Once Upon A Time...
Why chicks dig author Neil Gaiman.
      by Tara O'Shea

Tactical-dracula.com presents Gaiman with a donation of $2250 for the CBLDF in Chicago. Photo © Barrett McGivney

In addition to his work in comics, Gaiman co-authored Good Omens, a wickedly funny novel about the Apocalypse with best selling British author (and genius) Terry Pratchett, the film version of which is finally looking to be a reality (and won't suck) now that former Python animator Terry Gilliam has signed on to direct. Working with renowned artist Charles Vess, he wrote a Victorian fairy tale for adults called Stardust, the illustrated version of which was published by DC Comics, and a novel with no pictures published by Avon Books. When asked which version he thinks of as the "real" Stardust, Gaiman says that it's definitely the illustrated book. For television, he penned six episode dark fantasy series Neverwhere and adapted the teleplays into a solidly entertaining novel that follows the exploits of Richard Mayhew (played by Gary Bakewell, best known for looking exactly like a young Paul McCartney in Backbeat) a mundane Londoner who rescues a mysterious girl and is plunged into a strange and terrifying London below London. In a quirky twist, the novel was optioned by Jim Henson films and is currently in pre-production. He's written dozens of short stories and poems, and was approached by Miramax to draft the English language screenplay for Miyazaki Hayao's masterpiece Princess Mononoke. "My job was to take the literal Japanese translation," he told Locus in an April 1999 interview, "and turn it into lines of dialogue that didn't sound like Saturday morning animation. It's astonishing, like Star Wars set in a 14th-century Japanese forest."

The success of Mononoke has given Gaiman even more street cred in Hollywood, and Warner Bros. is currently waiting for him to complete the screenplay adaptation of Death: The High Cost of Living, in which Dream's sister Death is human and mortal for 24 hours and has adventures and eats hot dogs. The plan has always been for him to adapt the comic and then direct it, to ensure that the story he wants to tell makes it up on screen intact. "It's a small, character-driven film, that is not star-driven, and is not effects-driven. It's plot-driven," Gaiman informed the audience of the New York Last Angel reading October 18th. "When I began talking to Village Roadshow, I said, 'Look, one of the reasons I want to do this is, it's not intimidating. It's a small film, and it should be a small film in order to work. And it should be a small, cool film that people tell their friends about.'" He also noted that the plot of the comic will be expanded, because "if you took [the comic] and made a film out of it, you'd have a fairly cool 40-minute film. So it needs to grow."

The first stop of the Last Angel tour to benefit the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund kicked off October 16th with a cocktail party for premium ticket holders and members of the CBLDF. It was held in the bar area on the second floor of the Vic Theatre -- the "Brew and View" to locals -- in Chicago's ultra-trendy Lakeview neighborhood best known for the number of Kool-Aid colored hair-dos and body piercings that can be spotted any day of the week. CBLDF chairman Chris Orr was on hand to thank everyone effusively and repeatedly for their support, and beg them to partake of the six foot subs. Patrons gathered around Neil in a circle, and chatted, asked questions, and occasionally asked for autographs or gave him small gifts such as books. CBLDF volunteers Darrian and Sheila worked the crowd, trying to make certain that everyone had a chance to talk with Neil before the party ended. Having traveled from Syracuse, New York to attend the reading, Darrian and Sheila were also the winners of an eBay auction that featured not just VIP tickets to the cocktail party, but dinner with Neil the previous evening.

How would you feel about life if Death were your older sister?

There to introduce Neil was Chicago artist Jill Thompson, who had illustrated Brief Lives, one of the most popular Sandman arcs, and writer/artist of the Scary Godmother series of comics and children's books. As the lights dimmed, the audience was treated to a variety of short stories, poems, essays, Christmas Cards, a children's book called The Wolves In The Walls currently being illustrated by renowned artist Dave McKean. One of the surprise hits of the evening was a lovely prayer he wrote for friend Tori Amos' then-unborn child (Natashya Lórien was born September 5th) whom mother lovingly called in her final two trimesters "The Blueberry."

After the intermission, questions cards were collected from the audience for a question and answer session. Neil covered such territory as his purported feud with J.K. Rowling (a rumor begun by a Scottish tabloid that has no basis in fact) over the similarities between young bespectacled English wizard Harry Potter and young bespectacled English wizard Tim Hunter of Books of Magic. For the record, he made it quite clear that he does not believe Rowling was even aware of Tim Hunter, and that, as Terry Pratchett had always told him, everyone always has all the same ideas anyway. After much pestering, he also worked his dead-on Harlan Ellison impression into an anecdote about the short story he and legendary SF author Ellison are meant to be collaborating on that was begun at Mad Media in 1998 and has yet ever to be finished. Other impressions during the Q&A included William Shatner (who had apparently believed his fellow Guest of Honor at a South American convention was Neil Diamond, and not Neil Gaiman), and singer Lou Reed (who had been understandably upset when Neil had been very, very late for dinner with him because when they had told him he was meant to be having dinner with Lou Reed, Neil thought they were kidding).

The last reading of the night was a chapter of American Gods, the first draft of which clocks in a 175,000 words. "Now I'm gonna read you this," Gaiman said as he plunked the phone-book sized manuscript down on the podium and was of course met with cheers rather than the groans he no doubt had expected. "You are sad, sick people," he observed wryly before spinning a yarn about a Cornishwoman transported to the United States who brought the piskies with her in her stories and her heart and ways, and I don't doubt saucers of milk were set out on window sills and porches by many folks who had probably never heard of piskies before that night.

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