R.I.P. James Gandolfini
Photos: James Gandolfini, 1961-2013
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Arthur’s work is his own and does not necessarily reflect my views. Creative license. (And to the dimwits who don’t appreciate Arthur’s graphic commentary: this is based on Francisco de Goya’s Saturn Devouring His Son.)
Editor-in-Chief Nikki Finke - tip her here.
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thing is there’s nothing you can say.
Check mate, bitch.
@ shogun warrier
wow, dude, you can read wikipedia. brilliant.
Look, Arthur obviously has good art skills. He has artistic talent. His choice of how to use it is another matter. But the kid does have talent. He just needs some direction.
Welcome to H’wood, where you’re only as good as your last residual…
another great one as always! absolutely love it!
Hey D-bag Buck Rodgers (read s l o w l y lest you misunderstand, again) I see your words but no sense. Just to be clear: I no like Arthur’s artwork. I have zero idea if Nikki “likes’ it, though you are right she d i d post it. BUT s h e also nastily and pre-emptively provoked when she posted “dimwits.” dothent she protest too much? (rhetorical I don’t care what you think)
@ Buck Zollo
Hi Massoud!
Damn, you people take your aesthetics too seriously. If only you could pour this much passion into your real work we wouldn’t be saddled with so many shitty movies and tv shows.
@ jeezuz
thank you for your armchair insights. however, if you are inclined to know my thoughts – goya had a pretty amazing, if not incredibly messed up perspective – to take something (his painting) that is perceived as such an insight into the way part of the world was beginning to wrap their heads around the notion that science did not prove god’s existence and how that affected many of those thinkers at the time and really do a piss-poor job of “reinventing” it – well, i find it offensive and incredibly lame. snarky comments if you must.
Such subtext, such pathos! Nikki-your taste in cartoons sucks. Please stop.
@Dimwit
The three other toons you mentioned don’t quite fit the Saturn/Son model if you think about it.
Momentum Killer depicted a fast car merging into a concrete divider, thereby making the point of WME’s reckless merger. I’m pretty sure the grotesque cannibalism portrayed in Saturn & Son fails to make the same statement. Perhaps the wily Zeus (Endeavor) defeating Saturn (William Morris) would be a more apt metaphor since the takeover was “hostile,” but it now seems apparent both agencies needed each other to survive. So the the Saturn/Son cartoon makes a very different point then the Momentum Killer cartoon.
As for the Lesher cartoon, I guess you could have Saturn (Paramount) devouring his Son (Lesher) if the point was Lesher’s victimization. But this fails too since Lesher was notorious for his poor leadership and bullying. Thus, the guillotine and its symbolic power of popular uprising makes more sense to the many people who were victimized by Lesher and welcomed his comeuppance.
As for the “Summer Box Office” and “Awards Season” cartoon, well…let’s just say it’s clear you didn’t think hard about this. Hollywood’s cynical marketing of homosexuality (“The Bottom Line) doesn’t quite fit the Saturn/son model since the martyred hero (Milk) and the shameless clown (Bruno) coexist but Saturn and his son do not.
I’m glad you had fun with the labeling, but you might want to keep to Sudoku or the crossword puzzles.
This pic isn’t as grotesque as the situation. What goes around comes around.
If you’re a cartoonist and you have to put words on everything, isn’t that a sign something’s off?
If this drawing was simply a sentence that read “WME2 is destroying fair severance and fair wages” would it be any less effective? Sadly, no.
Comment by tf — July 31, 2009 @ 8:03 am
Nice rhetorical use of posing questions you then answer– please send along your script after finishing your mocha latte. Oh wait…sadly, no.
@ shogun warrior
no snarky response this time since you decided to write like an adult.
and who are you kidding? we’re both sitting in armchairs
goya never explained his work’s significance (read the article again: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn_Devouring_His_Son).
so your snobbery is a bit unjustified, even hypocritical, when you ascribe deep socio-religious meaning to a work the artist himself never explained and academics only guess about.
did arthur rip off goya? yes. does the cartoon’s violence grossly exaggerate the day-to-day “hardships” of wme assistants? yes. and do good people work at wme? i’m sure of it.
but wme does eat its young, inevitably. look at the partner list and look at the partner profiles. it’s a homogeneous group utterly terrified of usurpers. the shitty thing for a lot of the new/mid-level agents is it’s all la la land until you suddenly have a family and a mortgage and the threat to your livelihood (and the livelihoods of those whom depend on you) become very real.
personally, i think the picture is appropriate since it graphically depicts the frustration, paranoia, fear, and rage that comes with acquiring power at wme. goya’s painting works even better when you consider his saturn (rather than ruben’s) is DRIVEN to kill his son and is not simply a cold, calculated murderer. this is the price of power. the decreased wages and unfair severance pay-outs only add insult to injury.
wme’s corporate model isn’t sustainable less the corporate culture dramatically changes from a fraternity to a responsible, transparent organization. if not, the agency will fall just a surely as saturn did. strickler’s departure is not a good omen.
i guess the thing to watch for is the emergence of a challenger.
Wow. For a bunch of people who read a blog about the communications business, most commenters on this post are woefully ignorant of political cartooning.
If you disagree, then say you disagree, but the artist’s really good at this genre. If you don’t get it, or if you think the point is wrong, that’s fine – but saying the artist isn’t skilled, or criticizing the use of words in the image just exposes your ignorance.