HomeMy WebLinkAboutTimes-Advocate, 1979-10-17, Page 19 (2)Serving South Huron, North Middlesex
EXETER, ONTARIO, OCTOBER 17, 1979
His drawings ... not his body
Randy Jones in Playboy
By MARY ALDERSON
I was a little apprehensive
as I knocked on the door of
the Jones home on
Marlborough Street. After
all, weren't artists always a
little -- well, uh, -- strange?
Especially cartoonists? And
this one lived in New York
city, and drew cartoons for
Playboy, of all things! What
would I say to him?
I needn't have worried --
there's nothing "grange"
'about Randy Jones, except
that he has a very good sense
of humour and an excellent
drawing hand. Before long
he is doing a caricature of
me. I ask him if he has
noticed my "chip-
munk cheeks". He has. It
really does look like me.
But Randy says he'd
rather be drawing men than
women. You can give men
hooked noses a:id five
o'clock shadows. Women
don't like it if you do that to
them.
Randy is a freelance artist
living in New York. Last
week he visited in Exeter
with his parents, Ted and
Donna Jones, and was re-
acquainted with the town
where he gew up.
And what sort of things
does a freelance cartoonist
do. I wonder. Randy
describes one of his most
recent jobs.
A reporter had done an
article for the New York
Times comparing Jimmy
Carter and Ted Kennedy.
According to him, Kennedy
was doing everything in a
great flamboyant style,
while Carter just plodded
along. The Times asked
Randy to illustrated the
story.
Randy drew Carter and
Kennedy as babies playing in
a sand box. Both were in
diapers, bibs and bonnets.
Jimmy was playing with an
overturned sand bucket,
while Teddy had built an
enormous sand castle,
complete with elaborate
turrets and spires. "It was
funny, too funny," Randy
says. The New York Times
likes a certain amount of
humour; but they also like to
preserve their image. Since
this was a front page car-
toon, they asked Randy to
tone it down.
Randy changed Carter and
Kennedy to adults - but still
in caricature. Instead of a
child's sand box, he moved
them to a beach. But the
message was the same
while Jimmy had a bucket,
Teddy built flamboyant
castles.
The Times botlght it - it
was just funny enough.
Prior to that cartoon,
Randy did one of Bob
Strauss, the Middle East
peace negotiator, for the
Times. Again he was given
an article to read, and came
up with his own idea of what
to depict in the caricature.
One word stuck out in
Randy's mind, Strauss had
been described as a
"maverick".
As Randy went to work
with ink, Strauss became
just that - a rootin', tootin',
cowboy complete with six
guns, black hat and big
cigar. Underfoot were
Arabs, Israelis. and the
pyramids.
Strauss liked it, when it
appeared in the Times. He
phoned Randy, and asked
him if he could autograph a
copy and send it to him.
Randy told Strauss that he
had the original. Strauss
replied, "Maybe you could
give that to me to hang up on
the wall." To which Randy
replied "I don't like the word
'give'."
Strauss was embarrassed
to learn that what Randy
meant was "sell", and
quickly said that selling the
original was a really good
idea. Strauss bought it for
$300. The New York Times
paid Randy $250 for the
drawing, and he gets an
additional income if it's
reprinted. Randy says it took
him an evening to do the
cartoon.
Randy says that Strauss
has an easy face to
caricature, much easier than
Carter's. He says that Carter
is giving many cartoonists
problems with his increasing
number of lines and
wrinkles. Carter also did
something that threw them
off - he had the nerve to
change the part in his hair
from one side to another in
the middle of his career. "It
was a very insecure thing to
do," Randy says.
So how does a boy from
little, old Exeter, Ontario
become concerned about the
way the President parts his
hair? I ask Randy to tell me
his life history.
Embarrassed, he hands
me a magazine article
written about him a few
years ago. It reads that
Randy was born underan oak
tree on the bank of the
Ausable River, on May 7,
1949." Randy laughs.
"That's about it," he says.
. He attended grade school
in Exeter and went on to take
grade nine at South Huron
District High School. But at
that time there were no art
courses, and all Randy
wanted to do was draw. So
arrangements were made,
and Randy went to board in
London, so that he could
attend Beale Technical
School. Here he received his
only art education.
But let's make it clear that
Randy's talent goes far
beyond a clever cartoon. His
mother points to a detailed
oil painting of an aged man's
wrinkled face that's hanging
over Randy's head. Randy
did this oil when his mother
requested something to hang
on her living room wall.
