pretty passive guy. I’m afraid I’m the type of person who would thrive in an authoritarian state like North Korea. As long as I had access to the good rice and the clean water, I’d probably just shut up and trade my principals for a full belly.
ES: Gore Vidal said, “The War on Terrorism is as stupid as a War on Dandruff. America is Number One in only two products: weapons and advertising…the War on Terrorism is both.” Your take?
DR: He forgot our third big product: “Freedom.” That’s like saying “Bed, Bath & Beyond sells beds and baths”… and forgetting to mention the Beyond.
Published by Greg at 10:02 PM on June 12, 2008