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With over 4500 Issue Summaries now online, chances are you may not have read the following Issue Summary:
Wolverine (3rd series) #17
So why not go read it now.
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In Weird Al's song "White & Nerdy" one of the lines is "I've been browsin' and inspectin', X-Men comics you know I collect 'em." In the music video Al is holding up four X-Men comics, Uncanny X-Men #201, 210, 221 & 268. - Submitted by Millienumcyke
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 | | | | Before They Became Two of Comics Most Loved Writers !!!! | | |
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| | Author : Iceman (Trevor Cates) | Last Modified : December 7th 2003 |
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Iceman: There are many people in the world that started out at places like McDonalds or one of the other chains of stores, where was it that you started out at?
CW: There are two answers, really. There's my first job and then there is my first job in Hollywood. My first job was at a dry cleaner the summer before my freshman year at college. Not much too tell about that - it was hot and people are way too emotional about their clothes. My first job in Hollywood I got because of Nunzio actually. He was working as a writer’s assistant on the very short-lived NBC series Amazing Grace and got me a job as a production assistant on the show.
ND: I also have a history with dry cleaning - just one of those weird coincidences. My Dad has owned a LOT of dry cleaners over my lifetime, and I worked at his stores every weekend as a kid, and over summers and then for a year full-time after college. In Hollywood, my first job was as a personal assistant to two writer-producers. I followed them to the show Amazing Grace that Christina mentioned. My real dues-paying job in Hollywood, though, was my job as an assistant to a literary agent. She was really domineering and demanding and it was a hellish experience in some ways. She'd been through 3 or 4 assistants in 6 months before me, but I stuck it out for 3 years. Strangely enough, for all the grief she caused me, she's now a friend and a mentor figure - someone I really look up to.
Iceman: Sometimes in life we aspire to be things that we do not end up becoming. What was it that you strived to become or dreamt of achieving?
ND: Mine's a big cliché. I wanted to be an astronaut. I was ten when the first Space Shuttle was launched and I wanted to be part of that program. I went to the Bronx High School of Science and realized that, while I was good at Science, I kind of hated it. So, I was losing faith in my dream of life as an astronaut. Then of course, the Challenger exploded, and I knew for sure I'd never get into space. Not only did the space program look doomed, but also if I wasn't going as an astronaut, I knew I'd never go, because that flight was supposed to open up space for civilians. Then there was my brief flirtation with acting. But that was a college thing. I was writing all throughout, so in the end, I turned to the one constant.
Iceman: So tell me, why comics? Why get into the business known as comic books?
CW: I actually didn't have much knowledge of the comic book world until about six years ago. Our friend, Greg Rucka, was writing Whiteout and to be a supportive friend I read it. And I really enjoyed it. So Nunzio took it upon himself to start my comic book education. He had me read The Watchmen, all the Justice Leagues from the 1980s and Batman Year One. And another friend had me read Astro City. And I was hooked on the medium. A couple of years later when Nunzio and I were tossing the idea behind Skinwalker around, Greg Rucka suggested we do it as a comic miniseries first and a screenplay later. So we did and it was fun. There's an amazing creative freedom that comes with the style of writing in comic books.
Iceman: What was the first thing comic-wise dealing you ever had a hand in?
ND: I wrote an issue of Detective Comics during the "Officer Down" crossover. I got the job because Greg Rucka had introduced me to Bob Schreck and Matt Idelson, which allowed me to pitch story ideas. None of those ideas came to pass, but they gave me a shot at one of the chapters of the crossover. It was supposed to center on the interrogation of the man the cops believe shot Jim Gordon. I asked them to strip the stuff at the beginning and the end and push them into other chapters so my entire issue could focus on that interrogation. I was going for an homage to HOMICIDE: LIFE ON THE STREET, and in particular an episode called "Three Men and Adena" Christina and I were writing for film and TV together, but at that point, I thought I'd try comics alone - she was still learning about comics. But we came up with the idea for SKINWALKER and decided to start writing comics together too.
Iceman: Tell me, did you have any role models/look up to anyone in the biz? If so, did you ever meet them and how was that meeting?
ND: I grew up reading the Wolfman/Perez TITANS and the Claremont X-MEN. Those guys are idols, in a sense. I've never met any of them, but we've been talking to Chris Claremont via e-mail about the state of the X-Books. He's been very nice and easy to deal with - a real gentleman. And he was very flattering - apparently, he likes the work we're doing with his creations, and that means a lot to us. I also got to meet Dan Mishkin, who wrote one of my favorite books, BLUE DEVIL. Dan is a really nice guy, and a pleasure to talk to. There are others, whose work I really respect, like Alan Moore, that I figure I'll NEVER meet. Lastly, there are a couple of contemporaries whose work I really respect – Greg Rucka, Geoff Johns, Ed Brubaker. Greg, as we may have mentioned, is a close friend - he was my college roommate. So I knew him before he became a role-model. Geoff and Ed are both really easy-going, nice guys. So, so far, the pros I respect have been really easy to deal with.
Iceman: How did you land that comic deal with the big one?
CW: We met C.B. Cebulski at the San Diego Con. He'd read SKINWALKER and was willing to read some pitches from us. We discussed a Nightcrawler idea with him that actually never went anywhere. But a month or so later he called us to ask if we'd have any interest in pitching a take on NEW MUTANTS. Apparently Bill Jemas had just read Skinwalker and liked it and wanted to work with us. So we did up a proposal for New Mutants and the rest, as they say, is history.
Iceman: What would be something you did before you joined the Comic Industry some of us could remember?
ND: We worked on ARLISS, the HBO series about the sports agent. We were on staff for two seasons and "wrote" eight episodes. A lot of what made the screen with our name on it was severely re-written by Robert Wuhl - he controlled every aspect of that show and rewrote all the scripts - but some of the jokes in there are still ours.
Iceman: If you weren't a comic creator, what WOULD you be doing right now?
CW: Answering phones. Sad but true. The film and TV side of things is a little dry at the moment. But if you're asking what would I be doing if I weren’t a writer, I have absolutely no clue. I can't imagine doing anything else.
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