Beside him is a wooden
carving of a seaman's face
that he did to sit on his
mother's end table. Donna
says she'd like him to do
more oil painting or sculp-
tures.
And there are the copper
etchings that were turned
out on an antique press in
limited editions, and the
ornate drawings that he did
each year for the family's
Christmas cards. His mother
also brings out some books
that he's illustrated. I agree,
this is versatility.
How versatile is he, you
ask? Well, could you sketch a
good, wholesome Sesame
Street character for a
nursery rhyme book in the
morning, and then switch to
a raunchy love scene bet-
ween a beer -guzzling slob
and a space creature
suitable for Playboy in the
afternoon?
Doing the Sesame Street
nursery rhyme books was
fun, Randy says. When he
agreed to illustrate the two
books he wag sent to the
Muppet factory in New York.
It was strange. Randy says -
there were boxes full of eyes
and big rubber noses. He set
up the cute Muppet faces
around him and went to work
depicting such things as the
cow jumping over the moon.
The books were the "pop-up"
kind, so lots of extra work
making the parts that move
was involved. Randy en-
joyed the job, but his only
regret was not getting his
name in the book. Because
Jim Henson invented the
muppets, no one else is given
credit.
When you get a personal
memo from Hugh Heffner,
you know you're doing
something right. Last
February, Randy and a
writer started a comic strip
in Playboy. Heffner likes it.
It's called "Through Space
and Time with Schwimmer
and Jones" and it's about
them - Schwimmer, the
writer and Jones, the car-
toonist. His mother laughs at
the way he draws himself.
He really does have a chin,
she says.
Schwimmer and Jones
travel through outer space
and have affairs with weird
blobs in this science fiction
funny. Jones is seldom seen
without a beer can in his
hand. That's what Heffner
likes - Keep up with the beer -
guzzling slob, his memo said.
When Randy graduated
from Beale Tech he went on
to Toronto to try his hand at
freelancing. One of his first
jobs was illustrating Faust.
The characters are a cross
between Dickens type and
the grotesque. "I'd like to
illustrate Shakespeare,"
Randy says.
He also had cartoons and
drawings in the Globe and
Mail, The Toronto Star, the
Canadian, Macleans, and
Quest, but still he barely
made a living.
But he heard that money
could be made in New Yrok.
At first he was reluctant to
go there because "I believed
all the things I heard about
New York," Finally in 1973,
he "got up his nerve" and
moved there. He's never
looked back.
He used to have the oc-
casional cartoon in National
Lampoon, but "it got too
gross". He is kept busy with
the New York Times, the
Washington Star, Playboy,
and The New Yorker among
other magazines. He likes
collaborating with 'other
people, as he does with
Eugene Schwimmer for
Playboy. "I like drawing
other people's fantasies," he
says.
He also has taken a crack
at a syndicated comic strip -
he has great admiration for
Charles Shultz and how he
"lives". with Charlie Brown.
Before you sell a comic strip,
you have to produce over 300
strips (a year's supply) and
about 50 colour comics. But
that's for the future.
Right now he enjoys the
luxury of freelancing - taking
time off when he feels he
needs it. Last spring he
travelled to South America
and had a chance to practise
his hobby, photography. This
fall he came to visit his
parents, so he could relax in
their comfortable living
room and talk to the Times -
Advocate. He's turned down
jobs teaching art.
The future - "I'd like to do
a humour magazine." He
describes something bet-
ween Mad and National
Lampoon. He enjoys satire.
He's in the process of buying
a building in New York, to
share studios with other
artists. This will end the
hassle with landlords.
Or maybe there will be
another depression. Car-
toonists always do well
during a depression. People
want to laugh, Randy says.
In the meantime he's
sharing his apartment with
his mongrel dog Ackbar
Jones. He'd like to bring
Ackbar to Exeter sometime,
but "he's a real city dog ."
ONE OF RANDY'S OIL PAINTINGS — an old man hangs in
his parent's living room.
ONE OF RANDY'S CARTOONS — At left is Norman Lear, the creotor of mony of our
favourite television shows. You should recognize Archie Bunker and family, Maude and her
friends, and Sanford and Son. Norman Learowns the original of this drawing.
A "MAVERICK'.' — Robert Strauss; tftejs;.,
negotiator, liked the way Randy drew him for the New York FROM ONI EXTREME TO ANOTHER — Randy Jones shows his mother Donna his comic
Times lost August. In fact, he purchased Rondys original strip in Playboy • not exactly in the same category as nursery rhymes.
drowing for 5300.
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